Reinforcement Learning Dynamics of Network Vaccination and Hysteresis: A Double-Edged Sword for Addressing Vaccine Hesitancy

Abstract: Mass vaccination remains a long-lasting challenge for disease control and prevention with upticks in vaccine hesitancy worldwide. Here, we introduce an experience-based learning (Q-learning) dynamics model of vaccination behavior in social networks, where agents choose whether or not to vaccinate given environmental feedbacks from their local neighborhood. We focus on how bounded rationality of individuals impacts decision-making of irrational agents in networks. Additionally, we observe hysteresis behavior and bistability with respect to vaccination cost and the Q-learning hyperparameters such as discount rate. Our results offer insight into the complexities of Q-learning and particularly how foresightedness of individuals will help mitigate - or conversely deteriorate, therefore acting as a double-edged sword - collective action problems in important contexts like vaccination. We also find a diversification of uptake choices, with individuals evolving into complete opt-in vs. complete opt-out. Our results have real-world implications for targeting the persistence of vaccine hesitancy using an interdisciplinary computational social science approach integrating social networks, game theory, and learning dynamics.