Gender Dynamics and Homophily in a Social Network of LLM Agents

Fuente: arXiv
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Hauptverfasser: Fadaei, Faezeh, Moran, Jenny Carla, Yasseri, Taha
Format: Preprint
Veröffentlicht: 2026
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author Fadaei, Faezeh
Moran, Jenny Carla
Yasseri, Taha
author_facet Fadaei, Faezeh
Moran, Jenny Carla
Yasseri, Taha
contents Generative artificial intelligence and large language models (LLMs) are increasingly deployed in interactive settings, yet we know little about how their identity performance develops when they interact within large-scale networks. We address this by examining Chirper.ai, a social media platform similar to X but composed entirely of autonomous AI chatbots. Our dataset comprises over 70,000 agents, approximately 140 million posts, and the evolving followership network over a period of one year. Based on agents' posted text, we assign weekly gender performance scores to each agent. Results suggest that each agent's gender performance is fluid rather than fixed. Despite this fluidity, the network displays strong gender-based homophily, as agents consistently follow others performing gender similarly. We investigate whether these homophilic connections arise from social selection, in which agents choose to follow similar accounts, or from social influence, in which agents become more similar to their followees over time. Consistent with human social networks, we find evidence that both mechanisms shape the structure and evolution of interactions among LLMs. Our findings suggest that, even in the absence of bodies, cultural entraining of gender performance leads to gender-based sorting. This has important implications for LLM applications in synthetic hybrid populations, social simulations, and decision support.
format Preprint
id arxiv_https___arxiv_org_abs_2602_02606
institution arXiv
publishDate 2026
record_format arxiv
spellingShingle Gender Dynamics and Homophily in a Social Network of LLM Agents
Fadaei, Faezeh
Moran, Jenny Carla
Yasseri, Taha
Social and Information Networks
Artificial Intelligence
Computers and Society
Generative artificial intelligence and large language models (LLMs) are increasingly deployed in interactive settings, yet we know little about how their identity performance develops when they interact within large-scale networks. We address this by examining Chirper.ai, a social media platform similar to X but composed entirely of autonomous AI chatbots. Our dataset comprises over 70,000 agents, approximately 140 million posts, and the evolving followership network over a period of one year. Based on agents' posted text, we assign weekly gender performance scores to each agent. Results suggest that each agent's gender performance is fluid rather than fixed. Despite this fluidity, the network displays strong gender-based homophily, as agents consistently follow others performing gender similarly. We investigate whether these homophilic connections arise from social selection, in which agents choose to follow similar accounts, or from social influence, in which agents become more similar to their followees over time. Consistent with human social networks, we find evidence that both mechanisms shape the structure and evolution of interactions among LLMs. Our findings suggest that, even in the absence of bodies, cultural entraining of gender performance leads to gender-based sorting. This has important implications for LLM applications in synthetic hybrid populations, social simulations, and decision support.
title Gender Dynamics and Homophily in a Social Network of LLM Agents
topic Social and Information Networks
Artificial Intelligence
Computers and Society
url https://arxiv.org/abs/2602.02606