Success-driven opinion formation determines social tensions Chica Serrano, Manuel Perc, Matjaž Santos, Francisco C. Polarization is common in politics and public opinion. It is believed to be shaped by media as well as ideologies, and often incited by misinformation. However, little is known about the microscopic dynamics behind polarization and the resulting social tensions. By coupling opinion formation with the strategy selection in different social dilemmas, we reveal how success at an individual level transforms to global consensus or lack thereof. When defection carries with it the fear of punishment in the absence of greed, as in the stag-hunt game, opinion fragmentation is the smallest. Conversely, if defection promises a higher payoff and also evokes greed, like in the prisoner’s dilemma and snowdrift game, consensus is more difficult to attain. Our research thus challenges the top-down narrative of social tensions, showing they might originate from fundamental principles at individual level, like the desire to prevail in pairwise evolutionary comparisons. 2024-05-28T10:15:55Z 2024-05-28T10:15:55Z 2024-02-16 journal article Chica, Manuel, Matjaž Perc, and Francisco C. Santos. Success-driven opinion formation determines social tensions. iScience 27 (2024), 109254 [doi:10.1016/j.isci.2024.109254] https://hdl.handle.net/10481/92154 10.1016/j.isci.2024.109254 eng http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ open access Atribución-NoComercial 4.0 Internacional Elsevier