SCWIR: A rumor propagation model considering user waiting behavior

Abstract The rapid development of the Internet has brought convenience to people in accessing information, but it has also exacerbated the spread of rumors. Therefore, it becomes crucial to study the propagation patterns of rumors and devise corresponding suppression strategies. In the study of rumor propagation, the existing rumor propagation model studies have not fully considered the neutral wait-and-see population, nor have they taken into account the possibility of users waking up midway after believing in the rumor to wait and see for a second time. To address the above shortcomings, this paper established the SCWIR (Susceptible, Commented, Waited, Infected, Recovered) rumor propagation model, which introduced the Commenter (Commented, C) and the Waited (Waited, W) to better model users' positions of commenting and neutral waiting in rumor events. Based on the proposed model, this paper investigated the transformation process of five types of users, namely susceptible users, commenters, waiting users, spreaders, and recovery users, under the influence of government intervention, higher education coverage rate, and information timeliness; and conducted simulation experiments to verify the validity of the proposed model. The research results show that the model proposed in this paper can better reflect the possible behaviors of users such as commenting on rumors, neutral waiting, and spreading rumors during the rumor-spreading process. It achieves good performance in predicting the peak periods of rumor outbreaks, the peak value of outbreaks, the lifecycle of rumors, and the changing proportions of various members over time.