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An agent-based modelling approach to wave-like diversification of language families

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In contrast to phylogenetic tree inference, wave model approaches are often regarded as difficult to computationally implement for inference of language relatedness. This paper proposes a basic framework for the computational modelling of wave-like diversification in language families and explains the model type of agent-based models for linguistic data. The approach is based on agent-based simulations which allow for the detailed simulation of speaker interactions within speech communities. The proposed framework operates by simulating a large number of possible diversification situations with different parameter settings and selecting those runs that yield a good fit to the linguistic data of the geographical spread of different languages. The model can be fed with the geographical extent of languages and their known innovations in order to computationally reconstruct the most likely diversification scenarios of these languages under the wave model.

Keywords: linguistic diversification, wave model, phylogenetics, agent-based models
Article outline
  • 1.Introduction
  • 2.The model
    • 2.1The test case setup
    • 2.2Model architecture
      • 2.2.1The modules of the ABM
      • 2.2.2Running and evaluation
      • 2.2.3A note on sampling algorithms for ABMs
      • 2.2.4Model selection and prior choices
  • 3.Results
    • 3.1Model comparison
    • 3.2Innovation reconstruction
    • 3.3Parameter inference
  • 4.Discussion and outlook
  • 5.Conclusion
  • Acknowledgements
  • Notes
  • Abbreviations
  • References
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