Impact of asymmetric activity on interactions between information diffusion and disease transmission in multiplex networks

Disease is a serious threat to human society. Understanding the characteristics of disease transmission is helpful for people to effectively control disease. In real life, it is natural to take various measures when people are aware of disease. In this paper, a novel coupled model considering asymmetric activity is proposed to describe the interactions between information diffusion and disease transmission in multiplex networks. Then, the critical threshold for disease transmission is derived by using the micro-Markov chain method. Finally, the theoretical results are verified by numerical simulations. The results show that reducing the activity level of individuals in the physical contact layer will have a continuous impact on reducing the disease outbreak threshold and suppressing the disease. In addition, the activity level of individuals in the virtual network has little impact on the transmission of the disease. Meanwhile, when individuals are aware of more disease-related information, the higher their awareness of prevention will be, which can effectively inhibit the transmission of disease. Our research results can provide a useful reference for the control of disease transmission.