Dynamic Theory of Communication

Communication is a dynamic and complex process. The study of human communication introduces us to a world of multiple scenarios, agents, variables and interconnections, which are important to understand. As in any scientific discipline, the compromise between abstraction and a rigorous analysis, on one hand, and the need to discuss subjects in all their complexity and deepness, on the other hand, is a difficult task, and some simplifications and shortcomings become inevitable. In the analysis of such a wide and pervasive subject as is communication, it is necessary to choose a path, to define strategies of analysis and to formulate concrete problems. In this book, communication is worked on the basis of mathematical models that deal with relations between variables of the communicational process. Centring the attention on the notion of dynamic process, techniques of intertemporal analysis and optimal control are considered with the goal of highlighting and reinforcing some of the main ideas that the communication theory has produced and explored in the last few decades.