We study the effects of discrete, randomly distributed time delays on the
dynamics of a coupled system of self-propelling particles. Bifurcation analysis
on a mean field approximation of the system reveals that the system possesses
patterns with certain universal characteristics that depend on distinguished
moments of the time delay distribution. Specifically, we show both
theoretically and numerically that although bifurcations of simple patterns,
such as translations, change stability only as a function of the first moment
of the time delay distribution, more complex patterns arising from Hopf
bifurcations depend on all of the moments