Maximizing Diversity of Opinion in Social Networks
Optimization and Control
2019-04-01 v2 Social and Information Networks
Systems and Control
Abstract
We study the problem of maximizing opinion diversity in a social network that includes opinion leaders with binary opposing opinions. The members of the network who are not leaders form their opinions using the French-DeGroot model of opinion dynamics. To quantify the diversity of such a system, we adapt two diversity measures from ecology to our setting, the Simpson Diversity Index and the Shannon Index. Using these two measures, we formalize the problem of how to place a single leader with opinion 1, given a network with a leader with opinion 0, so as to maximize the opinion diversity. We give analytical solutions to these problems for paths, cycles, and trees, and we highlight our results through a numerical example.
Keywords
Cite
@article{arxiv.1811.03706,
title = {Maximizing Diversity of Opinion in Social Networks},
author = {Erika Mackin and Stacy Patterson},
journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:1811.03706},
year = {2019}
}
Comments
9 pages, 3 figures