Opinion leaders: Their role and effect on social network

• Main Author: Lee, Ning Jie
• Other Authors: Xiao Gaoxi
• Format: Final Year Project
• Language: English
• Published: 2015
• Subjects: DRNTU::Engineering::Electrical and electronic engineering
• Online Access: http://hdl.handle.net/10356/64691
• Institution: Nanyang Technological University

Opinions are formed continuously in our daily life, when we hear a news broadcast, when we hear an opinion of other, when we met a new person and under many scenarios. Consciously or sub-consciously, humans form their own opinion on everything, even while on neutral grounds, it can be considered as a form of opinion of being in the middle of two extremes. In recent decades, the topic of opinion dynamics has garnered more interest among scientist, researcher and mathematician to gain more insights of opinions formation, transmission and it led to the findings of various opinion dynamics models. Theories used in conjunction with mathematic tools and software programming form these models which give insights to how opinions behave or change over time. These models can be applicable to a wide variety of application, for example political sciences and social networks. A better understanding of opinions can be valuable in these cases as different opinions could lead to a different resulting opinions over time. In this project, the various opinion dynamic models will be studied and a model will be chosen to for the research. Matlab will be used for simulations of results with the objective of exploring the impact of Opinions Leader in a social network.