  In this paper, we present an empirical study of the opinion dynamics of a
large-scale sample of online social network users. We estimate opinions of
users as continuous scalars based on their subscriptions to information sources
and analyze how friendship connections affect the dynamics of these
estimations. Distinguishing between positive (toward opinions of friends) and
negative (away from opinions of friends) opinion shifts, we find that the
existence and magnitude of opinion shifts are positively related (largely
through a linear form or an inverted U-shaped form) to the degree of divergence
in opinions between user and their friends. Additionally, we moderate the
balance between positive and negative shifts using opinion divergence: if the
opinions of the focal user and their friends are too similar or dissimilar,
there is a relatively low chance of a positive shift.
