  Recent technological changes have increased connectivity between individuals
around the world leading to higher frequency interactions between members of
communities that would be otherwise distant and disconnected. This paper
examines a model of opinion dynamics in interacting communities and studies how
increasing interaction frequency affects the ability for communities to retain
distinct identities versus falling into consensus or polarized states in which
community identity is lost. We also study the effect (if any) of opinion noise
related to a tendency for individuals to assert their individuality in
homogenous populations. Our work builds on a model we developed previously [11]
where the dynamics of opinion change is based on individual interactions that
seek to minimize some energy potential based on the differences between
opinions across the population.
