Understanding relationship overlapping on social network sites: A case study of Weibo and Douban

Nowadays people have many overlapping relationships across different social network sites. Will the communication frequency of a relationship on a focal SNS increase or decrease after the corresponding parties begin interacting with each other on a new SNS? What kinds of relationships and parties on the focal SNS are more robust to relationship overlapping across different sites? We conducted a case study on two Chinese popular social network sites (Weibo and Douban). Our results indicate that relationships' interactions on a new SNS have negative effect on the parties' communication frequency on the focal SNS. The communication frequency of older relationships on the focal SNS is more susceptible to the influence of the interacting on the new SNS, while relationships with more common groups and more extensive posts are less likely to be influenced. Our findings imply opportunities for SNS designers to strengthen their existing fragile ties and help users to build much more robust relationships.