Algorithm can create a bridge between Clinton and Trump supporters

A growing number of people have expressed their concern about high levels of polarization in the society. For instance, the World Economic Forum’s report on global risks lists the increasing societal polarization as a threat – and others have suggested that social media might be contributing to this phenomenon. The article that received the best student-paper award in the Tenth International Conference on Web Search and Data Mining (WSDM 2017) builds algorithmic techniques to mitigate the rising polarization by connecting people with opposing views – and evaluates them on Twitter.