People of opposing views can share common interests

In online social networks, people tend to connect with like-minded people and read agreeable information. Direct recommendation of challenging content has not worked well because users do not value diversity and avoid challenging content. In this poster, we investigate the possibility of an indirect approach by introducing intermediary topics, which are topics that are common to people having opposing views on sensitive issues, i.e., those issues that tend to divide people. Through a case study about a sensitive issue discussed in Twitter, we show that such intermediary topics exist, opening a path for future work in recommendation promoting diversity of content to be shared.