Hanyang University announced that Professor Han Kyung-sik’s research team from the School of Data Science has developed HearHere, an AI-based news consumption interface designed to mitigate political polarization and enhance users’ awareness of information diversity.

HearHere is an interface that allows users to compare their news and comment consumption patterns- analyzed by AI- with opinions from progressive and conservative communities on a visualized 2D map. Through this process, users can recognize their own political positioning and are encouraged to explore and accept diverse viewpoints.

Professor Han’s team validated HearHere’s effectiveness in promoting political bias awareness through real-user experiments. They also found that changes in users’ perceptions of the importance and diversity of information consumption varied according to demographic factors, offering insights for future research directions. The technology’s excellence was recognized through winning the Best Paper Award at the 2023 Korea Software Congress, domestic patent application, and software copyright registration. The team is now advancing their research by developing HearHere Version 2 based on large language models (LLMs), aiming to further leverage AI technology in addressing social challenges.

Professor Han Kyung-sik stated, “This research demonstrates the potential of AI technology to contribute to restoring social trust and alleviating political conflict,” adding, “We will continue interdisciplinary convergence research to tackle social challenges.”

This research was supported by the Ministry of Science and ICT’s project “Establishment of a Real-Time Social Environment Monitoring and Social Simulation System Based on Big Data for Risk Management in a Hyperconnected Society” (Project No. 2018R1A5A7059549, Principal Investigator: Professor Cha Jae-hyuk). The research results have been accepted for presentation at CSCW 2024 (International Conference on Computer-Supported Cooperative Work and Social Computing). The paper, “HearHere: Mitigating Echo Chambers in News Consumption through an AI-Based Web System,” was co-authored by Kim Jae-hun (combined Master’s–Ph.D. program), Park So-hyun (Master’s program), Professor Kim Sang-wook of the Department of Computer Science, and Professor Han Kyung-sik, who served as the corresponding author.