Is it possible to reach a consensus with someone whose political opinion differs from your own? What if you both rely on social media like Facebook and Twitter for information about news and politics?

According to a new paper co-authored by Professor Janos Kertesz, head of CEU’s Department of Data and Network Science, the kinds of “echo chambers” created by online media make reaching such a consensus unlikely. Not only do people with vastly different political opinions resist change, even those with less different beliefs have trouble finding consensus between themselves.