Does the public discuss other topics on climate change than researchers? A comparison of explorative networks based on author keywords and hashtags

Twitter accounts have already been used in many scientometric studies, but the meaningfulness of the data for societal impact measurements in research evaluation has been questioned. Earlier research focused on social media counts and neglected the interactive nature of the data. We explore a new network approach based on Twitter data in which we compare author keywords to hashtags as indicators of topics. We analyze the topics of tweeted publications and compare them with the topics of all publications (tweeted and not tweeted). Our exploratory study is based on a comprehensive publication set of climate change research. We are interested in whether Twitter data are able to reveal topics of public discussions which can be separated from research-focused topics. We find that the most tweeted topics regarding climate change research focus on the consequences of climate change for humans. Twitter users are interested in climate change publications which forecast effects of a changing climate on the environment and to adaptation, mitigation and management issues rather than in the methodology of climate-change research and causes of climate change. Our results indicate that publications using scientific jargon are less likely to be tweeted than publications using more general keywords. Twitter networks seem to be able to visualize public discussions about specific topics.     

Twitter Use During TV: A Full-Season Analysis of #serviziopubblico Hashtag

Several recent reports pointed out how the practice of using a “second screen” while following a television program is becoming an increasingly widespread phenomenon. When the secondary device is used to read or to comment about a watched program, most of the discussion takes place on popular social media such as Facebook and Twitter. Previous research has shown that the analysis of these contents could lead to a better understanding of the behavior of networked publics and of the structure of the show itself. Nevertheless most of the existing research is focused on the content only and focused on a single episode analysis or on big media events. Leveraging this background, this article presents instead a study focused on the relationships between content and users across an entire airing season of a TV program. Through a quantitative network analysis of the tweets produced during 25 episodes of the Italian political talks show Servizio Pubblico, we identified a small loyal group of viewers. Despite the differences in quantity of content produced, the loyal viewers do not show any sign of forming a community-like structure. We also performed a qualitative analysis of the tweets produced during one specific episode and discussed the elements of the TV show that generated the higher level of engagement on Twitter.     

Tweeting the Viewer—Use of Twitter in a Talk Show Context

Twitter is currently one of the most popular outlets of so-called social media, Internet services that allow their users to communicate and share content in a variety of ways. As with the Internet itself, Twitter has been heralded to hold interesting possibilities within the context of journalism—potentially bringing journalists and their respective audiences closer to each other through supposedly common Twitter practices like @ messages and retweeting. This article presents a large-scale empirical study on Twitter use in the journalistic context. The aim is to assess patterns of journalist-audience interaction on Twitter. Specifically, the article outlines a structural analysis of Twitter use pertaining to the first season of the current events talk show Hübinette, which aired on Swedish public service television during the fall of 2011. Employing state-of-the-art approaches for data collection and analysis, the article shows that while traditional patterns of journalist-reader relationships are most common, some users are employing the Twitter platform in somewhat unforeseen ways.     

Tweeting Apart: Applying Network Analysis to Detect Selective Exposure Clusters in Twitter

Twitter users see content mostly from the other users they select to follow. Networks of connected users on Twitter define the set of content to which each user is exposed. We developed a Selective Exposure Cluster (SEC) method to study these connected networks and their discussion patterns in Twitter. To illustrate the SEC method, we collected networks of connections among users who talked about a shared topic: the U.S. President's State of the Union speech in 2012. Cluster analysis was applied to identify subgroups of users who were densely interconnected. These users followed users from their own cluster more than they connected to users in other clusters. In each cluster, the primary distributors of information—the hub users—were identified, along with the hashtags, hyperlinks, and top-mentioned usernames in the content of the messages. Each of these indicators was labeled in terms of its political orientation. An analysis of the resulting patterns of selective exposure suggests that users participate in fragmented interactions and form divided groups in which people tune in to a narrow segment of the wider range of politically oriented information sources. We discuss the strengths and weaknesses of the proposed Selective Exposure Cluster method.     

Something Old,Something New,Something Borrowed From Something Blue: Experiments on Dual Viewing TV and Twitter

The use of second screens to dual-view television and social media is exponentially increasing. As a result, television producers are increasingly augmenting television content with social media comments from viewers, which may serve as a type of real-time public opinion indicator. The current research effort utilizes two experimental studies to explore the effects of this new media production practice on viewer's attitudes and opinions. In these studies, a Twitter feed was integrated in to entertainment (Study 1) and political (Study 2) television broadcasts and manipulated to convey either positive or negative opinions of the content. Participants' opinions were found to conform to the majority opinion presented in the manipulated Twitter feed in nearly all of the analyses. Implications for dual viewing and second screen use are discussed in light of findings.     

Can social media increase government responsiveness? A case study of Seoul,Korea

Despite the expectation that social media use in the public sector contributes to enhancing government responsiveness to citizens, few empirical studies exist on whether social media use actually leads to more responsive public administration in practice and how social media are used by governments to build citizen-centric governance. The purpose of this study is to examine what roles are played by mayors and public officials in social media networks to increase government responsiveness. Thus, we adopt social network analysis (SNA) to the Twitter network of public services as well as carry out a case study on interactions among the mayor, local government, and citizens via Twitter in Seoul, Korea. The research findings show that the mayor of Seoul plays the most important role as a bridging hub in the Twitter network. Specifically, the mayor serves as a bridge between different clusters of citizens and public officials as well as a hub for the most connected users in the network. The mayor's role as a bridging hub in the Twitter network contributes to enhancing government responsiveness by making possible to overcome the disconnection between citizens and the local government, and information asymmetry among the mayor, public officials, and citizens.     

From Silence to #WhyIStayed: Locating Our Stories and Finding Our Voices

Domestic violence is a serious public health issue in the United States. In the digital age, social media platforms like Twitter provide users with the opportunity to anonymously share short, 140-character narratives. Following the Ray Rice domestic violence scandal, thousands of women took to Twitter to share their abuse stories using the hashtag #WhyIStayed. Building on existing domestic violence research, we conduct what is, to our knowledge, the first assessment of women utilizing Twitter to share their lived experiences with abusive relationships and reasons for staying. Findings revealed four themes: (lack of) resources, responsibility for abuse, fear, and gender-linked power. The results suggest that Twitter functions as a space where women can share lived experiences about domestic violence, which then fosters discussion about a stigmatized topic. Thus, Twitter functions as a connective mechanism where women can understand the lived experiences of domestic violence and access a large community where information and support can be exchanged.     

Elite Interaction

While a good deal of research has examined the uses of Twitter in journalism, comparably few research projects employ comparative research designs in order to provide new insights. The present study details Twitter use by public service broadcasters (PSBs) during recent national elections in Norway and Sweden. Utilizing quantitative analysis of social media content in tandem with qualitative interviews with key PSB journalists, the main results indicate that while the PSB organizations—the Norwegian NRK and the Swedish SVT—are both frequently contacted by “regular” citizens on Twitter, they seem to prefer to retweet and interact with journalists, politicians or other “elite” users. Compared with the interviews performed, the study uncovers an interesting tension as journalists often talk about the need to engage with “regular” users—a practice that is arguably in line with PSB regulations, but that is seldom adhered to in the contexts studied here.     

Can twitter analytics predict election outcome? An insight from 2017 Punjab assembly elections

Since the beginning of this decade, there has seen an exponential growth in number of internet users using social media, especially Twitter for sharing their views on various topics of common interest like sports, products, politics etc. Due to the active participation of large number of people on Twitter, huge amount of data (i.e. big data) is being generated, which can be put to use (after refining) to analyze real world problems. This paper takes into consideration the Twitter data related to the 2017 Punjab (a state of India) assembly elections and applies different social media analytic techniques on collected tweets to extract and unearth hidden but useful information. In addition to this, we have employed machine learning algorithm to perform polarity analysis and have proposed a new seat forecasting method to accurately predict the number of seats that a political party is likely to win in the elections. Our results confirmed that Indian National Congress was likely to emerge winner and that in fact was the outcome, when results got declared.     

#SocialJournalism: Local News Media on Twitter

A content analysis of 4,507 tweets from 60 local news organizations in the United States was conducted to examine Twitter strategies used by the local news industry. Results indicate that local news organizations in the United States mainly used Twitter as an additional platform for news dissemination. While local TV stations and newspapers differed significantly in their use of tweet structures, content, and strategies, both followed the similar practices of their traditional media portals. In addition, the number of followers and total tweets of a news organization’s Twitter account, use of photos, hashtags, usernames, and tweet content predicted audience engagement with the site. Overall, local news organizations in the United States did not appear to use Twitter to cross-promote and/or supplement their traditional business practices. This research calls for more systematic, multi-dimensional social media management in local newsrooms.     

Capricious opinions: A study of polarization of social media groups

Experts claim that the world is increasingly polarized by emerging social media platforms. The political actors amplify the polarization through their agents' user-generated content. The extreme political ideologies sway the people sitting on the fence on these social media platforms. Using tweets on a recent policy change on identity in India, the present study seeks to perform a scientific analysis of the polarization of the debates within ordinary citizens' groups from a theoretical lens. We further highlight some of the crucial trends that triggered these polarized discussions in general. Through the lens of Echo chambers and Herd behavior, this study provides valuable insights surrounding the influencers and individuals involved in this discussion where the polarization of preferences is witnessed. Proposing a novel design of a root-level influencer, this study establishes them as polarization actors on a social media platform (Twitter). Through various engagement metrics, we also identify the role of targeted communication (hashtags) and similarity in the users' discussion across the political domain as potential behavioral explanations for opinion polarization on Twitter.     

TweetStorm in #ferguson: How News Organizations Framed Dominant Authority,Anti-Authority,and Political Figures in a Restive Community

After Officer Darren Wilson fatally shot African American teen Michael Brown in August 2014, rioters unleashed their anger on the streets of Ferguson, Missouri. Using content analysis and framing theory, this study analyzed how news organizations covered events in Ferguson on Twitter over the course of a month immediately following the shooting. Protesters were framed as troublemakers; but community leaders were not framed as “rabble-rousers.” Journalists continued to rely on official sources more than alternate sources in spite of criticism of law enforcement and other political elites, but nearly 10% of the coded tweets that relied on official sources included some element of skepticism. Tweets from cable news outlets did not show partisan bias in any significant amount; and traditional legacy news media sources utilized the Twitter platform enhancements—such as article links, photos, links to other content, or hashtags—more than their new digital media counterparts. As Twitter launched #ferguson into the national consciousness, it is quite plausible that the framing of the tweets by news agencies may have molded perceptions of larger issues about the racial health of the nation, established policies of law enforcement, and the challenge of elected leaders to resolve explosive domestic problems.     

An artist ranking system based on social media mining

Currently users on social media post their opinion and feelings about almost everything. This online behavior has led to numerous applications where social media data are used to measure public opinion in a similar way as a poll or a survey. In this paper, we will present an application of social media mining for the art market. To the best of our knowledge, this will be the first attempt to mine social media to extract quantitative and qualitative data for the art market. Although there are previous works on analyzing and predicting other markets, these methodologies cannot be applied directly to the art market. In our proposed methodology, artists will be treated as brands. That is, we will mine Twitter posts that mention specific artists’ names and attempt to rank artists in a similar manner as brand equity and awareness would be measured. The particularities of the art market are considered mainly in the construction of a topic-specific user network where user expertise and influence is evaluated and later used to rank artists. The proposed ranking system is evaluated against two other available systems to identify the advantages it can offer.     

Informal networking in the public sector: Mapping local government debates in a period of austerity

Studies in digital government research have not sufficiently considered the internal networking aspects of social media beyond interactions with the public. This article examines the function of social media as informal networks of professional practice within the public sector. The empirical study is based on a longitudinal analysis of the Twitter hashtag community #localgov used by British local government actors (dataset of 235,681 tweets posted within 2013–2015). In a period of significant budget reductions, Twitter conversations involved a wide range of responses about the impact of the cuts and future of services. #Localgov shows high level of cross-service exchanges in the institutional sharing of good practice while the dynamics of interaction reflect the traditional landscape of intergovernmental relationships in England. We argue about the importance and characteristics of hashtag communities like #localgov as spaces that bring together different actors with a public sector interest.     

News audience fragmentation in the Japanese Twittersphere

ABSTRACT

Although computational approaches to ideology-based audience fragmentation are promising, they are not without limitations. First, most existing studies have focused on the US, and the cross-national validity of their results has rarely been tested. Second, previous studies that rely solely on behavioral data from social media tend to make strong analytical assumptions such as that Twitter users prefer to follow media and politicians whose ideological positions are similar to their own, and that the ideologies of political elites can be extrapolated to infer the ideologies of ordinary users. We aim to address these limitations. First, we focus on Japan to test the generalizability of US findings in an Asian context. Second, we do not rely solely on behavioral measurement but combine survey and social media data to infer the ideologies of Twitter users. Results indicate that our classifier built based on these self-reported ideologies produces more valid estimates than naïve extrapolation from views of the elites. Based on these improved estimates of Twitter users’ ideologies, we demonstrate that the ideological distributions of those who follow major Japanese media accounts on Twitter largely overlap, suggesting an absence of ideology-based audience fragmentation.     

Maintaining neutrality: A sentiment analysis of police agency Facebook pages before and after a fatal officer-involved shooting of a citizen

Increased attention to and scrutiny of fatal police shootings across the U.S. is often credited to the rise of social media sites such as Facebook and Twitter, which provide a platform for citizens to publicly engage with police agencies. On its face, this type of citizen engagement appears to realize the promise of social media in the public sector to increase agency accountability, transparency, and legitimacy. However, research suggests that police agencies primarily use social media as a way to manage their public image, rather than for citizen engagement. In addition, the degree to which citizens use social media to hold police agencies accountable is unclear. We examined both sides by analyzing the emotional tone (sentiment) of over 350,000 police agency Facebook posts and user comments after a fatal officer-involved shooting of a citizen in 2016. On average, police agency posts were decidedly neutral in tone and did not change in the post-shooting time period, suggesting they did not post more positive content after the shooting in an attempt to bolster their public image. While user comments were more negative compared to pre-shooting levels, on average, the magnitude of the change was small, essentially neutral, and increased almost to pre-shooting levels very quickly. We also found small differences in user comment sentiment based on the race and armed status of the victim, but not in the expected direction. The findings provide evidence about how police agencies and users react to a police shooting on Facebook and raises critical questions about the ability of social media to serve as a meaningful tool for citizen engagement and accountability.     

#NotOkay: Stories of sexual assault in the midst of the 2016 U.S. presidential election

Sexual assault affects hundreds of thousands of Americans each year. Social media platforms such as Twitter allow users to anonymously share 140-character messages that serve to convey information and foster a supportive community. Following the release of a 2005 video that captured then Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump bragging in vulgar terms about kissing, groping, and trying to have sex with women, women took to Twitter to share their personal stories of sexual assault using the hashtag #NotOkay. The present study examines 1,091 tweets from women who shared their lived experiences with sexual assault. Findings revealed four themes: characteristics of sexual assault, relationship to perpetrator, public vs. private locations, and action and consequence. The results highlight Twitter as a venue for women to share their lived experiences with sexual assault.     

Examining government cross-platform engagement in social media: Instagram vs Twitter and the big lift project

As governments are increasingly turning to social media as a means of engaging the public, questions remain as to how they are actually using various social media platforms. Do specific platforms engender specific types of messages? If so, what are they, and how do they affect civic engagement, co-participation, and address citizen concerns? In this paper, we compare the use of Instagram and Twitter by ‘The Big Lift’, a bridge re-decking project completed by Halifax Harbour Bridges. Based on a content analysis of Instagram (n = 248) and Twitter (n = 1278) public posts, we found that Instagram was used as a more ‘informal’ narrative platform that promoted a clicktivist type of responses from the audience, whereas Twitter was a more ‘formal’ news platform that supported greater two-way communication between the organization and the audience. We conclude that by building and maintaining their active presence and following base on social media, and especially on Twitter, organizations can develop a capacity to address social concerns during disruptive events or infrastructure projects like ‘The Big Lift’.     

Comparing Disaster News on Twitter and Television: an Intermedia Agenda Setting Perspective

Intermedia agenda setting predicts a high degree of convergence between news media agendas. However, the rise of social media forces a re-examination of this expectation. Using the 8.8-earthquake of February 27, 2010 in Chile as a case study, this article compares which topics were covered by professional journalists on broadcast news and Twitter, analyzing both cross-sectional and longitudinal trends. A positive, reinforcing influence was found among the journalistic agendas of TV and Twitter. However, counter to the idea that social media are echo chambers of traditional media, it was found that Twitter influences TV news more so than the other way around. Thus, the study provides an early lens into the agenda setting function of social media among television news professionals, and its findings are consistent with Twitter succeeding among journalists due to its provision of valuable information.     

Understanding government social media users: an analysis of interactions on Immigration,Refugees and Citizenship Canada Twitter and Facebook

Social media is being adopted at a rapid pace by governments around world and across different levels of government. In Canada, federal, provincial and municipal governments created social media accounts in 2000s and are now using them to interact with the public. Studies to date, however, focus primarily on social media strategies and practices of government agencies while government social media users' behaviors and perspectives remain understudied. This study analyzes experiences of government social media users and how they interact on Twitter and Facebook accounts maintained by a Canadian federal government agency – Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada (IRCC). It also explores why users chose to interact on social media as well as their perspectives. The findings suggest that Canadian immigration agencies are using social media as a customer services tool, and migrant social media users are turning to government social media to hear directly from the government agencies and are expecting personalized answers.