Computational analysis of drug addiction epidemiology by integrating molecular mapping and social media signals

How are users’ experiences of production, sharing, and interaction with the media they create mediated by the interfaces of particular social media platforms? How can we use computational analysis and visualizations of the content of visual social media (e.g., user photos, as opposed to upload dates, locations, tags and other metadata) to study social and cultural patterns? How can we visualize this media on multiple spatial and temporal scales? In this paper, we examine these questions through the analysis of the popular mobile photo–sharing application Instagram. First, we analyze the affordances provided by the Instagram interface and the ways this interface and the application’s tools structure users’ understanding and use of the “Instagram medium.” Next, we compare the visual signatures of 13 different global cities using 2.3 million Instagram photos from these cities. Finally, we use spatio–temporal visualizations of over 200,000 Instagram photos uploaded in Tel Aviv, Israel over three months to show how they can offer social, cultural and political insights about people’s activities in particular locations and time periods.

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Black Trolls Matter: Racial and Ideological Asymmetries in Social Media Disinformation

Social Science Computer Review ◽

10.1177/0894439320914853 ◽

2020 ◽

pp. 089443932091485 ◽

Cited By ~ 1

Author(s):

Deen Freelon ◽

Michael Bossetta ◽

Chris Wells ◽

Josephine Lukito ◽

Yiping Xia ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Social Media ◽

Computational Analysis ◽

Preliminary Evidence ◽

Internet Research ◽

The Internet ◽

Russian Government ◽

Social Scientists ◽

Substantial Role ◽

General Relevance ◽

Black Activist

The recent rise of disinformation and propaganda on social media has attracted strong interest from social scientists. Research on the topic has repeatedly observed ideological asymmetries in disinformation content and reception, wherein conservatives are more likely to view, redistribute, and believe such content. However, preliminary evidence has suggested that race may also play a substantial role in determining the targeting and consumption of disinformation content. Such racial asymmetries may exist alongside, or even instead of, ideological ones. Our computational analysis of 5.2 million tweets by the Russian government-funded “troll farm” known as the Internet Research Agency sheds light on these possibilities. We find stark differences in the numbers of unique accounts and tweets originating from ostensibly liberal, conservative, and Black left-leaning individuals. But diverging from prior empirical accounts, we find racial presentation—specifically, presenting as a Black activist—to be the most effective predictor of disinformation engagement by far. Importantly, these results could only be detected once we disaggregated Black-presenting accounts from non-Black liberal accounts. In addition to its contributions to the study of ideological asymmetry in disinformation content and reception, this study also underscores the general relevance of race to disinformation studies.

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A Computational Analysis of the Language of Drug Addiction

10.18653/v1/e17-2022 ◽

2017 ◽

Cited By ~ 1

Author(s):

Carlo Strapparava ◽

Rada Mihalcea

Keyword(s):

Drug Addiction ◽

Computational Analysis

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‘Peace with a Woman’s Face’: Women, Social Media and the Colombian Peace Process

Contexto Internacional ◽

10.1590/s0102-8529.2019420300001 ◽

2020 ◽

Vol 42 (3) ◽

pp. 515-538

Author(s):

Alexis Henshaw

Keyword(s):

Social Media ◽

International Relations ◽

Computational Analysis ◽

Close Reading ◽

Men And Women ◽

Mixed Methods Approach ◽

Peace Processes ◽

Peace And Security ◽

Growing Body

Abstract The idea that men and women approach conflict resolution differently forms the backbone of the international agenda on Women, Peace, and Security (WPS) and is supported by a growing body of scholarship in international relations. However, the role of women who represent insurgent groups in peace talks remains understudied, given the relatively rare appearance of such women in peace processes. The present study examines how men and women from the negotiating team of the Revolutionary Armed Forced of Colombia (FARC) engaged in public-facing discourse on Twitter leading up to a referendum on the peace accords in 2016. Using a mixed-methods approach that includes computational analysis and a close reading of social media posts, I demonstrate that women in the FARC’s negotiating team were more successful social media users than their male counterparts and that they offered a distinct contribution to the discourse on peace, centring the relevance of gender and promoting issue linkages like the need to address LGBTI rights.

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