Measuring affective polarization of online topic-based communities: a computational study on collective anxiety of Weibo (Preprint)

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Yi Yang ◽  
Na Ta ◽  
Kaiyu Li ◽  
Fang Jiao
Keyword(s):  
Social Media ◽  
Computational Model ◽  
Public Interest ◽  
Computational Study ◽  
Community Members ◽  
Individual Level ◽  
Personal Influence ◽  
Conflicting Information ◽  
Nature Of Information ◽  
Personal Accounts

BACKGROUND The emergence of social media highlights the decentralized nature of information, which means people can be prone to uncertainty and be affectively polarized. A wealth of research around online affective polarization has focused on quantifying anxiety at an individual level, while neglecting that on a collective basis. To address this gap, the manner in which the anxiety of topic-based communities on social media polarizes warrants further examination. OBJECTIVE This study aims to gauge the origin and fluctuation in the collective anxiety of topic-based communities on Weibo, and also investigates its correlations with topic characteristics and users’ personal influence. METHODS In this paper, researchers proposed a computational model based on neural networks to assess the collective anxiety score of Weibo topic-based communities. The empirical study was based on 200 communities with 403,380 personal accounts and 358,260 messages. RESULTS With demonstrated effectiveness of our computational model (85.00% precision and 87.00% recall), we found correlations between the collective anxiety level and the extent to which a certain topic involves public interest, as well as how community members interpret and elaborate the topics on social network platforms. Furthermore, the ratio of influencers might impact anxiety polarization of topic-based communities by setting tones and leading the trends within their groups. More specifically, how close a certain topic is to public interest and people’s conflicting perceptions are responsible for increases of this collective anxiety, while the number of influencers engaged accounts for the decline of its increment. CONCLUSIONS This paper examines the manner in which the anxiety of topic-based communities on Weibo platform polarizes. We found the collective anxiety to augment due to topic proximities to public interest and members’ lack of declarative knowledge on topics, while to decline with an increasing portion of online influencers. These findings indicate that anxiety is induced due to a lack of credibility. Also, the amount of conflicting information shared by different people places them in a state of flux. Therefore, a community with more influencers may be more likely to experience anxiety polarization, bringing forth the issue of layered information and inequality.

scholarly journals Influential Factors on Collective Anxiety of Online Topic-Based Communities

2021 ◽  
Vol 12 ◽  
Author(s):  
Yi Yang ◽  
Na Ta ◽  
Kaiyu Li ◽  
Fang Jiao ◽  
Baijing Hu ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Public Interest ◽  
Influential Factors ◽  
Declarative Knowledge ◽  
Community Members ◽  
Community Size ◽  
Individual Level ◽  
The Public ◽  
Conflicting Information ◽  
Anxiety Levels ◽  
Personal Accounts

Background: Under the uncertainty led by the decentralized information on social media, people seek homogeneity in either opinions or affection to establish group identity to better understand the information. This also means they are easily polarized, not only ideologically but also in their actions. Affective polarization is the emotional tendency for people to show animosity toward opposing partisans while seeking homogeneity from fellow partisans. Much research into online affective polarization has focused on quantifying anxiety at an individual level while neglecting that on a collective basis. Therefore, this paper examined the polarization of collective anxiety in topic-based communities on Weibo.Methods: We aim to interpret correlations between collective anxiety online and topic characteristics, user competence, as well as the proportion of influencers of Weibo topic-based communities. Our neural networks model and statistical analysis were based on 200 communities with 403,380 personal accounts and 1,012,830 messages.Results: Collective anxiety levels are correlated to (1) the extent to which a topic captures public interest, (2) how community members articulate topics on social network platforms, and (3) the ratio of influencers in the community. Specifically, people’s conflicting perceptions and articulations of topics might increase collective anxiety, while the extent to which a topic is of the public interest and the number of influencers engaged in a topic account for any decline in its ranking. Furthermore, familiarity with a topic does not help predict collective anxiety levels. There are no significant links between community size or interactivity dynamics and the level of collective anxiety in the topic-based community. Our computational model has 85.00% precision and 87.00% recall.Conclusion: This study found the collective anxiety augment due to topic proximities to public interest and members’ lack of declarative knowledge on topics, while to decline with an increasing portion of online influencers. These findings indicate that collective anxiety is induced due to a lack of credibility. Also, the amount of conflicting information shared by different people places them in a state of flux. Therefore, a community with more influencers may be more likely to experience anxiety polarization, bringing forth the issue of layered information and inequality.

Avenues to News and Diverse News Exposure Online: Comparing Direct Navigation, Social Media, News Aggregators, Search Queries, and Article Hyperlinks

2021 ◽  
pp. 194016122110091
Author(s):  
Magdalena Wojcieszak ◽  
Ericka Menchen-Trevino ◽  
Joao F. F. Goncalves ◽  
Brian Weeks
Keyword(s):  
Social Media ◽  
Search Engines ◽  
Direct Access ◽  
Data Set ◽  
Individual Level ◽  
News Sources ◽  
Internet Users ◽  
News Websites ◽  
The Us ◽  
Social Media Platforms

The online environment dramatically expands the number of ways people can encounter news but there remain questions of whether these abundant opportunities facilitate news exposure diversity. This project examines key questions regarding how internet users arrive at news and what kinds of news they encounter. We account for a multiplicity of avenues to news online, some of which have never been analyzed: (1) direct access to news websites, (2) social networks, (3) news aggregators, (4) search engines, (5) webmail, and (6) hyperlinks in news. We examine the extent to which each avenue promotes news exposure and also exposes users to news sources that are left leaning, right leaning, and centrist. When combined with information on individual political leanings, we show the extent of dissimilar, centrist, or congenial exposure resulting from each avenue. We rely on web browsing history records from 636 social media users in the US paired with survey self-reports, a unique data set that allows us to examine both aggregate and individual-level exposure. Visits to news websites account for about 2 percent of the total number of visits to URLs and are unevenly distributed among users. The most widespread ways of accessing news are search engines and social media platforms (and hyperlinks within news sites once people arrive at news). The two former avenues also increase dissimilar news exposure, compared to accessing news directly, yet direct news access drives the highest proportion of centrist exposure.

Effect of infarct stiffness on non-infarcted left and right ventricular tissue remodeling: a computational study based on myocardial mechano-transduction

2020 ◽  
Vol 41 (Supplement_2) ◽  
Author(s):  
T Koopsen ◽  
N Van Osta ◽  
E Willemen ◽  
F.A Van Nieuwenhoven ◽  
J Gorcsan ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Computational Model ◽  
Computational Study ◽  
Compensatory Hypertrophy ◽  
Funding Source ◽  
Tissue Mass ◽  
Model Simulations ◽  
National Budget ◽  
End Diastolic Volume ◽  
Public Grant ◽  
Infarcted Tissue

Abstract Background/Introduction The mechanical properties of infarcted myocardium are important determinants of cardiac pump function and risk of developing heart failure following myocardial infarction (MI). Purpose To better understand the effects of infarct stiffness on compensatory hypertrophy and dilation of non-infarcted tissue in the left (LV) and right ventricle (RV), by using a computational model. Methods The CircAdapt computational model of the human heart and circulation was applied to simulate an acute MI involving 20% of LV wall mass. The simulation was validated using previously published experimental data. Subsequently, two degrees of increased infarct stiffness were simulated. In all three simulations, a model of structural myocardial adaptation of the non-infarcted tissue was applied, based on sensing of mechanical loading of myocytes and extracellular matrix (ECM). Results Mild and severe stiffening of the infarct reduced the increase of LV end-diastolic volume (EDV) from +23 mL to +17 mL and +16 mL, respectively, and the increase of LV non-infarcted tissue mass from +31% to +21% and +18%. RV EDV decreased after adaptation, and mild and severe infarct stiffening reduced the decrease of RV EDV from −21 mL to −12 mL and −10 mL, respectively. Increase of RV tissue mass was reduced from +13% to +8% and +7% with mild and severe infarct stiffening. In the LV, reduced dilation and hypertrophy were driven mainly by a reduction of maximum stress in the ECM and a higher stress between the myocytes and ECM following infarct stiffening. The decreased RV hypertrophy, but not EDV reduction, was caused by a reduction of maximum RV ECM stress and maximum RV active myofiber stress. Conclusions Model simulations predicted that a stiffened LV infarct reduces both LV and RV non-infarcted tissue hypertrophy as well as LV dilation. In LV remodeling, maximum ECM stress and stress between myocyte and ECM played a more prominent role than in RV remodeling, while maximum active stress was more important in the RV. Overview of all model simulations Funding Acknowledgement Type of funding source: Public grant(s) – National budget only. Main funding source(s): This work was funded by the Netherlands Organisation for Scientific Research and the Dutch Heart Foundation.

scholarly journals Looking for Safety in All the Right Places: When Threatening Political Reality Strengthens Family Relationship Bonds

2021 ◽  
pp. 194855062110183
Author(s):  
Sandra L. Murray ◽  
Mark D. Seery ◽  
Veronica M. Lamarche ◽  
Han Young Jung ◽  
Thomas L. Saltsman ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Social Media ◽  
Longitudinal Studies ◽  
Family Relationships ◽  
Social Bonds ◽  
Family Relationship ◽  
Community Members ◽  
Political Reality ◽  
The Right ◽  
And Behavior ◽  
Political Realities

Elections and pandemics highlight how much one’s safety depends on fellow community members, a realization that is especially threatening when this collective perceives political realities inconsistent with one’s own. Two longitudinal studies examined how people restored safety to social bonds when everyday experience suggested that fellow community members inhabited inconsistent realities. We operationalized consensus political realities through the negativity of daily nationwide social media posts mentioning President Trump (Studies 1 and 2), and the risks of depending on fellow community members through the pending transition to a divided Congress during the 2018 election season (Study 1), and escalating daily U.S. COVID-19 infections (Study 2). On days that revealed people could not count on fellow community members to perceive the same reality of President Trump’s stewardship they perceived, being at greater risk from the judgment and behavior of the collective community motivated people to find greater happiness in their family relationships.

A shift from science to politics : a content analysis of COVID-19 Videos on YouTube (Preprint)

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Chyun-Fung Shi ◽  
Matthew C So ◽  
Sophie Stelmach ◽  
Arielle Earn ◽  
David J D Earn ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Public Health ◽  
Social Media ◽  
Content Analysis ◽  
Large Scale ◽  
Control Measures ◽  
Mitigation Measures ◽  
Health Campaigns ◽  
Public Attention ◽  
Conflicting Information ◽  
Social Media Platforms

BACKGROUND The COVID-19 pandemic is the first pandemic where social media platforms relayed information on a large scale, enabling an “infodemic” of conflicting information which undermined the global response to the pandemic. Understanding how the information circulated and evolved on social media platforms is essential for planning future public health campaigns. OBJECTIVE This study investigated what types of themes about COVID-19 were most viewed on YouTube during the first 8 months of the pandemic, and how COVID-19 themes progressed over this period. METHODS We analyzed top-viewed YouTube COVID-19 related videos in English from from December 1, 2019 to August 16, 2020 with an open inductive content analysis. We coded 536 videos associated with 1.1 billion views across the study period. East Asian countries were the first to report the virus, while most of the top-viewed videos in English were from the US. Videos from straight news outlets dominated the top-viewed videos throughout the outbreak, and public health authorities contributed the fewest. Although straight news was the dominant COVID-19 video source with various types of themes, its viewership per video was similar to that for entertainment news and YouTubers after March. RESULTS We found, first, that collective public attention to the COVID-19 pandemic on YouTube peaked around March 2020, before the outbreak peaked, and flattened afterwards despite a spike in worldwide cases. Second, more videos focused on prevention early on, but videos with political themes increased through time. Third, regarding prevention and control measures, masking received much less attention than lockdown and social distancing in the study period. CONCLUSIONS Our study suggests that a transition of focus from science to politics on social media intensified the COVID-19 infodemic and may have weakened mitigation measures during the first waves of the COVID-19 pandemic. It is recommended that authorities should consider co-operating with reputable social media influencers to promote health campaigns and improve health literacy. In addition, given high levels of globalization of social platforms and polarization of users, tailoring communication towards different digital communities is likely to be essential.

The Afterlives of Violent Images

2015 ◽  
Vol 8 (2-3) ◽  
pp. 327-354
Author(s):  
Nadia Yaqub
Keyword(s):  
Social Media ◽  
Collective Memory ◽  
Refugee Camp ◽  
The Other ◽  
Community Members ◽  
Group Members ◽  
Violent Images

This article examines the posting of photographs on two Facebook groups created by survivors of the 1976 fall of the Tal al-Zaʾtar refugee camp and their descendants. What happens to photographs as they circulate through these particular social media groups, and what relations do people (including photographed subjects who appear in images of atrocity and trauma) create with such images as they circulate in new ways? How are they mobilized through social media to create and sustain collective memory? I argue that by addressing the yearning to discover, document and sustain networks of affiliation and association on one hand and a shared geography, lost in 1976 and virtually reconstructed through members’ activities on the sites on the other, group members appeal in complex ways to both indexical and iconic qualities of photographs, thereby allowing for the creative engagement with a collective past for the needs of community members in the present.

You can’t beat the feeling: How emotional responses to exemplars in news stories affect perceptions of expert sources and the message of the news story

2021 ◽  
Vol 00 (00) ◽  
pp. 1-22
Author(s):  
Lene Heiselberg ◽  
Morten Skovsgaard
Keyword(s):  
Emotional Response ◽  
Electrodermal Activity ◽  
Television News ◽  
Base Rate ◽  
News Story ◽  
News Stories ◽  
Conflicting Information ◽  
Rate Information ◽  
Personal Accounts ◽  
Main Message

Journalists include ordinary people as exemplars – also known as case sources – in news stories to illustrate the general issue through their personal accounts. These accounts from exemplars tend to evoke emotions in the audience and carry greater weight than base rate information when people form perceptions or attitudes on the problem at hand. In this study, drawing on a news story in which an expert source and an exemplar provide conflicting information, we explore viewers’ emotional response to the exemplar and their perceptions of the expert source and the main message of the news story. We do this by presenting participants with two versions of a television news story – one with and one without an exemplar. We measure participants’ emotional response through a combination of open-ended and close-ended self-reports and directly through electrodermal activity, and we explore their perception of sources and the message of the story through open-ended questions. We find that viewers experience increased arousal when they watch the personal account of an exemplar, and that they tend to interpret the base rate information in the light of the exemplar’s account. Furthermore, some respondents tend to delegitimize the expert source that contradicts the account of the exemplar. We discuss the implications that these results have for journalists and provide tentative advice on which measures journalists can take to counter such effects.

Social media news deserts: Digital inequalities and incidental news exposure on social media platforms

2021 ◽  
pp. 146144482110595
Author(s):  
Matthew Barnidge ◽  
Michael A Xenos
Keyword(s):  
Social Media ◽  
Online Survey ◽  
Digital Inequality ◽  
Individual Level ◽  
Online Networks ◽  
Midterm Elections ◽  
Incidental Exposure ◽  
Social Media Platforms ◽  
Civic Skills ◽  
New Form

Some people live in social media “news deserts,” while others are embedded in online networks that are rich in news content. These news deserts represent a new form of digital inequality—distinct from problems of access, resources, or civic skills—that could foreclose one of the ways social media are believed to contribute to informing citizens and engaging them in democratic processes: providing opportunities for incidental news exposure. This study investigates incidental exposure on social media platforms, drawing on an online survey administered just before the 2018 US Midterm Elections ( N = 1493). The study finds that even after controlling for key individual-level factors, characteristics of social media discussion networks play a role in explaining variation in incidental exposure. The results are discussed in light of prevailing theory about incidental exposure, public engagement, and digital inequalities.

Creating a Community of Practice in Learning

2016 ◽  
pp. 1380-1398
Author(s):  
Ebenezer Uy ◽  
Eusebio Yu
Keyword(s):  
Social Media ◽  
Action Research ◽  
Community Of Practice ◽  
Online Community ◽  
Learning Context ◽  
Community Members ◽  
Inductive Approach ◽  
New Knowledge ◽  
Online Community Of Practice ◽  
Online Communities Of Practice

Social media plays a huge part in Filipinos' lives. In the area of learning, the proponents observed the emergence of an online community of practice using Facebook groups that has over 350 members. The aim of the chapter is to answer the question: How do online communities of practice engage students to learn and build new knowledge? The objective is to propose a framework that will guide readers to build their own online community of practice based on its learning context. To achieve the objective, the proponents use the inductive approach of grounded theory using action research. Results show that community members used different Facebook features to support their ongoing community of practice. Further studies may also assess the applicability of the framework in other areas of development.

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