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Research using twitter

Research using twitter

Combined research presentations detailing my work with twitter

Ed de Quincey

June 11, 2013
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  1. COMP1678 – User Centred Web Engineering - Twitter Research
    #swine u: Twitter
    predicts swine u
    outbreak in 2009
    Dr Ed de Quincey, Dr Patty Kostkova
    and Dr Martin Szomsor

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  2. COMP1678 – User Centred Web Engineering - Twitter Research
    Patty Kostkova, Martin Szomszor, Sue Wiseman, Gawesh Jawaheer

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  3. COMP1678 – User Centred Web Engineering - Twitter Research
    “Epidemics of seasonal influenza are
    a major public health concern,
    causing tens of millions of
    respiratory illnesses and 250,000 to
    500,000 deaths worldwide each year”
    Ginsberg et al., Nature Vol 457, 19 February 2009
    doi:10.1038/nature07634

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  4. COMP1678 – User Centred Web Engineering - Twitter Research
    14,286 deaths
    worldwide from
    Swine Flu in 2009

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  5. COMP1678 – User Centred Web Engineering - Twitter Research
    http://www.google.org/flutrends/

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  6. COMP1678 – User Centred Web Engineering - Twitter Research

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  7. COMP1678 – User Centred Web Engineering - Twitter Research

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  8. COMP1678 – User Centred Web Engineering - Twitter Research

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  9. COMP1678 – User Centred Web Engineering - Twitter Research
    15 million unique users per month
    50 million tweets per day
    2010

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  10. COMP1678 – User Centred Web Engineering - Twitter Research
    > 200 million registered accounts
    140 million tweets per day
    2011

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  11. COMP1678 – User Centred Web Engineering - Twitter Research
    Swine u

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  12. COMP1678 – User Centred Web Engineering - Twitter Research

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  14. COMP1678 – User Centred Web Engineering - Twitter Research
    http://search.twitter.com/search?q=flu

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  15. COMP1678 – User Centred Web Engineering - Twitter Research
    From almost 3 million
    tweets collected
    during May to
    December 2009

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  16. COMP1678 – User Centred Web Engineering - Twitter Research

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  17. COMP1678 – User Centred Web Engineering - Twitter Research
    Number of tweets containing the word “ u”

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  18. COMP1678 – User Centred Web Engineering - Twitter Research
    Most popular words found in all tweets

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  19. COMP1678 – User Centred Web Engineering - Twitter Research
    Collocation of words, one word to the right and the left of
    the word “ u”

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  20. COMP1678 – User Centred Web Engineering - Twitter Research
    “I have swine flu”
    12,954

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  21. COMP1678 – User Centred Web Engineering - Twitter Research
    “I have the flu”
    12,651

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  22. COMP1678 – User Centred Web Engineering - Twitter Research
    Word
    Frequency
    Word
    Frequency

    flu
    2,384,459
    #swineflu
    96,940

    swine
    1,691,154
    people
    93,217

    h1n1
    212,975
    cases
    89,081

    vaccine
    164,804
    sick
    76.239

    health
    108,715
    news
    68,368

    shot
    105,941
    :(
    62,362

    Most popular words found in all tweets

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  23. COMP1678 – User Centred Web Engineering - Twitter Research
    1 Word to Left 1 Word to Right
    Word Frequency Word Frequency
    swine 1,193,777 vaccine 123,156
    the 159,064 shot 88,361
    h1n1 77,968 cases 46,098
    seasonal 25,150 shots 43,676
    bird 13,097 death 26,665
    stomach 8,425 deaths 21,893
    regular 8,119 pandemic 18,527
    pig 6,650 season 17,521
    man 7,630 vaccines 17.277
    pandemic 6,626 virus 17,245
    Collocation of words, one word to the right and the left of
    the word “ u”

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  24. COMP1678 – User Centred Web Engineering - Twitter Research

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  25. COMP1678 – User Centred Web Engineering - Twitter Research
    The use of twitter by
    students and lecturers: the
    potential impact on
    feedback and engagement.
    Dr Ed de Quincey and Avril Hocking

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  26. COMP1678 – User Centred Web Engineering - Twitter Research
    Dr Ed de Quincey @eddequincey @DrEddeQuincey
    Senior Lecturer, School of Computing and Mathematical Sciences
    Head of the Web 2.0/Social Web for Learning Research Group, eCentre
    http://www2.gre.ac.uk/research/centres/ecentre/research-groups/web-2.0
    Avril Hocking @AvrilHocking
    Senior Lecturer, School of Health and Social Care
    Member of the Web 2.0/Social Web for Learning Research Group, eCentre

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  27. COMP1678 – User Centred Web Engineering - Twitter Research

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  28. The use of twitter by students and lecturers

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  29. The use of twitter by students and lecturers
    Can follow and discuss topical issues

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  30. COMP1678 – User Centred Web Engineering - Twitter Research

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  31. COMP1678 – User Centred Web Engineering - Twitter Research
    Using twitter with this course
    We are intending to use twitter with this course in 3
    ways:
    1.  As an alternative method for posting useful course
    specific information to students e.g. links to articles,
    emergency changes to lecture times etc.
    2.  Enable students to ask questions about courses e.g.
    clarifying something from a lecture, asking about
    coursework specifications etc.
    3.  Encourage students to help one another and create
    communities of practice/learning.

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  32. COMP1678 – User Centred Web Engineering - Twitter Research

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  33. COMP1678 – User Centred Web Engineering - Twitter Research
    you could also use hashtags such as
    #COMP1314Lec1 if you are asking about
    something in the first lecture, #COMP1314Lab1
    for the first lab session, #COMP1314CW for
    information about the coursework and so on. Just
    make sure that the hashtag includes #COMP1314

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  34. COMP1678 – User Centred Web Engineering - Twitter Research
    Twitter was introduced during the first tutorial session for 3
    courses at UG and PG level, across 2 Schools within the
    University by 2 lecturers (@DrEddeQuincey and @AvrilHocking).

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  35. The use of twitter by students and lecturers

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  36. The use of twitter by students and lecturers
    Tweets collected
    1.  All tweets posted from
    lecturer accounts
    2.  All tweets that contained the
    relevant course codes
    3.  All direct messages and
    replies (for @DrEddeQuincey and @AvrilHocking)

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  37. The use of twitter by students and lecturers
    created in April 2011 solely for
    student/University related tweets,
    currently has 130 followers

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  38. COMP1678 – User Centred Web Engineering - Twitter Research
    a rough estimate is that 80 (62%)
    are present or past students
    within the University

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  39. The use of twitter by students and lecturers

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  40. COMP1678 – User Centred Web Engineering - Twitter Research
    289 tweets have been sent
    from the lecturer account
    between September 2011 and
    April 2012

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  41. COMP1678 – User Centred Web Engineering - Twitter Research
    !
    frequency of terms used within those 289 tweets

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  42. COMP1678 – User Centred Web Engineering - Twitter Research
    161 tweets (56%) were
    @mentions i.e. the lecturer
    replying to a student’s tweet
    indicating a good level of 2 way-
    communication

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  43. The use of twitter by students and lecturers

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  44. COMP1678 – User Centred Web Engineering - Twitter Research
    !

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  45. COMP1678 – User Centred Web Engineering - Twitter Research
    received 40 direct (private)
    messages from 11 students, all
    asking questions, again
    indicating a good level of 2-way
    communication

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  46. The use of twitter by students and lecturers
    The hashtags for the 2 courses
    had less impact than the use of
    messaging, with #COMP1444
    being used 98 times (50% by the
    lecturer account) and
    #COMP1314, 75 times (33%
    by the lecturer account).

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  47. The use of twitter by students and lecturers
    Around 31% students used twitter as a
    way of communicating with
    @DrEddeQuincey regarding the
    course and although a few individuals
    made attempts at sharing information
    by the use of hashtags, this was not
    the primary use

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  48. COMP1678 – User Centred Web Engineering - Twitter Research

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  49. COMP1678 – User Centred Web Engineering - Twitter Research
    Students were willing to sign up
    for twitter and the majority sent at
    least one tweet, but their continued
    use was very much dependent on
    whether they were already active
    users or whether they understood it’s
    potential uses during and after the
    course

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  50. The use of twitter by students and lecturers
    “This was very
    stressfull............. but
    successfull..
    #nurs1301”

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  51. COMP1678 – User Centred Web Engineering - Twitter Research
    Communication

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  52. The use of twitter by students and lecturers
    A number of students have utilised
    twitter as a quick method of
    communication between
    themselves and the lecturer. This
    enabled for almost real time
    communication outside of lectures
    and tutorials and immediate
    resolution of issues

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  53. The use of twitter by students and lecturers
    Why not just use email?

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  54. The use of twitter by students and lecturers
    students have to ask concise questions that can
    be answered within the same limitation. From the
    lecturer point of view, replies can be quick and
    to the point, no need for email etiquette and
    format e.g. salutations and sign-offs.

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  55. The use of twitter by students and lecturers
    For lecturers that utilise
    twitter on a continuous basis
    as a natural part of
    their work, the ability to
    monitor and send quick
    replies to students via a
    range of devices is more
    efficient and does not get
    lost amongst other work
    related email.

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  56. The use of twitter by students and lecturers
    other students who follow the user
    who sent the @mention can also see
    the @reply from the lecturer,
    potentially reducing the
    number of communications
    that ask the same question.

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  57. COMP1678 – User Centred Web Engineering - Twitter Research
    The hashtag course codes
    were primarily only used by the
    lecturer and were sparsely
    used in all courses to share
    information, discuss course content
    etc. by students.

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  58. The use of twitter by students and lecturers

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  59. COMP1678 – User Centred Web Engineering - Twitter Research

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  60. COMP1678 – User Centred Web Engineering - Twitter Research

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  61. COMP1678 – User Centred Web Engineering Twitter Research
    Tweeting Credibility and
    Thankfulness:
    An Exploratory Study of
    Charity Twitter Accounts in
    the UK
    Dr Ed de Quincey and Dr Nicky Garsten

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  62. Methodology

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  64. “identified 63 twitter accounts
    of these 50 charities in
    November 2011”

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  65. 1.  Profile information
    The accounts’ start dates, and total number of tweets
    and followers were ascertained, along with a number of
    other attributes.
    2. Tweet activity
    Tweets over a one-week period (1st November to 7th
    November 2011) were collected and the contents
    analysed to identify common words used, retweets, links,
    hashtags and emoticons.

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  66. Results
    1. Profile Information

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  67. The average number of tweets per
    charity was 2,634 (range of
    12,887 to 46) and the average number
    of followers was 19,201 (range of
    466,824 to 198).

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  68. strong, +ve correlation was
    found (rho 0.77) between the
    number of tweets posted
    and the number of followers
    that account has

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  69. “Verification is currently used to establish
    authenticity of identities on Twitter.”

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  70. Authorship   Percentage  of  
    accounts  
    No.  of  accounts    
    No  name  of  
    individual  or  team  
    specified  
    84%   53  
    Func&onal  team  
    name  (e.g.  PR  or  
    digital  team)  
    13%   8  
    Chris&an  name/s   10%   6  
    Full  name   2%   1  

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  71. Results
    2. Tweet Activity

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  72. 2,241 tweets collected
    during the first week of
    November 2011

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  73. 46% of tweets are @replies
    36% of tweets contain a link
    6% of tweets are retweets

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  75. “thanks” and “thank”
    were used 459 times
    (20% of all tweets)
    “thanks” and “thank”
    used in 37% of @replies

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  76. “thanks” and “for” were present in 291 tweets
    Thanking for … Number of tweets
    Retweet (“RT”) 126
    “support” 63
    Follow Friday (“#FF”) 50
    “sharing” 18

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  77. What Are Hashtags ("#" Symbols)?
    Definition: The # symbol, called a hashtag, is
    used to mark keywords or topics in a Tweet
    #eupreraspring12

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  78. 956 tweets contained #hashtags

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  79. An emoticon (/ɨˈmoʊtɨkɒn/) is a
    pictorial representation of a facial
    expression using punctuation
    marks and letters, usually written
    to express a person's mood.
    >:] :-) :) :o) :] :3 :c) :> =] 8) =) :} :^)
    ""

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  80. 63 tweets contain :-)
    3 tweets contain :-(

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  81. Questions?
    106 tweets contain a
    question mark at the end.

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