1
|
Duncan NW, Shean R. Analysing the effectiveness of Twitter as an equitable community communication tool for international conferences. PeerJ 2023; 11:e15270. [PMID: 37180583 PMCID: PMC10174057 DOI: 10.7717/peerj.15270] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 12/23/2022] [Accepted: 03/30/2023] [Indexed: 05/16/2023] Open
Abstract
Scientific conferences increasingly include online aspects. Some are moving to be entirely virtual whilst others are adopting hybrid models in which there are both in-person and virtual elements. This development of opportunities for people to attend conferences virtually has the potential to both reduce their environmental impact and to make access to them more equitable. An issue with virtual conference participation that has been raised, however, is that there is a reduction in informal communication between attendees. This is an important deficit as informal contacts play a significant role in both knowledge transmission and professional network development. One forum where some informal communication around conferences does occur is Twitter, with participation there being encouraged by some conferences. It is not clear, however, how effective Twitter is as a community communication tool in terms of equitable participation amongst conference attendees. To investigate this, we looked at Twitter usage surrounding four international conferences between 2010 and 2021. It was found that engagement with conference hashtags increased steadily over time, peaking in 2019. Users represented 9% of conference attendees and were primarily located in Europe and North America, communicating primarily in English (97% of tweets). Hub nodes within the interaction network were also primarily located in these regions. East Asia had fewer users than would be expected based on neuroscience publication numbers from that region. What users there were in East Asia were engaged with less than were users in other regions. It was found that the overall interaction network showed a rich-club structure, where users with more connections tend to interact more with others with similar connection numbers. Finally, it was found that users in Europe and North America tend to communicate with other users in their own regions whereas users in the rest of the world direct their interactions out of their region. These results suggest that although conference-related Twitter use has been successful to some degree in opening up access, there are some notable limitations in its usage that may mirror aspects of inequality inherent to in-person conferences. How to build equitable informal communication networks around virtual conferences remains a challenging question that requires further discussion.
Collapse
Affiliation(s)
- Niall W. Duncan
- Graduate Institute of Mind, Brain and Consciousness, Taipei Medical University, Taipei, Taiwan
- Brain and Consciousness Research Centre, TMU-Shuang Ho Hospital, New Taipei City, Taiwan
| | - Russell Shean
- Center for Data Science, Washington State Department of Health, Tumwater, Washington, United States of America
| |
Collapse
|
2
|
Toupin R, Millerand F, Larivière V. Who tweets climate change papers? investigating publics of research through users’ descriptions. PLoS One 2022; 17:e0268999. [PMID: 35657791 PMCID: PMC9165795 DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0268999] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 05/24/2021] [Accepted: 05/13/2022] [Indexed: 11/18/2022] Open
Abstract
As social issues like climate change become increasingly salient, digital traces left by scholarly documents can be used to assess their reach outside of academia. Our research examine who shared climate change research papers on Twitter by looking at the expressions used in profile descriptions. We categorized users in eight categories (academia, communication, political, professional, personal, organization, bots and publishers) associated to specific expressions. Results indicate how diverse publics may be represented in the communication of scholarly documents on Twitter. Supplementing our word detection analysis with qualitative assessments of the results, we highlight how the presence of unique or multiple categorizations in textual Twitter descriptions provides evidence of the publics of research in specific contexts. Our results show a more substantial communication by academics and organizations for papers published in 2016, whereas the general public comparatively participated more in 2015. Overall, there is significant participation of publics outside of academia in the communication of climate change research articles on Twitter, although the extent to which these publics participate varies between individual papers. This means that papers circulate in specific communities which need to be assessed to understand the reach of research on social media. Furthermore, the flexibility of our method provide means for research assessment that consider the contextuality and plurality of publics involved on Twitter.
Collapse
Affiliation(s)
- Rémi Toupin
- Laboratory for Communication and the Digital (LabCMO), Centre Interuniversitaire de Recherche sur la Science et la Technologie (CIRST), Université du Québec à Montréal, Montréal, Québec, Canada
- * E-mail:
| | - Florence Millerand
- Laboratory for Communication and the Digital (LabCMO), Département de Communication Sociale et Publique (DCSP), Centre Interuniversitaire de Recherche sur la Science et la Technologie (CIRST), Université du Québec à Montréal, Montréal, Québec, Canada
| | - Vincent Larivière
- École de Bibliothéconomie et des Sciences de l’Information (EBSI), Université de Montréal, Montréal, Quebec, Canada
- Observatoire des Sciences et des Technologies (OST), Centre Interuniversitaire de Recherche sur la Science et la Technologie (CIRST), Université du Québec à Montréal, Montréal, Québec, Canada
| |
Collapse
|
3
|
Citizen Science on Twitter: Using Data Analytics to Understand Conversations and Networks. FUTURE INTERNET 2020. [DOI: 10.3390/fi12120210] [Citation(s) in RCA: 10] [Impact Index Per Article: 2.5] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 11/16/2022] Open
Abstract
This paper presents a long-term study on how the public engage with discussions around citizen science and crowdsourcing topics. With progress in sensor technologies and IoT, our cities and neighbourhoods are increasingly sensed, measured and observed. While such data are often used to inform citizen science projects, it is still difficult to understand how citizens and communities discuss citizen science activities and engage with citizen science projects. Understanding these engagements in greater depth will provide citizen scientists, project owners, practitioners and the generic public with insights around how social media can be used to share citizen science related topics, particularly to help increase visibility, influence change and in general and raise awareness on topics. To the knowledge of the authors, this is the first large-scale study on understanding how such information is discussed on Twitter, particularly outside the scope of individual projects. The paper reports on the wide variety of topics (e.g., politics, news, ecological observations) being discussed on social media and a wide variety of network types and the varied roles played by users in sharing information in Twitter. Based on these findings, the paper highlights recommendations for stakeholders for engaging with citizen science topics.
Collapse
|
4
|
Mizuno A, Kishi T, Matsumoto C, Ishida M, Sanada S, Fukuda M, Sahashi Y, Sugimoto T, Hirano M, Yoshikawa Y, Yamamoto E, Kimura T, Node K. Two-Year Experience in "Tweeting the Meeting" During the Scientific Sessions - Rapid Report From the Japanese Circulation Society. Circ Rep 2020; 2:691-694. [PMID: 33693196 PMCID: PMC7937497 DOI: 10.1253/circrep.cr-20-0093] [Citation(s) in RCA: 2] [Impact Index Per Article: 0.5] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 08/18/2020] [Accepted: 08/18/2020] [Indexed: 11/17/2022] Open
Abstract
Background: Twitter has become increasingly popular at annual medical congresses as a platform to communicate to attendees. The aim of this study is to reveal the twitter usage in the annual congress of the Japanese Cirsulation Society. Methods and Results: We compared the total number of tweets during the Japanese Circulation Society's annual meetings in 2019 and 2020. The total number of tweets increased from 7,587 in 2019 to 23,867 in 2020. Most tweets were retweets (>70%), and approximately half of Twitter users tweeted only once. Conclusions: Twitter usage during the Japanese Circulation Society's annual meeting increased from 2019 to 2020, and a large number of tweets were from Twitter ambassadors of the Japanese Circulation Society. However, further evaluation is needed, with future studies investigating the usefulness of this platform.
Collapse
Affiliation(s)
- Atsushi Mizuno
- Department of Cardiology, St. Luke's International Hospital Tokyo Japan
- Penn Medicine Nudge Unit, University of Pennsylvania Philadelphia, PA USA
- Leonard Davis Institute for Health Economics, University of Pennsylvania Philadelphia, PA USA
- Information and Communication Committee, the Japanese Circulation Society Tokyo Japan
| | - Takuya Kishi
- Department of Graduate School of Medicine (Cardiology), International University of Health and Welfare Okawa Japan
- Information and Communication Committee, the Japanese Circulation Society Tokyo Japan
| | - Chisa Matsumoto
- Department of Cardiology, Center for Health Surveillance & Preventive Medicine, Tokyo Medical University Tokyo Japan
- Information and Communication Committee, the Japanese Circulation Society Tokyo Japan
| | - Mari Ishida
- Department of Cardiovascular Physiology and Medicine, Graduate School of Biomedical and Health Sciences, Hiroshima University Hiroshima Japan
- Information and Communication Committee, the Japanese Circulation Society Tokyo Japan
| | - Shoji Sanada
- Center for Clinical Research and Innovation, Osaka City University Hospital Osaka Japan
- Information and Communication Committee, the Japanese Circulation Society Tokyo Japan
| | - Memori Fukuda
- Department of Cardiology, Keio University School of Medicine Tokyo Japan
- Information and Communication Committee, the Japanese Circulation Society Tokyo Japan
| | - Yuki Sahashi
- Department of Cardiology, Gifu University Graduate School of Medicine Gifu Japan
- Department of Health Data Science, Graduate School of Data Science, Yokohama City University Yokohama Japan
- Information and Communication Committee, the Japanese Circulation Society Tokyo Japan
| | - Tadafumi Sugimoto
- Department of Clinical Laboratory, Mie University Hospital Tsu Japan
- Information and Communication Committee, the Japanese Circulation Society Tokyo Japan
| | - Miki Hirano
- Department of Nursing, Kameda Medical Center Kamogawa Japan
- Information and Communication Committee, the Japanese Circulation Society Tokyo Japan
| | - Yusuke Yoshikawa
- Department of Cardiovascular Medicine, Graduate School of Medicine, Kyoto University Kyoto Japan
| | - Erika Yamamoto
- Department of Cardiovascular Medicine, Graduate School of Medicine, Kyoto University Kyoto Japan
| | - Takeshi Kimura
- Department of Cardiovascular Medicine, Graduate School of Medicine, Kyoto University Kyoto Japan
| | - Koichi Node
- Department of Cardiovascular Medicine, Saga University Saga Japan
- Information and Communication Committee, the Japanese Circulation Society Tokyo Japan
| |
Collapse
|