All posts by Samantha Finn

Twitter’s increasing polarization about the refugee crisis via #RefugeesWelcome

Events and Memes

Since the Paris attacks in November, 2015, social media has become increasingly polarized and emotional when it comes to discussing the refugee crises.  On the 18th, the hashtag #RefugeesWelcome was trending on Twitter in the US.  The co-retweeted network visualizes just how polarized and international the debate is.

network

top-description-words-all
The co-retweeted network of the #RefugeesWelcome data, collected on 11/18. The largest groups are noted on the graph. Users are highly polarized, as well as grouping by language and location. The word clouds show the most common user-profile words for each group, with colors matching the graph (English stop words are filtered out).

On the left are three pro-refugee groups, differentiated by language and location.  The purple group is largely German; the green are Scottish, many identifying with the Scottish National Party; and the blue are American liberals.  On the right are four groups spreading anti-refugee messages.  In yellow, another group of Germans; the red, orange and pink groups are all English speaking, mostly American, with similar messages and identifying themselves with terms like #tcot and “christian.” 

The co-retweeted network graph is interactive on TwitterTrails, and includes a widget below the graph where you can view aggregated statistics on each group, including user languages, most used words in descriptions and most used hashtags.

You can explore this network on TwitterTrails:
http://twittertrails.wellesley.edu/~trails/stories/investigate.php?id=984767780

Comparison with past usage

#RefugeesWelcome was also trending on September 3rd, in reaction to the images of the body of a drowned Syrian toddler, Alyan Kurdi, washed up on a Turkish beach.  At this time, the network was not polarized, and although there are different groups shown they are mainly spreading the pro-refugee message.  

Continue reading Twitter’s increasing polarization about the refugee crisis via #RefugeesWelcome →

Strong emotions on Twitter let the false claim that 10,000 refugees arrived in New Orleans spread unchecked

Uncategorized

Various rumors have been spreading on social media–even Twitter, which usually moderates false claims–following the Paris attacks on November 13th, 2015.  We recently reported on Trump’s misattributed tweet earlier, and now we highlight another claim that is spreading in this emotionally charged environment: that 10,000 Syrian refugees (that’s apparently them in the image below, notably all young men) have recently arrived in New Orleans.

A photo which has been posted with the claim show the supposed refugees who arrived in New Orleans
A photo which has been posted with the claim show the supposed refugees who arrived in New Orleans

10,000 Syrian refugees have not arrived in New Orleans.  The image, according to snopes, was taken in Hungary in September 2015.  This claim, fueled by the emotional climate on social media due to the Paris attacks, a combination of anger, fear and increasing xenophobia, vastly inflated the reality of only two Syrian refugee families arriving in New Orleans. (Yet, the arrival has caused backlash from Louisiana republicans, including presidential candidate Bobby Jindal, adding to the momentum of false claims).  

Like the Trump tweet claim, this story has moderate spread for a false claim (as observed by TwitterTrails), and also very low skepticism.  Very little fact checking has affected the emotional spread of this claim.

spread

If you are familiar with the Twittertrails.com system you can explore the story on TwitterTrails, or keep reading to see how strong emotions manifest in the spreading of rumors on Twitter.
http://twittertrails.wellesley.edu/~trails/stories/investigate.php?id=647751846

Continue reading Strong emotions on Twitter let the false claim that 10,000 refugees arrived in New Orleans spread unchecked →

Did Donald Trump write an insensitive tweet about the Nov 13th attacks in Paris?

Uncategorized

tweetThe tweet on the right caught my attention this morning.  It contains a screenshot of Gérard Araud, French ambassador to the US replying to a tweet written by Donald Trump.  Trump calls the “tragedy in Paris” “interesting” given that France has some of the strictest gun control laws in the world and Araud calls Trump “repugnant” and lacking “human decency”.

My immediate reaction was skepticism: even Trump, now running for president, wouldn’t write such an insensitive tweet following November 13th’s tragic attacks.  So, after getting over the shock value of what I read, I went into fact checking mode.  It didn’t take very much research to poke holes in this claim.  The screenshot posted in the tweet shows the tweet by Trump was sent on January 7th; obviously not after the attacks.  I also checked Donald Trump’s twitter account, and quickly observed that the tweet was not in his timeline, and he had in fact tweeted prayers for Paris.  

However, the tweet by Trump is real and a quick google search found it (at the time of writing this, it has not been deleted):
https://twitter.com/realdonaldtrump/status/552955167533174785
trump-tweet

Rather than being about the attacks on November 13th, the tweet was written in response to the Charlie Hebdo attacks, which happened January 7th, 2015.  (The tweet by Araud seems to be legitimate and has been mentioned by various sources, but has been deleted)

So how did so many people miss this fact?  

Continue reading Did Donald Trump write an insensitive tweet about the Nov 13th attacks in Paris? →

Global warming denialists make lousy spammers

Case Studies,

nasa-tweetTwitterTrails is a system focused on studying how rumors and memes spread online, but it can also track efforts by spammers to promote spam messages on Twitter. In one such case, which we observed recently, global warming denialists online misrepresented an article posted by NASA to claim that NASA’s article effectively denies the existence of global warming. TwitterTrails discovered their effort and identified 115 of these denialists. Here’s what happened:

On October 30th, 2015, NASA posted an article about a study showing that the amount of ice in the Antarctic ice sheet has increased overall.  They tweeted about the article, summarizing it with: “Antarctica is overall accumulating ice, but parts have increased ice loss in last decades.”

Several news websites posted articles about the study which were widely shared on Twitter expressing overall skepticism about both the findings and their implications for global warming:

However, the link shared by far the most on Twitter a website called “The Real Strategy” which takes a very different spin on the NASA study:

NASA Debunked Global Warming Hoax in Study

You will not hear this on your mainstream “News” channels… A new study by NASA has proven that the global warming hoax is a myth, once and for all.

A study released by NASA on October 30 says that the amount of ice in the poles has increased steadily over the last several decades. What happened to Al Gore’s claim that the poles would be melted completely by this year? Obama was just filmed claiming that “Global Warming” is proven… How stupid are their audiences really? Has everyone been programmed to just accept what these liars tell them as gospel? This study proves that “Global Warming” is so bogus that the world is actually COOLING!

The story continues on to quote the NASA article at length to support its claim that climate change is a “hoax”. This story received widespread air time on Twitter; nearly 4,000 of the 8,700 tweets we collected in reference to the NASA article included a link to “The Real Strategy,” compared to just a few hundred links to other relevant articles (including NASA’s original).

So, does Twitter audience believe that NASA’s own study disproves global warming?  Not quite.   

Continue reading Global warming denialists make lousy spammers →

#Pinkout vs. #Blackout

Uncategorized

On September 29th, 2015, Planned Parenthood organized a #PinkOut hashtag, to give Twitter users a forum in which to show support for the group.  However, data collected with the #PinkOut hashtag shows one of the most polarized co-retweeted networks we have collected on TwitterTrails, far more polarized than even US electoral debates!

The co-retweeted network of #PinkOut investigated on Sept. 29, 2015 at 10AM ET.
The co-retweeted network of #PinkOut investigated on Sept. 29, 2015 at 10AM ET.

Attempting to undermine #PinkOut, some Twitter users opposed to Planned Parenthood suggested their own hashtag: #BlackOut. On the 28th, @PolitiBunny tweeted: “Stand w/the babies on Sept 29, make your avi black & white, #BLACKout ur banner photo to protest @PPFA’s #PinkOut. We need you! #Life #ccot”

Thus, a Twitter “war” of attention was waged; or rather, another “battle” in a long standing social media feud.   This blog post explores the polarization in the network, and the two opposing hashtags.

Continue reading #Pinkout vs. #Blackout →

Twitter’s increasing doubts about the Germanwings cell phone video

Case Studies, False Claims

On March 31, 2015, at around 1 PM eastern time (9 PM in Germany), German news outlet Bild posted an article claiming they had received a cell phone video of the final moments of the Germanwings flight, which was crashed by the co-pilot in the French Alps.  Bild writes (in their English translation):

Paris – A video emerged from on-board Germanwings flight 4U9525. German newspaper BILD and French magazine „Paris Match“ were able to view it.

– Video shows last seconds of death flight 4U9525, BILD

Paris Match, the French magazine which also claimed to see the video, describes it (from their English translation):

Its origin – a cell phone – was clear.  The scene was so chaotic that it was hard to identify people, but the sounds of the screaming passengers made it perfectly clear that they were aware of what was about to happen to them.  One can hear cries of “My God” in several languages.  Metallic banging can also be heard more than three times, perhaps of the pilot trying to open the cockpit door with a heavy object.  Towards the end, after a heavy shake, stronger than the others, the screaming intensifies.  Then nothing.

– EXCLUSIVE: THE FINAL MOMENTS BEFORE THE CRASH, Paris Match

Neither organization posted the video, but rather descriptions of what the video showed.

When @cnnbrk posted the story, it was retweeted over 500 times, and the conversation began to pick up steam on Twitter.  However, not all Twitter users were convinced, even before reports began to spread that French officials were denying the existence of this video.  Continue reading to learn about how TwitterTrails allows users to trace the increasing doubt about the Germanwings cell phone video.

Continue reading Twitter’s increasing doubts about the Germanwings cell phone video →

Two Police Officers shot during Ferguson Protests: Observations through TwitterTrails

Case Studies, , ,

The Ferguson police chief resigned on March 11th, 2015, following the Justice Department’s report about systematic bias in the Ferguson police department.  This prompted protests outside the police department, during which two police officers were shot and wounded.

Using TwitterTrails, we investigated this claim the following morning, about 10 hours after the shooting, and repeated the data collection twice over the next 12 hours to get a larger dataset.  We find that, even though we did not collect data live during the event, TwitterTrails can still reconstruct an interesting and meaningful account of the reporting on Twitter.  We capture not only traditional news media reporting, but also first hand accounts written by people on the scene of the protest (which contain information that is less visible in tweets written by the news media).  Finally, we find a very polarized audience taking to Twitter to discuss the shooting, as captured by the co-retweeted network.

The Co-Retweeted network, capturing a very polarized audience discussing the shooting of two Ferguson police officers during a protest in the early hours of March 12th, 2015.
The Co-Retweeted network, capturing a very polarized audience discussing the shooting of two Ferguson police officers during a protest in the early hours of March 12th, 2015.

Read on for our observations, or view the story for yourself on TwitterTrails.

Continue reading Two Police Officers shot during Ferguson Protests: Observations through TwitterTrails →

Charting Skepticism vs. Spread and determining whether claims are likely true or false

About TwitterTrails

If you’ve read our blog post False rumors do not spread like true ones you will probably recognize this graph:

graph

It plots the skepticism of TwitterTrails stories vs. their spread, contrasting how much doubt people have in the information a story presents and how visible and discussed a story was (read more about Spread and Skepticism here).   This graph is now visible to the public, and you can view the skepticism and spread of all the stories in our database: RUMOR SPREAD vs SKEPTICISM graph (hovering over a point displays skepticism and spread, and clicking brings up a summary of the story)

Continue reading for more information about this graph, and how TwitterTrails determines whether claims are likely true or false based on the wisdom of the crowd on Twitter.

Continue reading Charting Skepticism vs. Spread and determining whether claims are likely true or false →