Volume and patterns of toxicity in social media conversations during the COVID-19 pandemic

Report

In this RISJ Factsheet we assess the volume and patterns of toxic conversations on social media during the COVID-19 pandemic. We specifically analyse worldwide conversations on Twitter targeting the World Health Organization (WHO), a central actor during the pandemic. Our analyses are based on a filtered a dataset of 327.5 million tweets including COVID-19 related terms from January to April 2020, from which we obtained a final sub-subset of 222,774 tweets mentioning the WHO. Using a machine learning approach, we found that toxic messages amount to 21% of the overall conversation touching on the COVID-19 pandemic and the role of WHO on the crisis. The volume of toxicity increases after 26 March when many countries were facing the growing adverse effects of the pandemic and passing tightened measures to confine their populations. Our analysis contributes to the current research on the health of online debates amid the increasing role of social media as critical entrance to information and mediator of public opinion building.

Authors: Majó-Vázquez, S; Nielsen, RK; Verdú, J; Rao, N; de Domenico, M

• Publication status: Published
• Publisher: Reuters institute for the study of journalism
• Place of publication: Oxford
• Publication date: 2020-07-09
• DOI: 10.60625/risj-5902-2323
• Language: English
• Keywords: COVID-19; social media; uncivility; WHO; toxic conversations; public opinion