CAREER: Unraveling Online Disinformation Trajectories: Applying and Translating a Mixed-Method Approach to Identify, Understand and Communicate Information Provenance

这个项目将提高我们对虚假信息在在线环境中传播的理解。它将在社会计算、危机信息学和以人为中心的数据科学领域的人机交互领域做出贡献。从概念上讲，它探索了技术、结构和人类行为之间的关系--应用结构化理论的镜头来理解技术提供如何塑造在线行为，在线行为如何塑造信息空间的底层结构，以及这些整合结构如何塑造信息轨迹。在方法论上，它能够进一步发展、阐明和评价迭代、混合方法方法，以便对“大数据”进行解释性分析。最后，它的目的是利用这些经验、概念和方法方面的贡献，开发追踪虚假信息轨迹的创新解决方案。虚假信息的在线传播是一个由在线系统和人类行为交汇而成的社会问题。这项研究计划旨在加强我们对虚假信息如何传播以及为什么传播的理解，并开发工具和方法，供包括人道主义响应人员和日常分析人员在内的人们用来检测、理解和传达其传播。这项研究有三个具体的、相互关联的目标：(1)更好地了解虚假信息的产生、演变和传播；(2)扩展、支持和阐明一种不断演变的方法，用于分析“大数据”社交媒体数据，用于识别和传达与虚假信息流动有关的“信息来源”；(3)调整和转移这种方法的工具和方法，供不同的用户用于识别虚假信息及其来源和轨迹。更广泛地说，它将通过加强对技术提供、社会网络结构、人类行为和故意欺骗策略之间关系的理解和概念化，促进科学的进步。该计划包括一项支持博士生培养的教育计划，并通过多种机制招募不同的本科生从事研究，包括学分研究小组和学术桥梁计划。该奖项反映了NSF的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的智力优势和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

This project will improve our understanding of the spread of disinformation in online environments. It will contribute to the field of human-computer interaction in the areas of social computing, crisis informatics, and human centered data science. Conceptually, it explores relationships between technology, structure, and human action - applying the lens of structuration theory towards understanding how technological affordances shape online action, how online actions shape the underlying structure of the information space, and how those integrated structures shape information trajectories. Methodologically, it enables further development, articulation and evaluation of an iterative, mixed method approach for interpretative analysis of "big" social data. Finally, it aims to leverage these empirical, conceptual and methodological contributions towards the development of innovative solutions for tracking disinformation trajectories. The online spread of disinformation is a societal problem at the intersection of online systems and human behavior. This research program aims to enhance our understanding of how and why disinformation spreads and to develop tools and methods that people, including humanitarian responders and everyday analysts, can use to detect, understand, and communicate its spread. The research has three specific, interrelated objectives: (1) to better understand the generation, evolution, and propagation of disinformation; (2) to extend, support, and articulate an evolving methodological approach for analyzing "big" social media data for use in identifying and communicating "information provenance" related to disinformation flows; (3) to adapt and transfer the tools and methods of this approach for use by diverse users for identification of disinformation and communication of its origins and trajectories. More broadly, it will contribute to the advancement of science through enhanced understandings and conceptualization of the relationships between technological affordances, social network structure, human behavior, and intentional strategies of deception. The program includes an education plan that supports PhD student training and recruits diverse undergraduate students into research through multiple mechanisms, including for-credit research groups and an academic bridge program.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.