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网络环境中虚假信息传播的理解。它将为社会计算、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，它探讨了技术、结构和人类行为之间的关系——运用结构理论的视角来理解技术支持如何塑造在线行为，在线行为如何塑造信息空间的底层结构，以及这些综合结构如何塑造信息轨迹。在方法上，它能够进一步发展、阐明和评估一种迭代的混合方法，用于“大”社会数据的解释性分析。最后，它的目的是利用这些经验，概念和方法上的贡献来开发跟踪虚假信息轨迹的创新解决方案。虚假信息的在线传播是网络系统与人类行为交叉的一个社会问题。该研究项目旨在加强我们对虚假信息传播方式和原因的理解，并开发工具和方法，使人们，包括人道主义救援人员和日常分析人员，可以用来检测、理解和传达其传播。该研究有三个具体的、相互关联的目标：(1)更好地理解虚假信息的产生、演变和传播；(2)扩展、支持并阐明一种不断发展的方法方法，用于分析“大”社交媒体数据，用于识别和沟通与虚假信息流相关的“信息来源”；(3)调整和转移这一方法的工具和方法，供不同的用户使用，以识别虚假信息并传播其起源和轨迹。更广泛地说，它将通过加强对技术支持、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。该项目包括一项教育计划，支持博士生培训，并通过多种机制招募不同的本科生参与研究，包括学分研究小组和学术桥梁项目。该奖项反映了美国国家科学基金会的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的知识价值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.