Platforms for Issue Mapping: Demonstrating the Relevance for Participatory Social Research

问题映射为分析Web上的时事提供了一套工具、方法和技术。围绕这一方法的活跃研究社区目前正在英国和国际上涌现，因为近年来已有三个问题地图绘制平台上线：Issuecrawler、demoscience.org和映射争议。这些基于网络的平台为问题的在线定位、分析和可视化提供了一系列应用程序和指南。它们为数字社会研究提供了一种独特的方法，因为它们能够实现“实时”研究的形式：动态内容的在线分析。问题地图还需要对社会研究采取参与性办法，因为它将计算技术与社会方法和视觉输出的设计结合在一起。问题地图平台目前既用于主要社会科学部门的学术研究，也用于活跃于问题倡导、设计研究和社会技术的组织。该项目旨在通过促进问题地图的不同用户和开发者之间的交流，来发展问题地图对数字社会研究的贡献。更具体地说，其目的是确定、促进和传播问题分析对发展参与性和实时数字社会研究方法的贡献。为了确定、促进和详细说明问题地图平台在数字社会研究中的使用，该项目将结合两种形式：a)主办研讨会，将现有和未来的问题地图用户和开发者聚集在一起，以及b)为社会研究受众开发关于问题地图目标、方法和策略的指导性出版物。近年来，英国在牛津大学和兰开斯特大学等地组织了几个关于在线问题地图绘制的研讨会和方法课程。这些活动主要集中在向研究人员和研究生传授问题映射技能。在拟议的项目中，将使用研讨会的形式，以自下而上的方式确定社会研究中问题图谱的方法。具体地说，讲习班将产生问题映射，说明其在三个关键方面对参与性社会研究的贡献：研究需求的校准，问题映射中分析能力的重新分配，以及一系列可视化策略的相关性。两个讲习班将使问题地图的用户和开发人员聚集在一起，他们具有四种不同的能力概况：社会研究、创意计算、问题宣传和视觉设计。这四个能力组别的代表的参与对于阐明和阐述问题映射对数字社会研究方法创新的贡献至关重要。在讲习班期间，小组将探讨问题测绘项目中的具体相关问题：测绘问题需要什么研究，以及测绘问题能否完成？问题映射如何在设备、分析师和社交分析对象之间重新分配分析能力？对于问题映射，哪些可视化策略是相关和有效的？这些小组将开发案例研究，为社会研究人员介绍问题地图的数字方法。讲习班将产生具有示范价值的视觉成果。因为这些成果将构成创建两份出版物的基础：一份面向问题地图组织用户的报告，以及一份关于问题地图作为数字社会研究方法的指导性出版物，这两份出版物都将在本示范项目的最后阶段编写。

Issue mapping offers a set of tools, methods, and techniques for the analysis of current affairs on the Web. An active research community is currently emerging around this approach in the UK as well as internationally, as three platforms for issue mapping have come online in recent years: Issuecrawler, demoscience.org and Mapping Controversies. These web-based platforms make available a range of applications and guidelines for the online location, analysis and visualisation of issues. They offer a distinctive approach to digital social research insofar as they enable forms of 'real-time' research: the online analysis of dynamic content. Issue mapping also entails a participatory approach to social research, as it combines computing techniques with social methods and the design of visual outputs. Issue mapping platforms are currently used in both academic research in leading social science departments as well as by organisations active in issue advocacy, design research and social technology. This project seeks to develop the contribution of issue mapping to digital social research, by enabling exchange among these diverse users and developers of issue mapping. More specifically, its aim is to identify, facilitate and communicate the contribution of issue analysis to the development of participatory and real-time methods of digital social research. In order to identify, facilitate and elaborate the use of issue mapping platforms in digital social research, this project will combine two formats: a) the hosting of workshops that bring together existing and future users and developers of issue mapping, and b) the development of instructional publications on the aims, methods and tactics of issue mapping for social research audiences, broadly conceived. Several workshops and methods courses around online issue mapping have been organised in the UK in recent years, among others at the University of Oxford and Lancaster. These events have mostly concentrated on the transfer of issue mapping skills to researchers and post-graduate students. In the proposed project, the workshop format will be used to identify methodologies of issue mapping in social research in a bottom-up way. Specifically, the workshops will produce issue mappings that exemplify its contribution to participatory social research in three key respects: the calibration of research needs, the re-distribution of analytical competencies in issue mapping, and the relevance of a range of visualisation tactics. Two workshops will bring together users and developers of issue mapping with four different competency profiles: social research, creative computing, issue advocacy, and visual design. The participation of representatives of each of these four competency groupings is crucial to explicate and elaborate the contribution of issue mapping to methodological innovation in digital social research. During the workshops small groupings will explore specific related questions in issue mapping projects: what research needs does and can issue mapping fulfil? how does issue mapping re-distribute analytical competencies among devices, analysts and objects of social analysis? What visualisation tactics are relevant and effective for issue mapping? The groups will develop case studies that will be able to serve as an introduction to digital methods of issue mapping for social researchers. The workshops will produce visual outputs with demonstrational value. as these outputs will form the basis for the creation of two publications: an report for organisational users of issue mapping, and an instructional publication on issue mapping as a digital social research method, both to be developed in the last stage of this demonstrator project.