A Google trends spatial clustering approach for a worldwide Twitter user geolocation

User location data is valuable for diverse social media analytics. In this paper, we address the non-trivial task of estimating a worldwide city-level Twitter user location considering only historical tweets. We propose a purely unsupervised approach that is based on a synthetic geographic sampling of Google Trends (GT) city-level frequencies of tweet nouns and three clustering algorithms. The approach was validated empirically by using a recently collected dataset, with 3,268 worldwide city-level locations of Twitter users, obtaining competitive results when compared with a state-of-the-art Word Distribution (WD) user location estimation method. The best overall results were achieved by the GT noun DBSCAN (GTN-DB) method, which is computationally fast, and correctly predicts the ground truth locations of 15%, 23%, 39% and 58% of the users for tolerance distances of 250 km, 500 km, 1,000 km and 2,000 km.The work of P. Cortez was supported by FCT – Funda ̧c ̃ao para a Ciˆencia eTecnologia within the R&D Units Project Scope: UIDB/00319/2020. We wouldalso like to thank the anonymous reviewers for their helpful suggestions

Automatic Event Geo-Location in Twitter

n/

The detection and location estimation of disasters using Twitter and the identification of Non-Governmental Organisations using crowdsourcing

status: publishe

LOCALIZATION OF EVENTS USING UNDERDEVELOPED MICROBLOGGING DATA

Event localization is the task of finding the location of an event. Events are defined as significant one-time occurrences that show notable deviation from expected or normal behavior. Event localization has been studied in many domains including medical data, internet-of-things (IoT), sensor data, and microblogging/social media domain. In this dissertation, we focus on event localization in the microblogging domain. The data in the microblogging presents a unique challenge in that it is underdeveloped. Underdeveloped data has low reliability and sporadic delivery slate. Since, microblogging data is underdeveloped it provides subjective and incomplete information, which is unsuitable for event localization. We propose enrichment methods for underdeveloped data that would make the data more suitable for event localization. Our enrichment methods include disaggregation, semantic filtering, and data generation using top-down and bottom-up approaches. Once the data is enriched, we identify event signatures that are specific to an event. We find both explicit and latent event signatures within the enriched data. Using these signatures an event can be efficiently localized. We use generated data and data collected from Twitter to test our enrichment methods and implement event localization strategies

A review of the role of sensors in mobile context-aware recommendation systems

Recommendation systems are specialized in offering suggestions about specific items of different types (e.g., books, movies, restaurants, and hotels) that could be interesting for the user. They have attracted considerable research attention due to their benefits and also their commercial interest. Particularly, in recent years, the concept of context-aware recommendation system has appeared to emphasize the importance of considering the context of the situations in which the user is involved in order to provide more accurate recommendations. The detection of the context requires the use of sensors of different types, which measure different context variables. Despite the relevant role played by sensors in the development of context-aware recommendation systems, sensors and recommendation approaches are two fields usually studied independently. In this paper, we provide a survey on the use of sensors for recommendation systems. Our contribution can be seen from a double perspective. On the one hand, we overview existing techniques used to detect context factors that could be relevant for recommendation. On the other hand, we illustrate the interest of sensors by considering different recommendation use cases and scenarios

Data-driven Computational Social Science: A Survey

Social science concerns issues on individuals, relationships, and the whole society. The complexity of research topics in social science makes it the amalgamation of multiple disciplines, such as economics, political science, and sociology, etc. For centuries, scientists have conducted many studies to understand the mechanisms of the society. However, due to the limitations of traditional research methods, there exist many critical social issues to be explored. To solve those issues, computational social science emerges due to the rapid advancements of computation technologies and the profound studies on social science. With the aids of the advanced research techniques, various kinds of data from diverse areas can be acquired nowadays, and they can help us look into social problems with a new eye. As a result, utilizing various data to reveal issues derived from computational social science area has attracted more and more attentions. In this paper, to the best of our knowledge, we present a survey on data-driven computational social science for the first time which primarily focuses on reviewing application domains involving human dynamics. The state-of-the-art research on human dynamics is reviewed from three aspects: individuals, relationships, and collectives. Specifically, the research methodologies used to address research challenges in aforementioned application domains are summarized. In addition, some important open challenges with respect to both emerging research topics and research methods are discussed.Comment: 28 pages, 8 figure

A Neural Network-Based Situational Awareness Approach for Emergency Response

publishedVersio

Spatial and Temporal Sentiment Analysis of Twitter data

The public have used Twitter world wide for expressing opinions. This study focuses on spatio-temporal variation of georeferenced Tweets’ sentiment polarity, with a view to understanding how opinions evolve on Twitter over space and time and across communities of users. More specifically, the question this study tested is whether sentiment polarity on Twitter exhibits specific time-location patterns. The aim of the study is to investigate the spatial and temporal distribution of georeferenced Twitter sentiment polarity within the area of 1 km buffer around the Curtin Bentley campus boundary in Perth, Western Australia. Tweets posted in campus were assigned into six spatial zones and four time zones. A sentiment analysis was then conducted for each zone using the sentiment analyser tool in the Starlight Visual Information System software. The Feature Manipulation Engine was employed to convert non-spatial files into spatial and temporal feature class. The spatial and temporal distribution of Twitter sentiment polarity patterns over space and time was mapped using Geographic Information Systems (GIS). Some interesting results were identified. For example, the highest percentage of positive Tweets occurred in the social science area, while science and engineering and dormitory areas had the highest percentage of negative postings. The number of negative Tweets increases in the library and science and engineering areas as the end of the semester approaches, reaching a peak around an exam period, while the percentage of negative Tweets drops at the end of the semester in the entertainment and sport and dormitory area. This study will provide some insights into understanding students and staff ’s sentiment variation on Twitter, which could be useful for university teaching and learning management

European Handbook of Crowdsourced Geographic Information

"This book focuses on the study of the remarkable new source of geographic information that has become available in the form of user-generated content accessible over the Internet through mobile and Web applications. The exploitation, integration and application of these sources, termed volunteered geographic information (VGI) or crowdsourced geographic information (CGI), offer scientists an unprecedented opportunity to conduct research on a variety of topics at multiple scales and for diversified objectives. The Handbook is organized in five parts, addressing the fundamental questions: What motivates citizens to provide such information in the public domain, and what factors govern/predict its validity?What methods might be used to validate such information? Can VGI be framed within the larger domain of sensor networks, in which inert and static sensors are replaced or combined by intelligent and mobile humans equipped with sensing devices? What limitations are imposed on VGI by differential access to broadband Internet, mobile phones, and other communication technologies, and by concerns over privacy? How do VGI and crowdsourcing enable innovation applications to benefit human society? Chapters examine how crowdsourcing techniques and methods, and the VGI phenomenon, have motivated a multidisciplinary research community to identify both fields of applications and quality criteria depending on the use of VGI. Besides harvesting tools and storage of these data, research has paid remarkable attention to these information resources, in an age when information and participation is one of the most important drivers of development. The collection opens questions and points to new research directions in addition to the findings that each of the authors demonstrates. Despite rapid progress in VGI research, this Handbook also shows that there are technical, social, political and methodological challenges that require further studies and research.