Semantic Systems and Visual Tools to Support Environmental Communication

Given the intense attention that environmental topics such as climate change attract in news and social media coverage, scientists and communication professionals want to know how different stakeholders perceive observable threats and policy options, how specific media channels react to new insights, and how journalists present scientific knowledge to the public. This paper investigates the potential of semantic technologies to address these questions. After summarizing methods to extract and disambiguate context information, we present visualization techniques to explore the lexical, geospatial, and relational context of topics and entities referenced in these repositories. The examples stem from the Media Watch on Climate Change, the Climate Resilience Toolkit and the NOAA Media Watch—three applications that aggregate environmental resources from a wide range of online sources. These systems not only show the value of providing comprehensive information to the public, but also have helped to develop a novel communication success metric that goes beyond bipolar assessments of sentiment

Potential and Limits of Automated Classification of Big Data: A Case Study

This case study highlights the potentials and limits of big-data analyses of media sources compared to conventional, quantitative content analysis. In an FFG-funded multidisciplinary project in Austria (based on the KIRAS security research program), the software tool WebLyzard was used for an automated analysis of online news and social media sources (comments on articles, Facebook postings, and Twitter statements) in order to analyze the media representation of pressing societal issues and citizens’ perceptions of security. Frequency and sentiment analyses were carried out by two independent observers in parallel to the automated WebLyzard results. Specific articles on selected key topics like technology or Muslims in two major online newspapers in Austria (Der Standard and Kronen Zeitung) were counted, as were user comments, and both were evaluated according to different sentiment categories. The results indicate various weaknesses of the software leading to misinterpretations, and the automated analyses yield substantially different results compared to the sentiment analysis carried out by the two raters, especially for cynical or irrelevant statements. From a social-sciences methodological perspective, the results clearly show that methodology in our discipline should promote theory-based research, should counteract the attraction of superficial analyses of complex social issues, and should emphasize not only the potentials but also the dangers and risks associated with big data

Using Big Data to measure tourist sustainability: myth or reality?

The concern about the production of international standards to measure the sustainability of tourism is present today, especially the discourse on the introduction of new sources. This article aims to survey and describe the main approaches and methodologies to use big data to measure tourism sustainability. Successful cases are addressed by explaining the main opportunities and challenges for the creation of official tourist statistics. A comprehensive review of publications regarding this field was carried out by applying the systematic literature review technique. This contributes a knowledge base to destination management organisations to encourage the implementation of official tourism statistics systems using big data.This research was funded by the Xunta de Galicia and the European Union (European Social Fund—FSE) through predoctoral stage grants to universties and public research organisations in Galicia and other organisations of the Galician R+D+I System (2017), grant number ED481A-2017/230S

Social networks as a vehicle for science journalism: Scoping Review

La crisis de desinformación en que se ha traducido la consolidación de Internet y la explosión de las redes sociales ha puesto de manifiesto la importancia del periodismo científico para transmitir contenidos rigurosos, contrastados y de calidad a la sociedad. En este contexto, tanto a nivel profesional como académico, ponemos el foco en la disciplina y, de forma creciente, en el papel de las redes sociales como vehículo para potenciar los contenidos de divulgación científica. El presente trabajo analiza, por medio de la técnica de scoping review, los artículos publicados sobre periodismo científico y redes sociales entre los años 2017 y 2021, con objeto de identificar tópicos y tendencias de investigación, preocupaciones y desafíos. El estudio revela la influencia que las redes sociales están teniendo en el periodismo científico actual, destacando su rol como canal de difusión e interacción con las audiencias y su capacidad de engagement con nuevos públicos, al tiempo que evidencia el protagonismo de las temáticas sanitarias y ambientales asociadas a la verificación de datos. Se advierte además del reto que supone para los profesionales mejorar su desempeño para lograr una comunicación efectiva a través de los nuevos canales y generar contenidos visuales e interactivos.The disinformation crisis that has resulted from the consolidation of the Internet and the explosion of social networks has highlighted the importance of scientific journalism to communicate rigorous, contrasted and quality content to society. In this context, both professionally and academically level, the focus is on the discipline and, increasingly, on the role of social networks as a vehicle for promoting scientific dissemination content. This study analyzes, using the scoping review technique, the articles published on science journalism and social networks in the last five years (2017 and 2021) in order to identify research topics and trends, concerns and challenges. The study reveals the influence that social networks are having on current science journalism, highlighting their role as a channel for dissemination and interaction with audiences and engagement with new audiences. In addition to the prominence given to health, environmental and data verification issues. It also warns of the challenge for professionals to improve their performance in order to achieve effective communication through innovative channels and generate visual and interactive content.Agencia Nacional de Investigación y Desarrollo (ANID) / Subdirección de Capital Humano / Becas Chile de Doctorado en el Extranjero/2020-72210109Grupo HUM-466 y el Departamento de Información y Comunicación de la Universidad de Granad

Adapting data-driven research to the fields of social sciences and the humanities

Recent developments in the fields of computer science, such as advances in the areas of big data, knowledge extraction, and deep learning, have triggered the application of data-driven research methods to disciplines such as the social sciences and humanities. This article presents a collaborative, interdisciplinary process for adapting data-driven research to research questions within other disciplines, which considers the methodological background required to obtain a significant impact on the target discipline and guides the systematic collection and formalization of domain knowledge, as well as the selection of appropriate data sources and methods for analyzing, visualizing, and interpreting the results. Finally, we present a case study that applies the described process to the domain of communication science by creating approaches that aid domain experts in locating, tracking, analyzing, and, finally, better understanding the dynamics of media criticism. The study clearly demonstrates the potential of the presented method, but also shows that data-driven research approaches require a tighter integration with the methodological framework of the target discipline to really provide a significant impact on the target discipline

Semantic Knowledge Graphs for the News: A Review

ICT platforms for news production, distribution, and consumption must exploit the ever-growing availability of digital data. These data originate from different sources and in different formats; they arrive at different velocities and in different volumes. Semantic knowledge graphs (KGs) is an established technique for integrating such heterogeneous information. It is therefore well-aligned with the needs of news producers and distributors, and it is likely to become increasingly important for the news industry. This article reviews the research on using semantic knowledge graphs for production, distribution, and consumption of news. The purpose is to present an overview of the field; to investigate what it means; and to suggest opportunities and needs for further research and development.publishedVersio

Environmental communication in the digital deliberative sphere: a multimodal analysis of the role of the digital publics in YouTube-mediated Taiwanese environmental discourse

Environmental communication plays a key role in representing scientific and political issues, such as climate change and environmental policy. Digital media platforms such as YouTube now play a central role in communicating environmental communication and engaging in the digital deliberative sphere. These platforms have a significant impact on shaping public opinion on political and environmental issues. For example, the 2018 Taiwanese referendum resulted in the abolition of coal and nuclear power plants and other environmental reforms being achieved, as all three proposals related to environmental issues were passed. Consequently, the Taiwanese context provides a useful case study for understanding the concrete power of the deliberative sphere in shaping environmental policy. While research in this area is growing, it often focuses on Western European and English-speaking countries, neglecting the different cultural and political contexts that contribute to global environmental problems. Moreover, there is little evidence on the digital deliberative sphere, making it difficult to identify its role and how the system works. This thesis addresses these gaps by conducting a detailed multimodal analysis of environmental communication in Taiwanese current affairs programmes, including political talk shows, non-affiliated talk shows and in-depth reporting, mediated through YouTube. These programmes contribute to the digital deliberative system by providing non-serial forms of news media and extended discussions on platforms such as YouTube. The thesis utilises comment analysis and Up-next algorithm analysis to examine in depth the composition of publics and counterpublics, as well as the mobilisation of publics through YouTube's initial recommendation system. The results of the study show the communicative modes of the programmes in the digital deliberative system on environmental issues, the mediating role of the YouTube system (comments and Up-next algorithm) and the connections between the two. This study not only contributes to the understanding of the role of the deliberative system in media and platforms, but also provides robust evidence for policy makers and advocates working to promote environmental issues. The thesis presents four key findings: (1) the results indicate a similarity to the siloed media logic of traditional one- or two-channel television media, with Taiwanese media remaining the dominant channels in the new media landscape, suggesting that the concept of 'totality of publics' is similar to traditional television media; (2) environmental issues exhibit varying degrees of politicisation in different programme genres, with political talk shows being the most affected, followed by non-affiliated talk shows and in-depth reporting. This politicisation of environmental issues underlines YouTube's role in mediating these issues and is associated with significant political polarisation, as a comparison of the agenda setting of the videos and the comments below them shows; (3) the practises of YouTube's recommendation system reveal a tendency to promote political radicalisation. A typical communicative practice associated with this is the use of numbers to support political arguments. For example, round numbers are often used to attract public attention, while precise numbers are used in data representation to complement and emphasise information sources or professional opinions; (4) the multimodal analysis identifies six communicative practices that aim to promote arguments by reducing content ambiguity and highlighting key points. This finding highlights the mediating role between raising public awareness and taking environmental action within the digital deliberative sphere. The study identifies an emerging deliberative system on digital platforms that offers a new approach to communicating environmental issues and influencing environmental policy through the proposed methodology