Social science offers sophisticated methods for governments to better understand social media. Social scientists are using established research techniques to improve meaningful collection of social data via social media.

Researcher Jason Leavy argues that social scientists are also working towards managing the tremendous amounts of data publicly available via social media (known as the “Big Data” problem). Data from blogs, Twitter, Facebook, Google+, websites, news sources, web forums, public e-commerce sites, public information on web search terms, and other technologies can be used to better inform social policy.

Leavy suggests that social media data gathered through social science methods might also be used to help track and plan for future socio-economic crises. Social scientists are also ideally positioned to help inform new policy challenges arising from social media. This includes privacy, online safety and other public practices that impact on public health and civic participation.

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Over to you!

Can you see other big data issues you’re wondering about? Have you got any questions about how social science can improve social media?

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