Measuring Public Opinion with Social Media Data
How can we overcome the challenges involved in conducting public opinion surveys using social media data? In this paper, we outline strategies for conquering the difficulties of identifying public opinion, the representativeness of social media users, and aggregating from individual responses to public opinion.
Citation
Klašnja, Marko, Pablo Barberá, Nick Beauchamp, Jonathan Nagler, and Joshua A. Tucker. "Measuring Public Opinion with Social Media Data." In The Oxford Handbook of Polling and Survey Methods, edited by Lonna Rae Atkeson and R. Michael Alvarez. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2018. https://doi.org/10.1093/oxfordhb/9780190213299.013.3
Date Posted
Oct 01, 2017
Area of Study
Tags
Abstract
This chapter examines the use of social networking sites such as Twitter in measuring public opinion. It first considers the opportunities and challenges that are involved in conducting public opinion surveys using social media data. Three challenges are discussed: identifying political opinion, representativeness of social media users, and aggregating from individual responses to public opinion. The chapter outlines some of the strategies for overcoming these challenges and proceeds by highlighting some of the novel uses for social media that have fewer direct analogs in traditional survey work. Finally, it suggests new directions for a research agenda in using social media for public opinion work.
Background
Social media sites such as Facebook and Twitter are playing an increasingly central role in politics. Since 2012, presidential campaigns have relied heavily on social media to appeal to their voters, as well as frame the agenda for their presidency. Social media sites have also been essential for disseminating information and organizing during many recent episodes of mass protest. For numerous political organizations, and millions of users, social media have become the primary means of acquiring, sharing, and discussing political information. But to what extent can one aggregate political messages published on social networking sites to obtain a measure of public opinion that is comparable, or better, than those obtained through surveys?
Study
To better understand how much Twitter and other social networking sites can gauge public opinion, we first consider the challenges and opportunities involved in conducting public opinion surveys using social media data. Specifically, we talk about three challenges: identifying political opinion, representativeness of social media users, and aggregating from individual responses to public opinion. Social media provides an opportunity to examine the opinions of the public without any prompting or framing effects from analysts. Rather than measure what someone thinks about politics in the artificial environments of a front porch, dinnertime phone call, or survey web page, we can observe how people spontaneously speak about politics in the course of their daily lives. The reach of social media is also far wider, with relatively low cost.
Results
Overall, we outline some strategies for overcoming these challenges by highlighting some uses for social media that have fewer direct analogs in traditional survey work. Overall, we find and make some suggestions for potential new directions for research in using social media for public opinion work.