Copyright © 2020 PhdAssistance. All rights reserved 1

How You Can Use Twitter as a Tool for Phd Health Research

Dr. Nancy Agens, Head,

Technical Operations, Phdassistance

info@phdassistance.com

In brief

We explore the rapidly growing field of using

social media especially Twitter as a source of

data for Health and Medicine related

Research. The types of data available and

their application, the limitations in

Methodology and standard guidelines with

future areas of research are highlighted.

Keywords: Twitter, PhD health research

Dissertation Topic Selection, Best Research

Thesis topic, computing Dissertation topic

selection, PhD statistics topic selection

support.

I. REALITY OF THE VIRTUAL WORLD-

AN OXYMORON

No one can escape living in the virtual world

today. The virtual world is brimming with

Information and knowledge whose scope is

much beyond one had imagined even till five

years ago. In their attempts to find

comprehensive databases, health workers and

researchers are tapping the potential of these

major interactive sites. These sites transcend

geography and hold the potential in providing

significant data related to population health,

preferences, trends, and behaviour patterns.

Predominant among these are Facebook,

Instagram, and Twitter with Twitter being the

most used for public health research

(Alshaikh, Ramzan, Rawaf, & Majeed, 2014).

II. “TWEET” “TWEET”

Twitter is a social media interacting site based

out of San Francisco with over 25 offices

worldwide. Users register and can post their

messages or „tweets‟ of up to 280 characters

while interacting with each other. It is termed

as „SMS of the internet‟ due to the large

number of registered users running into

hundreds of millions. It is the most widely

used social medium for Research related to

Healthcare, because of the ease of access to

huge amount of data available to open access

(Twitter, 2020). Also,

● Tweets are consistent in length, machine

learning methods work better,

● Data is real-time, making time series

analysis possible,

● Interaction between people allows better

network analysis,

● Almost 100% data available through API,

● Uses hastag# making search by key words

easy,

● Sentiment analysis is easy with the „like‟,

„dislike‟ feature,

● Larger demographic group involved,

● Any user can follow another user.

It is for the above reasons that though

Twitter is not as widely used as Facebook or

WhatsApp, still it is the one that has attracted

Academics and Researchers the most,

making it a powerful tool for research data

(Neiger, Thackeray, Burton, Giraud-Carrier, &

Fagen, 2013).

III. WHAT TO USE AND HOW?

Sinnenberg et al performed a systematic

review of the studies conducted using Twitter

as a tool for health research. They summarized

the ways in which data from Twitter was used

for purpose of research (Sinnenberg et al.,

2017): -

● Content analysis – here body of text is

analysed and information relevant to the

topic is used. E.g. Content related to a

health topic like obesity or cancer.

● Sentiment analysis – The positive or

negative agreement to the topic in question

is analysed and data is used. E.g. „High

traffic‟ topics fund best research thesis.

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● Image analysis –Assessment of images in

the body of the text is analysed in the

context of the topic.

● Surveillance – Monitoring the level of

activity related to the topic in relation to

the background level of activity. E.g.

Dissertation topic selection can be done

based on the „hot‟ topics on social media.

● Prediction – Estimating prevalence of a

condition

● Engagement–Ability of a topic to engage

users to tweet, retweet and remain engaged

in the discussion with other users.

● Network analysis – Assessing interaction

between users on a topic.

● Recruitment (Fenner et al., 2012) – Using

the platform to recruit subjects for a

research study. E.g. recruitment of study

population having a rare condition.

● Intervention (Hawn, 2009) - Using the

platform to intervene in a research study.

E.g. weight loss, nutrition, smoking

cessation related interventions and their

outcome study. This could form a unique

method for PhD statistics topic selection

support (Balatsoukas, Kennedy, Buchan,

Powell, & Ainsworth, 2015).

● Ethical discussion - Studying the need for

approvals from ethical boards. E.g.

Whether online or written patient consent

is needed for research. Consent for using

Twitter data in addition to the terms and

conditions of service agreement at the time

of user registration.

● Funding – Database of organizations

funding research work.

● Computing Dissertation topic selection

performed on the Twitter-based research is

commonly related to public health,

infectious disease, behavioural medicine,

and psychiatry.

IV. THE ROAD AHEAD

● Standard processes for how the Twitter

data should be used is not defined. There

needs to be uniform reporting procedures

clearly defined and agreed upon. Time-to-

time these SOPs need to be revisited and

redone based on lessons learnt in the

interim period (Tsou, 2015).

● Criteria for validity, reliability and

scalability of Twitter-driven data need to

be studied and several organizations are

actively involved in funding such research.

● Also, privacy of data and ethical issues is a

broad field where clear-cut guidelines are

needed.

● Underutilisation of Twitter data is another

area of concern and guidelines regarding

the same are the need of the hour. Twitter

API vis-à-vis Twitter firehose accessing

1% and complete data, respectively.

● Twitter‟s data sharing policy and

affordances of the public API make the

database for research complicated and one

needs to be aware of these limitations to

understand the factors that can skew the

research study.

● Machine learning involving data

scientists for better understanding of the

demographic data of the users participating

in the research.

● Better use of the platform to study chronic

illnesses like diabetes and hypertension.

● Studying the effectiveness of using

Twitter-based data for medical research.

V. CONCLUSION

Twitter-based Medical Research is a

rapidly growing niche area with publications

almost doubling year on year in the last 2-3

years. The huge database with open access

along with opportunity for recruitment and

intervention are the major selling points for

Twitter compared to the other social media

sites. However, there are several limitations to

the methodology used by the different

research groups, the most significant being the

lack of standard reporting protocols and there

is an urgent need to address this with uniform

guidelines.

REFERENCES

[1] Alshaikh, F., Ramzan, F., Rawaf, S., & Majeed, A. (2014).

Social Network Sites as a Mode to Collect Health Data:

A Systematic Review. Journal of Medical Internet

Research, 16(7), e171.

https://doi.org/10.2196/jmir.3050

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[2] Balatsoukas, P., Kennedy, C. M., Buchan, I., Powell, J., &

Ainsworth, J. (2015). The Role of Social Network

Technologies in Online Health Promotion: A Narrative

Review of Theoretical and Empirical Factors

Influencing Intervention Effectiveness. Journal of

Medical Internet Research, 17(6), e141.

https://doi.org/10.2196/jmir.3662

[3] Fenner, Y., Garland, S. M., Moore, E. E., Jayasinghe, Y.,

Fletcher, A., Tabrizi, S. N., … Wark, J. D. (2012).

Web-Based Recruiting for Health Research Using a

Social Networking Site: An Exploratory Study. Journal

of Medical Internet Research, 14(1), e20.

https://doi.org/10.2196/jmir.1978

[4] Hawn, C. (2009). Take Two Aspirin And Tweet Me In

The Morning: How Twitter, Facebook, And Other

Social Media Are Reshaping Health Care. Health

Affairs, 28(2), 361–368.

https://doi.org/10.1377/hlthaff.28.2.361

[5] Neiger, B. L., Thackeray, R., Burton, S. H., Giraud-

Carrier, C. G., & Fagen, M. C. (2013). Evaluating

social media‟s capacity to develop engaged audiences

in health promotion settings: use of Twitter metrics as a

case study. Health Promotion Practice, 14(2), 157–

162. Retrieved from

https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/1524839

912469378

[6] Sinnenberg, L., Buttenheim, A. M., Padrez, K., Mancheno,

C., Ungar, L., & Merchant, R. M. (2017). Twitter as a

Tool for Health Research: A Systematic Review.

American Journal of Public Health, 107(1), e1–e8.

https://doi.org/10.2105/AJPH.2016.303512

[7] Tsou, M.-H. (2015). Research challenges and

opportunities in mapping social media and Big Data.

Cartography and Geographic Information Science,

42(sup1), 70–74. Retrieved from

https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/1523040

6.2015.1059251

[8] Twitter. (2020). Our talented and diverse employees work

together across 35+ offices worldwide. Retrieved July

4, 2020, from Twitter website:

https://about.twitter.com/en_us/company.html

itter‟s unique infrastructure and

the near-total availability of its data have ensured its

popularity among researchers remains

high

itter‟s unique infrastructure and

the near-total availability of its data have ensured its

popularity among researchers remains

high