Associations of Topics of Discussion on Twitter With Survey Measures of Attitudes, Knowledge, and Behaviors Related to Zika: Probabilistic Study in the United States.

ABSTRACT:

Background

Recent outbreaks of Zika virus around the world led to increased discussions about this issue on social media platforms such as Twitter. These discussions may provide useful information about attitudes, knowledge, and behaviors of the population regarding issues that are important for public policy.

Objective

We sought to identify the associations of the topics of discussions on Twitter and survey measures of Zika-related attitudes, knowledge, and behaviors, not solely based upon the volume of such discussions but by analyzing the content of conversations using probabilistic techniques.

Methods

Using probabilistic topic modeling with US county and week as the unit of analysis, we analyzed the content of Twitter online communications to identify topics relat

SUBMITTER: Farhadloo M 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC5889815 | biostudies-literature | 2018 Feb

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature