Analyzing the changing landscape of the Covid-19 vaccine debate on Twitter
Bibliographic Data
| ID | 4618567 |
|---|---|
| Authors | Arnaldo Santoro (0009-0006-6039-1594, Ca' Foscari University of Venice), Alessandro Galeazzi (0000-0001-6859-0391, Ca' Foscari University of Venice), Teresa Scantamburlo (0000-0002-3769-8874, Ca' Foscari University of Venice), Andrea Baronchelli (0000-0002-0255-0829, City, University of London), Walter Quattrociocchi (0000-0002-4374-9324, Sapienza University of Rome), Fabiana Zollo (0000-0002-0833-5388, Ca' Foscari University of Venice, corresponding author) |
| Year | 2023 |
| Volume | 13 |
| Issue | 1 |
| Publication date | 2023-09-14 |
| Open Access | Yes |
| Type | ARTICLE |
| Venue | Social Network Analysis and Mining (JOURNAL) |
| Journal identifiers | ISSN: 1869-5450 • E-ISSN: 1869-5469 |
| Publisher | Springer Science and Business Media LLC (PUBLISHER) |
| DOI | 10.1007/s13278-023-01127-3 |
| OpenAlex | W4386736317 |
| Language | EN |
| Citations received | 3 |
| References cited | 33 |
The issue of vaccine hesitancy has posed a significant challenge during the Covid-19 pandemic, as it increases the risk of undermining public health interventions aimed at mitigating the spread of the virus. While the swift development of vaccines represents a remarkable scientific achievement, it has also contributed to skepticism and apprehension among some populations. Against this backdrop, the suspension of the AstraZeneca vaccine by the European Medicines Agency further exacerbated an already contentious debate around vaccine safety. This paper examines the Twitter discourse surrounding Covid-19 vaccines, focusing on the temporal and geographical dimensions of the discussion. Using over a year's worth of data, we study the public debate in five countries (Germany, France, UK, Italy, and the USA), revealing differences in the interaction structure and in the production volume of questionable and reliable sources. Topic modeling highlights variations in the perspectives of reliable and questionable sources, but some similarities across nations. Also, we quantify the effect of vaccine announcement and suspension, finding that only the former had a significant impact in all countries. Finally, we analyze the evolution of the communities in the interaction network, revealing a relatively stable scenario with a few considerable shifts between communities with different levels of reliability. Our results suggest that major external events can be associated with changes in the online debate in terms of content production and interaction patterns. However, despite the AZ suspension, we do not observe any noticeable changes in the production and consumption of misinformation related to Covid-19 vaccines
Apprehension · Misinformation · Pandemic · Political science · Public relations · Social science · Sociology · Law · Media Influence and Politics · Medicine · Misinformation and Its Impacts · Psychology · Vaccine Coverage and Hesitancy
Automatic Time Series Forecasting
Social media and attitudes towards a Covid-19 vaccination
Polarization of the vaccination debate on Facebook
Fast unfolding of communities in large networks
Covid-19 Vaccine Hesitancy in the United States
Growing polarization around climate change on social media
Strengthening vaccination programmes and health systems in the European Union
Filter Bubbles, Echo Chambers, and Online News Consumption
Identification of affective valence of Twitter generated sentiments during the Covid-19 outbreak
Trust in science, social consensus and vaccine confidence
Political polarization of news media and influencers on Twitter in the 2016 and 2020 US presidential elections
Automatically detecting and understanding the perception of Covid-19 vaccination
| Citations per year | 3 |
|---|---|
| Citation span | 2025 - 2026 (2) |
| Highly cited | No |