Juxtaposing 5G Coronavirus Tweets with General Coronavirus Tweets During the Early Months of Coronavirus Outbreak
2021 IEEE 34th International Symposium on Computer-Based Medical Systems (CBMS), page 597-602. (2021)DOI: 10.1109/CBMS52027.2021.00107
Abstract
Understanding the behaviour of online communities on social media platforms helps in controlling the accompanying adverse phenomena like false claims and conspiracy theories. Towards that aim, we present a multifaceted analysis of Twitter users and set a special focus on their 5G coronavirus tweets, in the light of the infamous 5G conspiracy theory. We contrast their idiosyncrasies with general coronavirus tweets in five million tweets acquired over a period of four months and a cadence of two weeks. We find that awareness raising and situation monitoring are two main concerns of Twitter online community. Additionally, 0.13% of the elicited tweets mention 5G, where a causal relationship between 5G and coronavirus besides China-related discussions are more evident compared to overall tweets. Indicators of other conspiracy theories appear more frequently in 5G coronavirus tweets as well.
