APIs Archives - Social Media and Politics

#174: Web Browsing Data to Study Digital Political Behavior, with Prof. Sebastian Stier

May 5, 2024

Prof. Sebastian Stier, Scientific Director of Computational Social Science at GESIS and Professor of CSS at the University of Mannheim, discusses how web tracking data can inform social science questions. We discuss the data structure of web browsing data, how it is collected, and the types of incentives used to recruit participants. Prof. Stier also shares his insights and research integrating web browsing data with survey data, as well as how LLMs are opening up new methodological avenues in simulated data.

Here are the resources mentioned in the episode:

Analysis of Web Browsing Data: A Guide (2023)

Integrating Survey Data and Digital Trace Data: Key Issues in Developing an Emerging Field (2020)

Post Post-Broadcast Democracy? News Exposure in the Age of Online Intermediaries (2022)

The two R packages: webtrackR and adaR

#64: Platform API Lockouts, Occupy Wall Street, and Transnational Activism, with Dr. Dan Mercea and Dr. Shawn Walker

Dr. Dan Mercea, Senior Lecturer in Sociology at City University of London, and Dr. Shawn Walker, Assistant Professor in Social and Behavioral Sciences in the New College at Arizona State University, guests to discuss the current state of social media research in an environment where researcher are “Locked Out” of access to platform APIs. We also talk about how social media is used in protest movements, particularly Dr. Walker’s work on Occupy Wall Street and Dr. Mercea’s work on transnational serial activists.