Data Provided By Doctors Helped Form Positive Views On Vaccines
A group of researchers in Japan says people who made positive posts about coronavirus vaccines on social media tended to frequently access information provided by doctors.
Using artificial intelligence to analyze Twitter, the group studied shifts in views among people who posted above a certain number of tweets about the vaccines. The information was compiled by IT firm NTT DATA.
The group says AI determined that between June and October last year, 16,044 people who initially did not hold clear views on the vaccines started to write positively about them.
The group also studied the posts those people retweeted 10 days before and after their views of the vaccines became positive.
The group says it found posts by doctors accounted for half the top 20 retweets. Posts by many media outlets and public organizations were also retweeted.
Group leader Professor Toyoda Masashi of the University of Tokyo's Institute of Industrial Science says information provided by many doctors may have played an important role in promoting vaccine rollouts last year.