Analyzing Political Communication with Digital Trace Data

1. Front Matter

   Pages i-xxi

   PDF

2. Introduction: How to Use Twitter in the Social Sciences

   • Andreas Jungherr

   Pages 1-10

3. Twitter, Usage and Research

   • Andreas Jungherr

   Pages 11-23

4. Twitter in the Analysis of Social Phenomena: An Interpretative Framework

   • Andreas Jungherr

   Pages 25-68

5. Twitter as Political Communication Space: Publics, Prominent Users, and Politicians

   • Andreas Jungherr

   Pages 69-106

6. Sensor of Attention to Politics

   • Andreas Jungherr

   Pages 107-154

7. The Media Connection

   • Andreas Jungherr

   Pages 155-188

8. Predictor of Electoral Success and Public Opinion at Large

   • Andreas Jungherr

   Pages 189-210

9. Conclusion: Twitter and the Analysis of Social Phenomena

   • Andreas Jungherr

   Pages 211-220

This book offers a framework for the analysis of political communication in election campaigns based on digital trace data that documents political behavior, interests and opinions. The author investigates the data-generating processes leading users to interact with digital services in politically relevant contexts. These interactions produce digital traces, which in turn can be analyzed to draw inferences on political events or the phenomena that give rise to them. Various factors mediate the image of political reality emerging from digital trace data, such as the users of digital services’ political interests, attitudes or attention to politics. In order to arrive at valid inferences about the political reality on the basis of digital trace data, these mediating factors have to be accounted for. The author presents this interpretative framework in a detailed analysis of Twitter messages referring to politics in the context of the 2009 federal elections in Germany. This book will appeal to scholars interested in the field of political communication, as well as practitioners active in the political arena.

• Big Data
• Computational Social Science
• Digital Media
• Digital Trace Data
• Political Communication
• Twitter
• media research

• University of Mannheim, Mannheim, Germany

  Andreas Jungherr

Andreas Jungherr is a research fellow at the Chair of Political Psychology at the University of Mannheim, Germany. His research focuses on the use of digital trace data in the social sciences and the effects of the Internet on political communication and electoral campaigns. His research has been published in Journal of Communication, Internet Research and Social Science Computer Review.

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