Language matters in Twitter: a large scale study

Details

Event AAAI Conference on Weblogs and Social Media (ICWSM'11)

Authors

Lichan Hong
Convertino, Gregorio
Technical Publications
July 11th 2011
Despite the widespread adoption of Twitter internationally, little research has investigated the differences among users of different languages. In prior research, the natural tendency has been to assume that the behaviors of English users generalize to other language users. We studied 62 million tweets collected over a four-week period and found that more than 100 languages were used. Only half of the tweets were in English (51%). Other popular languages including Japanese, Portuguese, Indonesian, and Spanish together accounted for 39% of the tweets. Examining users of the top 10 languages, we discovered cross-language differences in adoption of features such as URLs, hashtags, mentions, replies, and retweets. We discuss our works implications for research on large-scale social systems and design of cross-cultural communication tools.

Citation

Hong, L.; Convertino, G.; Chi, E. H. Language matters in Twitter: a large scale study. Fifth International AAAI Conference on Weblogs and Social Media (ICWSM'11); 2011 July 17-21; Barcelona; Spain.

Additional information

Focus Areas

Our work is centered around a series of Focus Areas that we believe are the future of science and technology.

FIND OUT MORE
Licensing & Commercialization Opportunities

We’re continually developing new technologies, many of which are available for Commercialization.

FIND OUT MORE
News

PARC scientists and staffers are active members and contributors to the science and technology communities.

FIND OUT MORE