Over the past few years, social media platforms like Facebook, Instagram, and TikTok have become an essential communication infrastructure for both society and the individual. An increasing portion of our daily conversations occur through the mediation of these platforms. This mediation makes conversations that were once ephemeral permanent, searchable, scalable, and replicable. Starting with a reflection on the social impact of these four properties, the course focuses on the consequences of these changes for the study of society and communication. During the course, students will gain knowledge on how to find, store, and analyze conversations that take place on TikTok and Facebook.

Specifically, this year's course will be dedicated to analyzing conversations that arise around informative and disinformative content.

Lesson 1

Course Presentation
Media Manipulation and its Actors
Lesson 2

Misinformation, Disinformation, and Types of Disinformation Online

Lesson 3

The Role of Mainstream Media

Lesson 4

Introduction to Twitter and Facebook APIs

Facebook Graph API Explorer

Twitter API Console Tools

The Open Laboratory: Limits and Possibilities of Using Facebook, Twitter, and YouTube as Research Data

Lesson 5

Limits and Opportunities: JSON and CSV Formats

MediaCloud and CrowdTangle

Lesson 6

Coordinated Link Sharing Behaviour

Lesson 7

Social Network Analysis of Groups and Facebook with CooRnet and Gephi

Lesson 8

Introduction to R

Lesson 9

Introduction to Social Media Content Analysis

Lesson 10

Group Formation, Selection of Topics, and Start of Activities

Lesson 11

Workgroup

Lesson 12

Workgroup

Lesson 13

Workgroup

Lesson 13

Workgroup

Lesson 14

Workgroup

Lesson 15

Workgroup

Lesson 16

Preparation of the Final Report

Lesson 17

Preparation of the Final Report

Lesson 18

Preparation of the Final Report

Submission of Report

The registration of the student to the blended space within the first week of the course's start is considered a mandatory prerequisite.

1.1. Students acquire this knowledge by participating in groups in the analysis of data provided by the instructor during lectures.

2.1. Participants develop these skills during the management of the campaign, discussing within the group and with the instructor the evaluation of provisional results and the strategies to improve these results.

3.1. This capacity for judgement should be applied in classroom discussions with the instructor and peers, during practical exercises, and in preparing for the final exam.

4.1. Skills practiced in the classroom through the organization of discussion and exercise sessions.

5.1. Skills to be enhanced through arguments with the instructor and classmates.

The teaching material prepared by the lecturer in addition to recommended textbooks (such as for instance slides, lecture notes, exercises, bibliography) and communications from the lecturer specific to the course can be found inside the Moodle platform › blended.uniurb.it

The teaching material prepared by the lecturer in addition to recommended textbooks (such as for instance slides, lecture notes, exercises, bibliography) and communications from the lecturer specific to the course can be found inside the Moodle platform › blended.uniurb.it

Teaching

Lectures and classroom exercises, use provided data to explore and undersatand the pratical side of dark marketing on social media.

Innovative teaching methods

Problem-based learning
Learning by doing

Attendance

It will be a compulsory attendance, ¾ of the lesson time. Participation at https://edventurepartners.com/peer-to-peer-facebook-global-digital-challenge/.

Course books

• Jack, C. (2017). Lexicon of Lies: Terms for Problematic Information. Data & Society. Retrieved from https://datasociety.net/output/lexicon-of-lies/
• Marwick, A., & Lewis, R. (2017). Media Manipulation and Disinformation Online. Data & Society Research Institute (https://datasociety.net/output/media-manipulation-and-disinfo-online/)
• Acker, A. (2018). Data Craft. Data & Society. https://datasociety.net/library/data-craft/
• Donovan, J., & Friedberg, B. (2019). Source Hacking: Media Manipulation in Practice. Data&Society. https://datasociety.net/output/source-hacking-media-manipulation-in-practice/
• Giglietto, F., Righetti, N., & Marino, G. (2019, September 20). Understanding Coordinated and Inauthentic Link Sharing Behavior on Facebook in the Run-up to 2018 General Election and 2019 European Election in Italy. https://doi.org/10.31235/osf.io/3jteh

Assessment

The assessment of learning will take place through an individual oral interview based on the discussion of the group report, aimed at evaluating both the learning of the content, the ability to reprocess and argue.

Evaluations of excellence will be given for: possession of good critical and in-depth capabilities; the ability to interconnect the main themes addressed in the course; the use of language appropriate to the specificity of the discipline.

Good evaluations will be given for: possession of a rote knowledge of the content; a relative critical ability and connection between the themes addressed; the use of appropriate language.

Sufficient evaluations will be given for: achieving a minimal knowledge base on the themes addressed by the student, despite some educational gaps; the use of inappropriate language.

Negative evaluations will result from: difficulty in orienting with respect to the themes addressed in the exam texts; educational gaps; the use of inappropriate language.

Specifically, the final evaluation is structured as follows: Project work (60%), oral interview (30%), and class participation (10%). The group report will be subject to verification with the university's anti-plagiarism system. Cases of plagiarism will result in a negative evaluation. The assessment of class participation will include the number of lessons attended out of the total, participation in the classroom and in the blended space, contributions to group activity, and the originality of the contributions proposed.

Disability and Specific Learning Disorders (SLD)

Students who have registered their disability certification or SLD certification with the Inclusion and Right to Study Office can request to use conceptual maps (for keywords) during exams.

To this end, it is necessary to send the maps, two weeks before the exam date, to the course instructor, who will verify their compliance with the university guidelines and may request modifications.

This course does not differentiate between “attending” and “non-attending” students with regard to teaching methods, attendance obligations, course books or assessment.