RSSS Data Sprint 2020: tools, methods, data and ideas

The four-day event took place last week, consisting of two days of masterclasses and two days of data sprint. Rob Ackland opening masterclass included an introduction to data collection and network visualisation using the VOSON Lab open source tools: vosonSML and VOSON Dashboard as well as the Statnet package for statistical network analysis; Professor Ken Benoit presented an introduction to text analysis and the quanteda package; Dr Ignacio Ojea introduced to the agent modelling software: NetLogo, software developed by the Northwestern's Center for Connected Learning and Computer-Based Modeling. Masterclasses closed with an introduction to machine learning and natural language processing using Python by Ian Wood.

The Data sprint,  inspired by hackathons organised by the open-source community, aimed at exploring incivility behaviour on social media. During the two days, the group intensively explored incivility in two Reddit groups, including data collection, quantitative and qualitative data analysis, and data visualisation.  The session wrapped up with preliminary findings, which are the stepping stones for a research paper.