Evidence map›Paper›PMID 39854483›Full record

ArticlePloS one2025

Examining hurricane-related social media topics longitudinally and at scale: A transformer-based approach.

Dhiraj Murthy, Sophia Elisavet Kurz, Tanvi Anand, Sonali Hornick, Nandhini Lakuduva, Jerry Sun

Abstract read
In one paragraph

Article in PloS one, 2025. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Not yet cited in PubMed.

0numbers the graph read from it
0cells of the map it votes in
0citing papers in PubMed
–field-weighted citation impact
1 · What the graph read from it

What it found

Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.

The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.

2 · The registry

The trial behind it

Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.

Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.

3 · Its place in the literature

Who cites it

0 citing papers in PubMed.

No citing paper in PubMed yet.

4 · The record

Corrections and comments

PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.

5 · Who and what money

Authors and funding

6 authors.

Dhiraj MurthyMoody College of Communication, Department of Sociology, and School of Information, University of Texas at Austin, Austin, Texas, United States of America.ORCID 0000-0001-9734-1124
Sophia Elisavet KurzComputational Media Lab, University of Texas at Austin, Austin, Texas, United States of America.
Tanvi AnandComputational Media Lab, University of Texas at Austin, Austin, Texas, United States of America.
Sonali HornickComputational Media Lab, University of Texas at Austin, Austin, Texas, United States of America.
Nandhini LakuduvaComputational Media Lab, University of Texas at Austin, Austin, Texas, United States of America.
Jerry SunComputational Media Lab, University of Texas at Austin, Austin, Texas, United States of America.

Funding

No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.

6 · The paper itself

Abstract

Instead of turning to emergency phone systems, social media platforms, such as Twitter, have emerged as alternative and sometimes preferred venues for members of the public in the US to communicate during hurricanes and other natural disasters. However, relevant posts are likely to be missed by responders given the volume of content on platforms. Previous work successfully identified relevant posts through machine-learned methods, but depended on human annotators. Our study indicates that a GPU-accelerated version of BERTopic, a transformer-based topic model, can be used without human training to successfully discern topics during multiple hurricanes. We use 1.7 million tweets from four US hurricanes over seven years and categorize identified topics as temporal constructs. Some of the more prominent topics related to disaster relief, user concerns, and weather conditions. Disaster managers can use our model, data, and constructs to be aware of the types of themes social media users are producing and consuming during hurricanes.

Indexed as

Cyclonic StormsSocial MediaDisastersHumans

Identifiers

PMID39854483
PMCPMC11760010

What OpenQuestion holds

Textmetadata
LicenceCC BY
Read underepoch 390

Registered trials

None linked

Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.