The Effect of Social Media on Crowdsourcing Investigation
Open Access
Author:
Ji, Kaeun
Area of Honors:
Political Science
Degree:
Bachelor of Arts
Document Type:
Thesis
Thesis Supervisors:
Andrea H Tapia, Thesis Supervisor Dr. Gretchen G Casper, Thesis Honors Advisor
Keywords:
Social Media Boston Marathon Bombing Crowdsourcing Investigation Twitter
Abstract:
In this thesis, I present a different way of viewing how social media effects crowdsourcing investigations. I explored the Boston Marathon Bombing case and analyzed tweets that were collected during the crisis. I focused on the key participants, the national media, the police, and Twitter, to explain how important it is for them to understand to role of social media in order to prevent reporting false information. From the data, I indicated that there is a lack of understanding by the national media and the police to use social media as an investigation tool. This demonstrates that although social media has a high potential to be a useful tool in investigating, it will only create controversy, if not used correctly. This research suggests that there should be precaution when using social media in future investigations to prevent mistakes.