How did an election fraud narrative spread online? Testing theories us-ing machine learning and natural language processing

Abstract

In this study, we investigated 1) how election fraud narratives propagated on social media, and 2) the role of influential actors in the process of building and spreading the election fraud narratives. We applied machine learning (ML) and natural language processing (NLP) methods to examine Twitter data related to an election fraud narrative following the 2020 Presidential election. We identified influential actors and found evidence for the former President’s use of social media to cue group identity. 

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