A lot can be conveyed in 140 characters. Twitter allows for people to express their thoughts and emotions quickly and broadcast them in real time. This provides us with a large amount of untapped data, which the New England Complex Systems Institute used to map the change of sentiment of New Yorkers near different city landmarks.
What the research uncovered was that there were clear patterns of more positive tweets near public parks like Central Park, and the sentiment turned noticeably sour around transportation hubs like Penn Station, the Brooklyn Bridge and the airports. They also found that sentiment peaks on a daily basis around midnight then drops between 9 am and 12 pm.
These findings provide support to the efforts of the TKF Foundation to create public greenspaces that offer temporary sanctuary, encourage reflection and engender peace and well-being. Our research has shown that immersion in natural environments can positively influence physical and mental health, both which can be connected to the sentiment of a population.
A special algorithm was developed to classify tweets as positive or negative and then use their geotags and time information to create a map. Elements of the tweets that helped to identify their sentiment included the use of different emoticons and words that express emotions.
>>Learn more about the report here.
