Communications of the ACM
Social Media Posts Can Reveal Your Socioeconomic Status
Online posting activity can reveal income, making user profiling possible.
Researchers analyzed 2.6 million posts on the Nextdoor social media network and accurately predicted individuals' income by solely examining the posts they've published.
"Our study shows that the text posted by users in poor neighborhoods is distinguishable from the text generated in wealthier neighborhoods," says Ignacio Castro, a lecturer in data analytics at Queen Mary University of London, and an author of the published study.
The researchers found that different levels of income result in different online behaviors, and that user-generated content can predict both income and inequality, enabling user profiling. The researchers collected and analyzed posts from neighborhoods in the United States and the United Kingdom.
Residents who live in richer neighborhoods are more concerned about crime, with the 20% richest neighborhoods discussing crime approximately 1.5 times more compared to the poorest neighborhoods, where crime levels are 1.3 times higher.
From Queen Mary University of London
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