Emanuele Brugnoli

Emanuele Brugnoli, Marco Delmastro

The Covid-19 pandemic has sparked renewed attention on the prevalence of misinformation online, whether intentional or not, underscoring the potential risks posed to individuals' quality of life associated with the dissemination of misconceptions and enduring myths on health-related subjects. In this study, we analyze 6 years (2016-2021) of Italian vaccine debate across diverse social media platforms (Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, YouTube), encompassing all major news sources - both questionable and reliable. We first use the symbolic transfer entropy analysis of news production time-series to dynamically determine which category of sources, questionable or reliable, causally drives the agenda on vaccines. Then, leveraging deep learning models capable to accurately classify vaccine-related content based on the conveyed stance and discussed topic, respectively, we evaluate the focus on various topics by news sources promoting opposing views and compare the resulting user engagement. Aside from providing valuable resources for further investigation of vaccine-related misinformation, particularly in a language (Italian) that receives less attention in scientific research compared to languages like English, our study uncovers misinformation not as a parasite of the news ecosystem that merely opposes the perspectives offered by mainstream media, but as an autonomous force capable of even overwhelming the production of vaccine-related content from the latter. While the pervasiveness of misinformation is evident in the significantly higher engagement of questionable sources compared to reliable ones, our findings underscore the importance of consistent and thorough pro-vax coverage. This is especially crucial in addressing the most sensitive topics where the risk of misinformation spreading and potentially exacerbating negative attitudes toward vaccines among the users involved is higher.

Emanuele Brugnoli, Rosaria Simone, Marco Delmastro

The media attention to the personal sphere of famous and important individuals has become a key element of the gender narrative. Here we combine lexical, syntactic and sentiment analysis to investigate the role of gender in the personalization of a wide range of political office holders in Italy during the period 2017-2020. On the basis of a score for words that is introduced to account for gender unbalance in both representative and news coverage, we show that the political personalization in Italy is more detrimental for women than men, with the persistence of entrenched stereotypes including a masculine connotation of leadership, the resulting women's unsuitability to hold political functions, and a greater deal of focus on their attractiveness and body parts. In addition, women politicians are covered with a more negative tone than their men counterpart when personal details are reported. Further, the major contribution to the observed gender differences comes from online news rather than print news, suggesting that the expression of certain stereotypes may be better conveyed when click baiting and personal targeting have a major impact.