Unicamp collaborating researcher Fernando Nobre Cavalcante launched on Wednesday (11/5), at the University of Bremen (Germany), version 1.4 of the Qualichat software. Developed for research in WhatsApp groups, the computational package is the result of two years of ethnographic research.
“In the last presidential election, in 2018, Whatsapp was a determining medium for the direction of the election. With this in mind, we presented, together with a network of 50 researchers, a response from the Brazilian academic community to disinformation through the analysis of conversations in this application, which could also influence this year's elections”, emphasizes Fernando.
Qualichat allows you to detect public opinion by obtaining data shared in Whatsapp groups, such as news, topics, people involved, most used words, as well as the days and times with the highest peak of message exchanges.
Fernando explains that researchers can discover the relationship between words or themes and certain actors or groups. In other words, it is possible to identify, with the software, the issues most associated with the truck drivers' group, President Jair Bolsonaro, or former President Lula, for example.
As a result of a partnership with the Qualitube project, from the Federal University of Bahia (UFBA), the computational package also allows us to discover which sites were most shared in the Whatsapp groups studied and the number of views coming from these groups, among other possibilities.
About Qualichat
Qualichat was developed by a network of researchers on the subject of Digital Humanities and Post-Humanisms, from the Institute of Language Studies (IEL) at Unicamp. The project also benefited from debate with the Laboratory for the History of Communication and Media Change at the University of Bremen, in Germany. It was funded by the American Political Science Association and received support from the German company Tutanota, a leader in email encryption.
Scheduled to be launched in an election year, the software was built from extensive dialogue with human sciences researchers interested in offering instruments for research into politics.
Read more:
Tool developed at Unicamp assists in research on fake news on Whatsapp
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