Northeastern University

The Network Science Institute at Northeastern University is a multidisciplinary institute devoted to understanding the patterns and consequences of connectivity in complex systems. Of particular interest is the role of the internet in contemporary global society; researchers from the Institute have produced some of the key work evaluating how the internet is and should be connecting people to information of various types. This project will use methods drawn from computational social science to understand the role two key sociotechnical systems — Google and Twitter — play in structuring access to information regarding politics, with a particular focus on the prevalence and pathways of misinformation. This grant will support the Institute’s research relating to U.S. democracy.