Accepted for/Published in: Journal of Medical Internet Research
Date Submitted: Sep 14, 2022
Date Accepted: Mar 27, 2023
Date Submitted to PubMed: Jul 4, 2023
Warning: This is an author submission that is not peer-reviewed or edited. Preprints - unless they show as "accepted" - should not be relied on to guide clinical practice or health-related behavior and should not be reported in news media as established information.
COVID-19 among Spanish speaking and Caribbean communities: analysis of information circulation using a social media-based multidimensional model
ABSTRACT
Background:
Scientific research from North America and Europe tends to predominate on the internet, benefiting English speaking users. Meanwhile, the COVID-19 death rate at the beginning of the pandemic in Spanish speaking countries was high, and information about near-by Caribbean countries was rarely highlighted. Given that social media usage is increasing in these regions, detailed examination on how academic information about the coronavirus was diffused online is required.
Objective:
The objective of this study was to provide a multidimensional analysis of peer-reviewed information circulation related to COVID-19 in Spanish speaking and Caribbean regions.
Methods:
COVID-19 related peer-reviewed resources shared by online media accounts located in Spanish speaking and Caribbean countries were found through the altmetric website and their information collected. We employed a multidimensional model to examine this data, considering time, individuality, place, activity and relations.
Results:
Perception of scientific expertise was heavily concentrated in few peer- reviewed sources in the English language during the beginning of the pandemic. While the top scientific journals mentioned were from anglo speaking westernized regions, the top scientific authorship was from China. Also, top co-occurrences of authorship were among institutions located in the same country. A combination of media outlets, educational institutions and expert associations, particularly from Panama, were relevant for the diffusion of peer-reviewed information in the studied regions.
Conclusions:
We were able to determine diffusion patterns of peer-reviewed resources in Spanish speaking countries and Caribbean territories. The present study aims to advance management and analysis of online public data from People of Color for the improvement of public health communication in their regions.
Citation
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Copyright
© The authors. All rights reserved. This is a privileged document currently under peer-review/community review (or an accepted/rejected manuscript). Authors have provided JMIR Publications with an exclusive license to publish this preprint on it's website for review and ahead-of-print citation purposes only. While the final peer-reviewed paper may be licensed under a cc-by license on publication, at this stage authors and publisher expressively prohibit redistribution of this draft paper other than for review purposes.