New in Big Data & Society 🗞️
Alejandra Regla-Vargas, AJ Alvero, and Hajar Yazdiha analyze anti-Asian hate and counter-hate on social media during COVID-19, showing how hate and resistance enact racial projects through shifting frames.
🔗 doi.org/10.1177/2053...
Just popping in to say that I'll be at ESS in DC this week. Send me an email if you'd like to meet up!
Can AI please fold my clothes, that’s what I really need
🧵on my new paper "Synthetic personas distort the structure of human belief systems" w Roberto Cerina I'm v excited about...
🚨 Do synthetic samples look like human samples?
We compare 28 LLMs to the 2024 General Social Survey (GSS) to find out + develop host of diagnostics...
Just popping in to say that I'll be at ESS in DC this week. Send me an email if you'd like to meet up!
I got a tip that all over the world, people are using a dead-simple hack to manipulate AI behavior. It turns out changing what AI tells other people can be as easy as writing a blog post *on your own website*
I didn’t believe it, so I decided to test it myself www.bbc.com/future/artic...
Thanks!! 😊
Thanks so much for sharing our paper! @estelabdiaz.bsky.social
Morning read. A good paper about how admissions “consultants” make sense of their work in a deeply, deliberately unequal competition for a limited good. Humans are good at making stories.
academic.oup.com/socpro/advan...
No document will protect you. All they have to do is take it from you and "lose" it; take it from you and say you never gave it to them; claim it's fake ⬇️; make a new rule that you need ANOTHER document. Citizenship is a made-up status that governments decide the rules for. No one is free until all.
Thank you! SocPIE was a great audience!
New in @socprobsjournal.bsky.social w/ @estelabdiaz.bsky.social: the rapid growth of the admissions consulting industry has raised questions about inequality, privilege, and merit. We combine two original data sources to ask how consultants make sense of their work.
academic.oup.com/socpro/advan...
Bar chart showing the most common reasons that Democrats cite for being frustrated with their party. The chart is based on a September 2025 Pew Research Center survey.
Two-thirds of Democrats say their own party makes them feel frustrated. By far the most commonly cited reason is that the party is not pushing back hard enough against Trump. www.pewresearch.org/politics/202...
Two posts asking whether university administrators have thought about the consequences of purchasing and promoting AI for college campuses given a well documented college mental health crisis, and pointing out that university investment and endorsement may signal to students that dangerous technology is safe and beneficial
since chatgpt has coached another young person in a mental health crisis to their death, I am yet again tapping the sign
New from me +friends!
When my colleagues and I decided not to grade our course assignments, I was certain it would blow up in my face. But it didn't! We studied how our students responded—and discussed what we found on the Teaching Sociology podcast.
sagesociology.libsyn.com/teaching-soc...
Turn off location permissions for as many apps as you can. (3/4)
Turn off your phone’s “advertising ID” to make it harder for location data brokers to track you. (2/4)
I do not want the video. I will never watch the video. I usually won’t even give the video the effort of complaint.
I just want to read the news story. Give me the text. This would be my Ted Talk but that would be text too.
![Breaking News Consumer's Handbook
1. In the immediate aftermath, news outlets will get it wrong.
2. Don't trust anonymous sources.
3. Don't trust stories that cite another news outlet as the source of the information.
4. There's almost never a second shooter.
5. Pay attention to the language the media uses.
- "We are getting reports"... could mean anything.
- "We are seeking confirmation"... means they don't haveit.
- "[News outlet] has learned"... means it has a scoop or is going out on a limb.
6. Look for news outlets close to the incident.
7. Compare multiple sources.
8. Big news brings out the fakers. And photoshoppers.
9. Beware reflexive retweeting. Some of this is on you.](https://cdn.bsky.app/img/feed_thumbnail/plain/did:plc:qjoddtmp5jxzkzvt3hoqz3tt/bafkreigi2e6uxrt67htjbrfcmtpbasfuz4jvetyyecnqvxxyt45zile72y@jpeg)
Breaking News Consumer's Handbook 1. In the immediate aftermath, news outlets will get it wrong. 2. Don't trust anonymous sources. 3. Don't trust stories that cite another news outlet as the source of the information. 4. There's almost never a second shooter. 5. Pay attention to the language the media uses. - "We are getting reports"... could mean anything. - "We are seeking confirmation"... means they don't haveit. - "[News outlet] has learned"... means it has a scoop or is going out on a limb. 6. Look for news outlets close to the incident. 7. Compare multiple sources. 8. Big news brings out the fakers. And photoshoppers. 9. Beware reflexive retweeting. Some of this is on you.
With alt text:
You cannot effectively delete what is posted publicly on Bluesky. Data scientists (not affiliated with Bluesky) and commercial companies capture it all live, every comma and em dash.
Anything said in the heat of the moment could follow you to a job interview ten years from now.
Capisce?
This is a reminder that if you are faculty in Texas or anywhere else for that matter you need to join @texasaaup.bsky.social and @aaup.org . Your administration will not protect you from right wing attacks
In an experiment, Pew Research Center demonstrated that opt-in and probability-based surveys produced very different results about young adults' views of the Holocaust and abortion.
Remember, if you encounter what seems like an implausible survey finding, ask:
1. Were survey respondents selected randomly or was this an opt-in poll?
2. Could the results, especially for young adults, be driven by bogus respondents?
Keep this post in mind: www.pewresearch.org/short-reads/... 🧪
🌟On the Market Spotlight🌟
🧑🏫Meet Olivia Hu @oliviayhu.bsky.social, postdoc with the Program on Race, Science, and Society at UPenn
🔬Research interests:
Race & Ethnicity, Gender, Sexualities, Family, Immigration, Intersectionality, Culture, Asian American Studies, Qualitative Methods
On the job market and researching Asia or Asian America? We’d love to spotlight your work and cheer you on! Please share your name, photo, social media handle (Facebook/Bluesky), institutional affiliation, current position, research interests, (1/2)
Is this... the party of free speech?
"Although there has been between $30 and $40 billion in enterprise investment into generative AI, a recent MIT report shows that 95 percent of organizations are seeing zero return."
... whilst I open yet another email missive about incorporating AI into my teaching.
thehill.com/policy/techn...
Why should I write better when a machine can do it for me? Because actually no one can do it for you, because your voice is unique among all the people on earth. Siri never petted a horse's neck. Alexa has never been ghosted by the captain of the football team. But you have lived, your heart is beating, you have suffered, and you have something important to say. It's a human's job, to use words, and whatever job you give to a machine, that part of your brain goes dark. Maybe it's worth it when it comes to remembering phone numbers and directions, but when that part of your brain that uses words goes dark, that's a vast area that's very close to your soul. Don't let some internet platform convince you that what you have to say and create isn't worthwhile. Words are the echo of your soul. Honing that echo matters.
this iconic advertising copywriter named Kathy Hepinstall Parks died over the weekend and I wanted to share something from her website I thought Bluesky would like
Is there a link to a full report where this graphic is from? I'd like to use it in my class.
