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Sandra L. Lynch (LAW’71, Hon.’12), Chief Judge of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the First Circuit, delivers the Baccalaureate address to the Class of 2012 at Marsh Chapel before the University’s 139th Commencement. Hosted by Boston University on May 20, 2012.

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Judge Sandra L. Lynch: 2012 Baccalaureate Address

When it comes to sex and love, what is blurring the line? It’s been said that every seven seconds men think about sex, but what time of day do they think about it most, are they the only ones thinking about it, and what causes them to think about it? Oh, and as for love, why do we so often get the two confused? Is there some kind of factor causing this blur? The results of this study give us some insight into the love lives of men and women. Thanks to University of Edinburgh we were able to conduct this research using a tool they developed called TweetOLife . Researchers used TweetOLife to analyze millions of tweets collected between November 2009 and February 2010. It let us analyze the gender and hourly differences of these tweets, so that we could end up with the results below. Which Gender Actually Talks About Sex More Our first two questions were common ones: which gender talks about love more and which gender talks about sex more? If you look at the graph below, you’ll find that women talk about love 26% more than men. The exact numbers showing 37% of men and 63% of women discussed love. But what surprised us is that it is pretty even between the genders when it comes to who is talking about sex. Turns out women talk about sex nearly the same as men do. The actual numbers reveal 48% of men and 52% of women tweeted about sex. So When Is Sex On the Mind? So we know who’s talking about it sex and love, but when are they talking about it, and what is making them think about it? This answer was not that surprising: alcohol. When we looked at the frequency of tweets containing the word “drunk,” we noticed these tweets peaked from 10pm to 2am. We also noticed tweets containing the words “sex” and “love” also increased during these times. Just for fun, we put in the word “horny” and it had the highest correlation with “drunk” tweets. While this study is not perfect, it does reveal some interesting insights into the sex and love lives of men and women. It also gives us an idea of what may be blurring the line between these two feelings. It is important to remember these are general topics and phrases used in tweets. For example, analyzing tweets from a person saying “I love my boyfriend” would have been mixed in with the same patch of people stating “I love Justin Bieber.” Fans drunken love for Bieber would make a cool study though. In the study’s defense, these people are still stating their love which may have increased with intoxication. Also, to make sure this did not flaw the data we also tested the phrase “I love you” and found a similar correlation. So what can we learn from this study? If someone tells you they love you between 10pm and 2am, you might not want to trust what they are telling you.

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When Is Sex On the Mind?

Boston University Professor N. Venkat Venkatraman discusses possible risks associated with Facebook’s IPO. Venkatraman is a professor in the Information Systems Department of BU’s School of Management.

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N. Venkat Venkatraman: Evaluating the risk factors of the Facebook IPO

Boston University Professor N. Venkat Venkatraman explains what the Facebook IPO means for the company, users, competitors and the broader economy. Venkatraman is a professor in the Information Systems Department of BU’s School of Management.

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N. Venkat Venkatraman: What does the Facebook IPO mean for users, competitors & the economy?

A study from the University of Bristol’s Intelligent Systems Laboratory indicates that posts from Twitter users can serve as an accurate indicator of overall public opinion. Researchers Thomas Lansdall-Welfare, Vasileios Lampos and Nello Cristianin monitored keywords in random tweets from July of 2009 to January of 2012, tracking 140-character messages from nearly 10 million users to monitor public moods in the UK. The resulting study, “Effects of the recession on public mood in the UK,” shows correlations between tweets and public opinion. The researchers, who presented their findings at the International Workshop on Social Media Applications in News and Entertainment, noted increases in sadness, anger and fear in summer of 2011 during the London riots. Negative tweets also rose sharply in October of 2010 when the UK government announced sweeping spending cuts. Interestingly, negative emotions dropped during the wedding of Prince William and Kate Middleton. Researchers note that these events do not necessarily correlate with the full extent of Twitter users’ changes in tone and mood. While the goal of the study was to monitor Twitter users’ reaction to the recession, researchers did not intend to interpret the significance of specific events. Instead, they intended to show how Twitter’s micro-blogging format and widespread use makes it an accurate tool for monitoring overall public opinion. The researchers note that regular analysis of tweets could allow public officials to predict riots or to gauge the overall hostility of well-connected populations. There are certainly limitations to the study’s applications. Because the researchers used a “word mining” technique to collect their data, their results are less accurate. Some users might use trigger words ironically or sarcastically, which should not count towards an overall assessment of public opinion. The researchers note that their study’s accuracy would improve if they were able to pick through the results by hand. However, as the study looked at more than 484 million tweets, researchers could not have accurately sorted their results without severely diminishing their sample group. The study also has a more obvious skew: it focuses on Twitter users. Twitter users are more likely to be young and female than other social media websites’ users, so the user base’s opinion is less accurate than a general unbiased poll. As the study used basic keyword analysis to track joy, sadness, anger and fear, it also provides a very simplified picture of the UK population’s reactivity. Given Twitter’s 140-character limitations, some users might use more hyperbole in their online updates than they would in their day-to-day interactions, which would trigger an unrealistically dramatic change in the research data. Nevertheless, the research shows the feasibility of tracking public opinion through social media websites. Researchers could see Twitter users react in predictable ways to holidays like Christmas and Valentine’s Day. They could also instantaneously monitor public opinion during major news events to see visible changes in public opinion. The team’s future work will focus on a comparison of traditional media and social media. This will likely mean a comparison of general public polls and the research data to test the accuracy of the data. Until the researchers can test the accuracy of the data, any detailed analysis of the team’s data is premature. The research might show an accurate assessment of Twitter users’ opinions, but those users are certainly biased. This is not to say that the study isn’t exciting–future research on how social media users show their moods could have numerous advantages for social media marketers, political analysts and other professionals. Still, it is important to note that this type of research makes quick headlines, but analysts should give attention to possible biases before reading too far into the data.

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Can Twitter Accurately Show Public Moods?

The team from the Kenan-Flagler Business School, University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill was awarded the top prize of $25,000 at the 2012 BU School of Management International Tech Strategy Case Competition sponsored by Ericsson. Team members included Jae Lee, Rohan Vaidyanathan, Christophe Renaud, and Maciej Dudek. This year’s competition focused on the role a Networked Society could play in innovating education. Each team was asked how Ericsson could develop successful business models that will create value for the world in a Networked Society through education and the sharing and combining of expertise. The winning team took a holistic, two-pronged approach to closing the gaps in communication and access to information with their “Education Technology Platform” (ETP).

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School of Management/Ericsson 2012 Tech Strategy Case Comp Winning Presentation