The Diffusion of Crisis-Related Communication on Social Media: An Empirical Analysis of Facebook Reactions

During a crisis, authorities need to effectively disseminate information. We address the problem of deciding how crisis-related information should be published on Facebook to reach as many people as possible. We examine three recent terrorist attacks in Berlin, London and Stockholm. Our specific focus lies with official Facebook pages by municipalities and emergency service agencies. We collected posts about the events, along with the number of shares, likes and emotional reactions to them. In a regression analysis, several variables were examined that capture decisions on which information to publish and how. Posts containing condolences were found to result in three times as many emotiona…

When are researchers willing to share their data? - Impacts of values and uncertainty on open data in academia.

PLOS ONE 15(7), e0234172 (2020). doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0234172

Enhancing Disaster Response for Hazardous Materials Using Emerging Technologies: The Role of AI and a Research Agenda

Despite all efforts like the introduction of new training methods and personal protective equipment, the need to reduce the number of First Responders (FRs) fatalities and injuries remains. Reports show that advances in technology have not yet resulted in protecting FRs from injuries, health impacts, and odorless toxic gases effectively. Currently, there are emerging technologies that can be exploited and applied in emergency management settings to improve FRs protection. The aim of this paper is threefold: First, to conduct scenario analysis and situations that currently threat the first responders. Second, to conduct gap analysis concerning the new technology needs in relations to the pro…

Virtual Reality Applications for Higher Educations: A Market Analysis

Social Media Data in an Augmented Reality System for Situation Awareness Support in Emergency Control Rooms

AbstractDuring crisis situations, emergency operators require fast information access to achieve situation awareness and make the best possible decisions. Augmented reality could be used to visualize the wealth of user-generated content available on social media and enable context-adaptive functions for emergency operators. Although emergency operators agree that social media analytics will be important for their future work, it poses a challenge to filter and visualize large amounts of social media data. We conducted a goal-directed task analysis to identify the situation awareness requirements of emergency operators. By collecting tweets during two storms in Germany we evaluated the usefu…

More than experience? On the unique opportunities of virtual reality to afford a holistic experiential learning cycle

Virtual reality has been proposed as a promising technology for higher education since the combination of immersive and interactive features enables experiential learning. However, previous studies did not distinguish between the different learning modes of the four-stage experiential learning cycle (i.e., concrete experience, reflective observation, abstract conceptualization, and active experimentation). With our study, we contribute a deeper understanding of how the unique opportunities of virtual reality can afford each of the four experiential learning modes. We conducted three design thinking workshops with interdisciplinary teams of students and lecturers. These workshops resulted in…