Spatiotemporal Analysis to Observe Gender-Based Check-In Behavior by Using Social Media Big Data

What is it about?

The primary objective of this research is to explore human check-in behavior by male and female users in Guangzhou, China toward using Chinese microblog Sina Weibo (referred to as “Weibo”), which is missing in the existing literature.

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Photo by Austin Distel on Unsplash

Photo by Austin Distel on Unsplash

Why is it important?

In a location-based social network, users socialize with each other by sharing their current location in the form of “check-in,” which allows users to reveal the current places they visit as part of their social interaction. Understanding this human check-in phenomenon in space and time on location based social network (LBSN) datasets, which is also called “check-in behavior,” can archive the day-to-day activity patterns, usage behaviors toward social media, and presents spatiotemporal evidence of users’ daily routines. It also provides a wide range of opportunities to observe (i.e., mobility, urban activities, defining city boundary, and community problems in a city). In representing human check-in behavior, these LBSN datasets do not reflect the real-world events due to certain statistical biases (i.e., gender prejudice, a low frequency in sampling, and location type prejudice). However, LBSN data is primarily considered a supplement to traditional data sources (i.e., survey, census) and can be used to observe human check-in behavior within a city. Different interpretations are used elusively for the term “check-in behavior,” which makes it difficult to identify studies on human check-in behavior based on LBSN using the Weibo dataset.

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