Information Studies Colloquium: Social Media and the Spread of Hate (SMASH) with Dr. Christine Ong and Seul Lee

Please join us for our next IS Colloquium on December 5, 2:00-4:00 p.m. in the Reading Room, 3340 Moore Hall. There will be refreshments to follow. 

Social Media and the Spread of Hate (SMASH) 

Dr. Christine Ong and Seul Lee

Abstract

Social Media and the Spread of Hate or SMASH is an interdisciplinary collaboration between researchers, educators, and policy advocates from UCLA’s School of Education and Information Studies, the Semel Healthy Campus Initiative (HCI), and an independent non-profit partner, the Organization for Social Media Safety (OFSMS). SMASH is funded by UCLA’s Initiative to Study Hate.  

Our primary goal is to explore how young people encounter hate speech online, their responses to it, and ideas for making social media safe for everyone. Our study incorporates various methods including survey data gathered during school assemblies and in-depth conversations with young people about their own experiences using social media. 

In the past two years, SMASH has gathered survey data from over 24,000 students in grades 5-12 across 94 schools nationwide. Our findings have informed OFSMS program improvements.  Our research has also been shared by OFSMS partners in legislative testimony related to potential harms on social media and broader advocacy efforts at the local, state and national level.  SMASH results may also inform future development of educational resources and interventions, such as activities to promote kindness, empathy, resiliency, and critical thinking around social media use.

Bios

Seul Lee is a doctoral candidate in Information Studies at UCLA, holding a B.A. in Management Information Systems, an M.A. in Data Science, and a graduate certificate in Digital Humanities. Her research interests involve investigating the intricate landscape of information biases, algorithmic subjectivities, and the pivotal role of digital literacy education in fostering a nuanced and comprehensive understanding of biases behind the presentation of online information. She has been working as a graduate student researcher for the Social Media and the Spread of Hate (SMASH) team to combat online hate speech by collaborating with middle and high school students in the US.

Dr. Christine Ong is a research scientist at the National Center for Research on Evaluation, Standards and Student Testing (CRESST) at UCLA. Dr. Ong has extensive experience managing research and evaluation studies that involve multi-institution partnerships. She is project director of the Social Media and the Spread of Hate (SMASH) study, an interdisciplinary collaboration between researchers, educators, and policy advocates from UCLA’s School of Education and Information Studies and the non-profit Organization for Social Media Safety and funded by UCLA’s Initiative to Study Hate. This work includes an examination of features of social media apps that may help fuel hateful content adolescents encounter. She also serves as an external evaluator for two NSF grants that connect to computing education, Computational Thinking Equity Project (CTEP) and Researching Equity and Antiracist Learning (REAL-CS). In addition, she is part of the California Teacher Education Research and Improvement Network (CTERIN) and sister study, California Preparation Pathway Project (CP3, funded by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation), charged with constructing and enhancing teacher-level data related to new teachers’ preparation, placement and retention in the state.