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TRACTRUST (Tracking Trust)

What role do social media play in the socio-technical controversies surrounding Covid-19?

Monitoring Trust and Distrust: Analyzing Social Media to Support the Public Health Response to Covid-19

The médialab is a partner of the Tractrust project, coordinated by Laetitia Atlani Duhault (CEPED), between 2020 and 2023.The Tractrust project brought together researchers in anthropology, political sociology of health, communication studies, and computational social sciences. It focused on understanding the acceptance, adoption, and adherence to public health measures for the prevention and control of COVID-19, through a mixed-methods approach combining digital data analysis and qualitative interviews.

At Sciences Po’s médialab, in collaboration with the Sciences Po Chair in Health Studies (led by Daniel Benamouzig)), we explored sociotechnical controversies surrounding COVID-19 in the digital public sphere, with particular attention to the role of social media in reshaping scientific expertise and evaluation.

A case study was conducted on the “Lancet Gate” in 2020, which resulted in a publication in the journal Réseaux (available https://hal.science/hal-04866247).

Partnerships and Funding 

The Tractrust project was coordinated by Laetitia Atlani-Duault (CEPED – Centre Population et Développement).

It received funding from the French National Research Agency (ANR) under project number ANR-20-COVI-0102, and was co-funded by the European Commission through the Connecting Europe Facility (CEF) – Telecommunications Sector, under contract no. INEA/CEF/ICT/A2020/2394372.