A Dataset for the Study of Identity at Scale: Annual Prevalence of American Twitter Users with specified Token in their Profile Bio - 2015-2020

Abstract

Personally expressed identity is who or what an individual themselves says they are, and it should be studied at scale. At scale means with data on millions of individuals, which is newly available and comes timestamped and geocoded. This work introduces a dataset for the study of identity at scale and describes the method for collecting and aggregating such data. Further, tools and theory for working with the data are presented. A demonstration analysis provides evidence that personal, individual development and changing cultural norms can be observed with these data and methods.

Online in the US, Personal Identity is Increasingly Political

“…We argue that a modern digital analog to the TST is the social media "bio" where users are prompted to briefly describe themselves (Jones, 2021;Rogers & Jones, 2021). On Twitter, specifically, the user is asked to "Describe yourself in 160 characters or less" as they create their account.…”