An introduction to "botany". What is known about the effects of social bots on political opinions?

Content

It has been warned that so-called „social bots“ have contributed to the spreading of fake news and the rise of opinion polarization. There is even evidence for large-scale attempts to alter democratic elections with the help of bots. This seminar is concerned with these warnings. Starting from a literature overview, we develop formal models of opinion dynamics. We implement bots in these models and derive insights about the conditions under which bots are indeed dangerous.

Language of instructionGerman