2024-07-11: Disinformation Detection and Analytics REU Program - Year 3

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The REU summer cohort of 2024, along with ODU faculty and graduate students, 
at the REU orientation on May 24th, 2024, at the Computer Science Department.

Research Experiences for Undergraduates Program

Mis and disinformation can cause real damage in societies by confusing people and rallying individuals, groups, and communities toward harmful actions. Disinformation is false or misleading information spread with the intention to deceive or cause harm. It can appear in the form of fabricated or deliberately manipulated audio/visual content, intentionally created conspiracy theories, or rumors spread to harm or cause distrust. Misinformation, on the other hand, is information that is shared without the intent to manipulate people. This includes sharing rumors or false information before verifying their accuracy, unintentional mistakes such as inaccurate photo captions, dates, statistics, and translations, or situations where satire is mistakenly taken as factual.

Social media and online platforms enable the quick spread of mis and disinformation, necessitating a deep understanding of its circulation. With limited tools to identify disinformation, many communities are increasingly affected.

The Research Experiences for Undergraduates (REU) program provides hands-on learning experiences to undergraduates focused on disinformation detection and analysis at the Web Science and Digital Libraries Research Group (WS-DL Group) within the Department of Computer Science, in partnership with the Storymodelers Lab at the Virginia Modeling, Analysis, and Simulation Center (VMASC) and the Department of Communication Disorders & Special Education at Old Dominion University (ODU). Disinformation exists in the form of “fake news,” consisting of deliberate misinformation. There are seven identified forms of misinformation and disinformation:
  1. Satire or parody: No intention to cause harm but has the potential to fool.
  2. False connection: When headlines, visuals, or captions don't support the content.
  3. Misleading content: Misleading use of information to frame an issue or individual.
  4. False context: When genuine content is shared with false contextual information.
  5. Imposter content: When genuine sources are impersonated.
  6. Manipulated content: When genuine information or imagery is manipulated to deceive.
  7. Fabricated content: New content that is 100% false, made to deceive and do harm.

For example, a recent study found that the use of cannabis as a cancer cure generated 4.26 million engagements on social media, whereas accurate news generated only 0.036 million engagements. The recently released special Eurobarometer survey found that 71% of respondents encounter fake news several times a month or more often. Unfortunately, due to a lack of understanding of basic and/or the best available science, and the limited accessibility of information, a vast number of citizens are susceptible to disinformation.

Vision: The need to train future computer scientists to learn about the emergent problem of disinformation detection and analytics and the rich experience of our research team provide great opportunities to incorporate undergraduate students into ongoing research projects and related community efforts.

Goal: Our overarching goal is to train students to be independent, contributing, and functioning researchers. To achieve this goal, we will involve and challenge undergraduate students, particularly including members of underrepresented groups, as colleagues in ongoing graduate-level research topics and encourage them to pursue graduate study in STEM disciplines.

The REU site features a 10-week summer program where students work with ODU faculty and students from WS-DL, NirdsLab, AccessLab, LampSys, Storymodelers, and VMASC.

This year, we started the program for the second group of eight REU students. Below are their profiles and a few testimonies from them, halfway through the program, describing the significant impact it has had on them.

Emily Ebalo  is a rising senior at William & Mary with a double major in Data Science and Public Policy. Her interests are social network analysis, data visualization, and natural language processing. This summer, she is working on using machine learning for early detection of “fake news” and misinformation related to the Russian-Ukraine War. Her research advisor is Dr. Faryaneh Poursardar.

Program Impact: "I enjoy learning from and working alongside the PhD students and research mentors in the Storymodelers Lab at VMASC. Their interdisciplinary work inspires me to understand research questions through greater, holistic contexts outside of computing. My technical skills have expanded through this hands-on learning experience, and this program challenges me to grow as a student and researcher. I am grateful to have this opportunity to learn from my peers, mentors, and guest lecturers through the REU program." -Emily Ebalo.
   


















Jessica Melton is a sophomore at Tidewater Community College pursuing an Associate of Science in Computer Science. She plans to transfer to ODU fall 2025 to pursue her ultimate educational goal of completing a Master of Science in Data Science and Analytics. She has a passion for understanding and addressing societal challenges and believes that through data analytics, there is immense potential for harnessing information to drive meaningful change. Her goal for the summer program is to sharpen her teamwork and research skills while gaining experience with real-world datasets and analytical tools. Jessica's mentor is Dr. Erika Frydenlund.

Program Impact: "My REU internship experience at the Virginia Modeling, Simulation, and Analysis Center has been both enlightening and inspiring thus far. I have had the opportunity to learn from passionate individuals about how computer and data science concepts can be combined with various interdisciplinary fields to drive meaningful change. At the moment, I am honing my data analysis and research skills while mining social media data and conducting sentiment analysis. The insights I’ve been able to uncover from something as simple as a YouTube comment have been mind-boggling and intriguing. Overall, this internship is solidifying my passion for using data science to make a positive impact." -Jessica Melton.

Kevin Cauch  is a senior at St. John’s University, located in Queens, New York, majoring in Computer Science with a minor in Mathematics. As an aspiring graduate student, He aims to deepen his knowledge and skills in engineering and science disciplines through hands-on experiences, which he hopes to gain highly during this research opportunity. He is eager to meet fellow camp participants and mentors and is committed to making the most out of the summer experience at ODU. Kevin’s mentor is Dr. Sampath Jayarathna.

Program Impact: "Through the REU program, I have gained extensive knowledge, including learning new programming languages like C#. I've also delved into Virtual Reality (VR) and its integration with Unity. This experience has greatly improved my technical abilities and expanded my grasp of emerging technologies.” -Kevin J. Cauchi.

Leah Prince is a rising senior studying computer science at the University of Maryland, Baltimore County (UMBC). She is from Accokeek, MD. This summer, she is hoping to learn more about how to use analytics for social good and connect with other students. She also hopes that this experience will help her know what she will research in graduate school. Previously, she engaged in health informatics research. Leah’s mentor is Dr. Michele C. Weigle.

Program Impact: "Since participating in this program, I have learned a lot about what is at stake on Instagram and improved my Python skills. What I like about this program is that there is a lot of support available to me through graduate students and faculty mentors. With their help, I have become confident in applying my computer science education to real-world problems." -Leah Prince.


Ashlyn Farris is a rising senior at Harding University pursuing a degree in Mathematics (BS) and a minor in Computer Science. After graduation, Ashlyn plans to attend graduate school to learn more about teaching methods for mathematics and to work towards teaching math at a postsecondary level. Ashlyn has interests in mathematics, data analytics, and web development. Ashlyn's mentor is Dr. Michael L. Nelson.

Program Impact: "This summer working at the Old Dominion REU site has been a wonderful learning experience. Not only have I learned practical skills for the field I am interested in, but I have learned more about research and what being a graduate student could potentially look like. It has been interesting to learn about disinformation and the ways we can recognize it." -Ashlyn Farris.



Caoilainn (kay-lynn) Christensen is a rising sophomore at Pomona College in Claremont, CA. With academic interests at the intersection of cognitive science, linguistics, and computer science, her goal for the summer is to gain   practical experience with the systematic analysis of online content. Her long-term plans include graduate education and a career in natural language processing. In her free time, she loves musical theatre, playing piano, baking, and crochet. Caoilainn's mentor is Dr. Anne Perroti.

Program Impact: "During this experience so far, I have been able to grow my existing research abilities and gain new skills. The ability to have access to valuable mentorship and gain practice in independence has been very beneficial. The opportunities to both practice research itself, but also work on my practical presentation and communication capabilities is something I know will be very useful in the future." -Caoilainn (kay-lynn) Christensen.

Stefania Dzhaman is a rising junior attending Lehigh University, majoring in Computer Science. Her goals for this program are to gain experience with machine learning and writing research papers, and in the future she would like to pursue a PhD in cyber security or disinformation. She is from Champaign, Illinois, and enjoys hiking and running. Stefania’s mentor is Dr. Vikas G. Ashok. 

Program Impact: "This experience has introduced me to a lot of different topics within disinformation. One of the best parts has been getting to talk to the other students about their projects and watching professors and students present about their research - I hadn't had an opportunity until now to see so many different research projects underway before, and this has helped me visualize what graduate school would be like and what opportunities are out there for me." -Stefania Dzhaman.

Matthew Maisonave is a Sophomore at Old Dominion University, majoring in Computer Science with a minor in Biology. While he has done other projects that utilize the results of AI and machine learning methods, this will be the first time he is a part of formulating these programs. He is also interested in Bioinformatics and wishes to use this experience to improve his current skill set. Matthew's mentor is Dr. Jian Wu.

Program Impact: "This program has challenged me significantly, helping me become the best version of myself." -Matthew Maisonave.


REU Program Orientation

The program started with the orientation session on May 24th, 2024 at the Department of Computer Science. During the session, students met faculty mentors and visited the laboratories and facilities offered in the Department. Also, in the session, the REU interns were briefed about the program structure, including the upcoming research, expectations, entertainment, and networking events.
 
The programs guest speakers

The program's first week also had an invited talk by Dr. Sawood Alam, a Ph.D. alumnus of the  WS-DL group from the Department of Computer Science at the Old Dominion University, currently working as the research lead of the Wayback Machine at the Internet Archive. Dr. Alam discussed how web archives are helpful in the fight against disinformation. He also discussed some of the active steps by the Internet Archive, such as Save Page Now Save Page Now that allows crowdsourcing curation, partnerships with fact-checking organizations, and annotations on known disinformation using context banners.

The program's second week had an invited talk titled "A Language Framework for Characterizing Information Operation" by Dr. Alex Nwala, a Ph.D. alumnus of the WS-DL group from the Department of Computer Science at the Old Dominion University.
The program's fourth week had an invited talk titled "Risks to Web Archives" by Dr. Michael L. Nelson, an eminent scholar and professor of the WS-DL group from the Department of Computer Science at the Old Dominion University.

Research Work Presentations by REU Interns

The REU interns presented their impressive research work during the REU 2024 mid-summer presentation session.

 

The REU interns also got to visit the Storymodelers Lab, VMASC, and Hampton Roads Biomedical Consortium during the third week of the program.

The research experience gained by the interns through their work with faculty and Ph.D. students will inspire them to further their education to the doctoral level and foster their interest in pursuing careers as future researchers.

Special thanks to the NSF, College of Sciences and Dean, Dr. Gail E. Dodge, the CS Department, and ODU Graduate School for the help and support. Great thanks as well to all the faculty who made the REU program possible for their mentorship of the REU interns: Dr. Michael L. Nelson, Dr. Michele C. Weigle, Dr. Faryaneh Poursardar,  Dr. Erika Frydenlund, Dr. Sampath Jayarathna, Dr. Anne Perroti, Dr. Vikas G. Ashok, and Dr. Jian Wu.

The REU program is an NSF-funded continuous initiative being run by the ODU CS Department and its partner VMASC.

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