Twitter Engagement with Retracted Articles: Who, When, and How?

Rod Abhari, Nicholas Vincent, Henry K. Dambanemuya, Herminio Bodon, Emoke-Ágnes Horvát

Abstract: Retracted research discussed on social media can spread misinformation, yet we lack an understanding of how retracted articles are mentioned by academic and non-academic users. This is especially relevant on Twitter due to the platform's prominent role in science communication. Here, we analyze the pre and post retraction differences in Twitter engagement metrics and content of mentions for over 3,800 retracted English-language articles alongside comparable non-retracted articles. We subset these findings according to the five user types detected by our supervised learning classifier: members of the public, scientists, bots, practitioners, and science communicators. We find that retracted articles receive greater overall engagement than non-retracted articles, especially among members of the public and bot users, the majority of engagement happening prior to retraction. Our results highlight non-scientists' involvement in retracted article discussions and suggest an opportunity for Twitter to include a retraction notice feature.