Social Media, Emotions and Technology: Identifying Possibilities and Attitudes during the COVID-19 Pandemic

ABSTRACT

The disruption of the COVID-19 pandemic and its multiple challenges tested states, countries, and people. Regarding the latter, information, and communication technologies, together with social media platforms, became a resource that helped to reduce the shortcomings that arose because of the criticality at that moment. However, they also contributed to redirecting the emotional dimensions towards the digital space. This work proposes a novel approach to the case of Panama, by estimating the emotivity through opinion mining. The study used as a reactive element the official announcements issued by the Ministerio de Salud (Ministry of Health) related to the pandemic. The resulting reactions were recorded for six months through a popular social media platform. The results indicate a strong and negative impact on people's sensitivity. In addition, the data acquisition methods used, their processing, and analysis are provided as valuable contributions to the Latin American context for similar studies. © 2022 IEEE.