School of Social and Political Science

Aybuke Atalay

PhD student

Aybuke Atalay's photo
aybuke.atalay@ed.ac.uk
https://twitter.com/aybukeatalayy/
1.08
27/28 George Square
Edinburgh
UK

Research interests

Data & Digital Elections, public opinion and parties Studies of information and communication technology

Computational Propaganda, social bots, Hybrid regimes, Disinformation, Social media and politics, Twitter, Computational Social Science, Social network analysis

Background

I am a PhD student based in the School of Social and Political Science at the University of Edinburgh. I am interested in the role of automated accounts (i.e. bots) in social media manipulation and online disinformation in hybrid regimes. I am currently investigating bots and bot-like behaviour in the Turkish Twittersphere. I amthe co-organiser of the Summer Institute in Computational Social Science (SICSS-Edinburgh 2023) and the Research Coordinator of the Social Data Science Hub.

PhD Project 

Title: The Digital Logic of Political Survival in Hybrid Regimes: Bots and Computational Propaganda in the Turkish Twittersphere.

Principal supervisor: Dr Kate Wright

Co-supervisors: Dr Ugur Ozdemir and Dr Jean-Francois Daoust

Qualifications

MSc in International Relations
University of Edinburgh, UK (2018-2019)

BA in Political Science and International Relations
Bogazici University, Turkey (2013-2018)

Publications 

Seckin, O. C., Atalay, A., Otenen, E., Duygu, U., & Varol, O. (2024). “Mechanisms Driving Online Vaccine Debate During the COVID-19 Pandemic.” Social Media + Society, 10(1). https://doi.org/10.1177/ 20563051241229657

Working Papers & Research in Progress

Role Tolerance in NATO: Turkey’s Unique Position in the Ukraine-Russia War (working paper, abstract accepted for a Special Issue on Role Theory and the War on Ukraine, to be submitted to Foreign Policy Analysis) [with Yusuf Topaloglu ]

Bot Ecologies in a Competitive Authoritarian Regime (working paper) 

The Role of Political Elite Positionality in Misinformation (working paper) [with Ricardo Ribeira Ferrara] 

Measuring Attention to Politics Online with Clone Social Media Environments (working paper) [with Christopher Barrie and Alia ElKattan] 

Music Streaming as Global Cultural Diffusion (research in progress) [with Tod Van Gunten]

Selected Talks/ Guest Lectures/ Presentations

  • Guest Lecturer: Tracking Computational Propaganda on Twitter Course: Research Skills in the Social Sciences:Data Collection, University of Edinburgh, 2022)
  • Guest Lecturer: Political Actors, Audiences and Mechanisms Driving Disinformation in Turkey: Evidence from the Covid-19 Anti-Vaccine Propaganda on Twitter (Course: Controversies in the Data Society, University of Edinburgh, 2022)
  • Guest Lecturer: "Technologies of Liberation? Social Movements in the Era of Social Media" (Course: Internet and Society, University of Edinburgh, 2021)
  • Talk: "What is Computational Propaganda?" (Course: Internet and Society, University of Edinburgh, 2020)

Research Assistantships

Researcher in the Social Media Clone project funded by the British Academy/Leverhulme Trust (Supervised by Christopher Barrie , ongoing)

Researcher in the Project: Analysis of the Minutes of UK Science Advisory Committees During the COVID-19 Pandemic using Topic Modelling  (Principle Investigator: Nathan Coombs, 2023)

Researcher in the Project: Music Streaming as Global Cultural Diffusion (Principle Investigator: Tod Van Gunten, 2022)

Teaching Assistantships

Works within

Aybuke Atalay's Research Explorer profile