Development of methods for continuous child maltreatment surveillance - Emerging social media methodologies in child maltreatment epidemiology

Objectives: Developing methodologies to triangulate child maltreatment surveillance data is an important aspect of the future of child maltreatment epidemiology. Relying on a single source of information, such as cases... [ view full abstract ]

Objectives: Developing methodologies to triangulate child maltreatment surveillance data is an important aspect of the future of child maltreatment epidemiology. Relying on a single source of information, such as cases reported to child protective services, provides an incomplete and potentially biased view of the issue of child maltreatment. Other areas of surveillance, such as flu symptoms and flu related illnesses, have readily adopted social media and internet-based approaches to triangulation. However, there have been notable failures in accuracy by some of these approaches, which highlights the importance of rigorous evaluation and validation prior to adoption and dissemination. The purpose of this presentation is to provide an overview of social media triangulation methodologies for health surveillance, report results of evaluation and validation research on these methods, and synthesize a set of recommendations regarding research priorities for the application of these techniques to child maltreatment surveillance.
Methods: We will conduct a comprehensive literature review on the use of social media in health surveillance and synthesize the evidence-base for these approaches.
Results: Social media surveillance methods may be categorized into two main areas. Researchers may have direct contact with individuals, such as matching participant medical records to their social media posts. Researchers may also focus on aggregate data that is publically available without direct research participant contact, such as changes in Google search terms or trending Twitter hashtags. Each of these approaches has unique strengths and limitations, and has varying degrees of empirical support. We will also highlight areas of concerns about data validity and applicability to specific populations (e.g., young children compared to adolescents, specific forms of child maltreatment, etc.).
Conclusions: The findings of this review may have important implications for the development of novel child maltreatment surveillance methodologies to generate a more complete picture of the child maltreatment burden.