My research and teaching interests revolve around the structure and impact of social networks in various online platforms. These sites include social networking apps (such as Facebook and WeChat), Massively Multiplayer Online Games (such as EverQuest II, World of Tanks, Eve Online), and other online communities designed for collaborative peer production, social support and political discussion. More recently, I have also taken an interest in the reaction to and diffusion of online misinformation and how we could correct it, especially misinformation in multimedia format (see a recent paper here). My work on misinformation has been funded by the National Science Foundation (abstract) and Facebook.
My research frequently utilizes digital footprint data (so-called "big data"). But I am also aware that they can be limited in various ways, so I try to match them with "smaller data" collected from surveys and experiments.
My work has regularly appeared in journals such as Communication Research, Journal of Computer-Mediated Communication, Social Networks, New Media & Society, and Computers in Human Behavior. I co-edited the book Predicting Real World Behaviors From Virtual World Data (Springer), and am the recipient of numerous top paper awards. My work has been featured on major news outlets such as Wired, MSNBC, Reuters, ABC and Fox News.