April 2025 – New publication! Provost, V. and van der Ven, H. 2025. Mis-Framing Marine Plastic Pollution on TikTok. Environmental Communication. Ahead of print. https://doi.org/10.1080/17524032.2025.2492889.
Abstract: TikTok has emerged as a significant platform for environmental communication, particularly in ocean protection and waste cleanup. This paper analyzes 250 English-language videos tagged with #plasticpollution and #marineplasticpollution. The videos were retrieved in 2023 by searching hashtags and downloading available videos chronologically from the “Top 100” section. Our analysis includes a descriptive statistical analysis of content framing (cause, issue, solution) derived from marine plastic pollution literature and a 10% video sample, as well as stylistic framing (deficit/dialogue, fearful/hopeful) delineated from established environmental communication models. Our findings suggest a significant disjuncture between experts’ perceptions of marine plastic pollution, obtained through a literature review on the topic, and how the issue is presented on TikTok. Specifically, TikTok individualizes the causes and solutions to the challenge, tends to foreground technological answers, and primarily frames the nature of the issue as solely ecological. This presents a one-sided perspective on this systemic problem and neglects the socio-political injustices tied to plastic pollution. Stylistically, most videos use a data-centered deficit model and a fearful emotional genre, assuming the public needs information due to a knowledge gap while evoking apprehension to drive action. While these models could raise awareness of the issue, they differ from the preferred dialogue and optimistic communication models, which have been linked to greater public engagement based on previous research in the field. Generally, this research finds that the framing of marine plastic pollution in English-language TikTok videos perpetuates one-sided narratives, suggesting flaws in how demographics consuming these videos obtain information about the challenge.
December 2024 – New publication! Elnur, R. and van der Ven, H. 2024. Bioenergy Discourse: A Comparison Across Media and Technologies. BioProducts Business 9(3): 39-52.
Abstract: This study compares the discourse surrounding Bioenergy with Carbon Capture and Storage (BECCS) and Sustainable Aviation Fuel (SAF) across two mediums: social media and academic literature. Through an automated content analysis of Twitter posts (n=11,314) and peer-reviewed articles (n=140), we identify significant differences in the prevalence of techno-optimism, techno-skepticism, and engagement with critical issues related to socio-environmental impacts and technological uncertainty for these bioproducts. The findings reveal that social media content is generally more optimistic and less critical of these technologies compared to the academic literature, with a notable lack of discussion on the potential social and environmental consequences. Furthermore, our analysis highlights a greater polarization of views in relation to BECCS, with both techno-optimism and techno-skepticism being more prominent across both mediums. The study emphasizes the importance of effective science communication, balanced evaluations of risks and benefits, and closer collaboration between academia and businesses to foster a more informed and nuanced discourse on disruptive technologies in the bioeconomy. Our findings also emphasize the need for scholars and businesses operating in the biomaterials and bioproducts industry to adopt a critical approach to media literacy.
December 2024 – New publication! van der Ven, H. Corry, D., Elnur, R., Provost, V.,Syukron, M., Tappauf, N. Does Artificial Intelligence Bias Perceptions of Environmental Challenges? Environmental Research Letters 20 (1): 014009. https://doi.org/10.1088/1748-9326/ad95a2.
Abstract: Artificial intelligence (AI) is reshaping how humans obtain information about environmental challenges. Yet the outputs of AI chatbots contain biases that affect how humans view these challenges. Here, we use qualitative and quantitative content analysis to identify bias in AI chatbot characterizations of the issues, causes, consequences, and solutions to environmental challenges. By manually coding an original dataset of 1512 chatbot responses across multiple environmental challenges and chatbots, we identify a number of overlapping areas of bias. Most notably, chatbots are prone to proposing incremental solutions to environmental challenges that draw heavily on past experience and avoid more radical changes to existing economic, social, and political systems. We also find that chatbots are reluctant to assign accountability to investors and avoid associating environmental challenges with broader social justice issues. These findings present new dimensions of bias in AI and auger towards a more critical treatment of AI’s hidden environmental impacts.
May 2024 – New publication! van der Ven, H. Corry, D., Elnur, R., Provost, V.,Syukron, M. (2024). Generative AI and Social Media May Exacerbate the Climate Crisis Global Environmental Politics 24(2): 9–18. https://doi.org/10.1162/glep_a_00747.
Abstract: The contributions of generative artificial intelligence (AI) and social media to the climate crisis are often underestimated. To date, much of the focus has been on direct emissions associated with the life cycle of tech products. In this forum article, we argue that this narrow focus misses the adverse and indirect impacts of generative AI and social media on the climate. We outline some of the indirect ways in which generative AI and social media undermine the optimism, focus, creativity, and veracity required to address the climate crisis. Our aim is twofold. First, we seek to balance the tide of optimism about the role of digitalization in addressing the climate crisis by offering a skeptic’s perspective. Second, we outline a new research agenda that moves beyond counting directly attributable carbon emissions and proposes a more comprehensive accounting of the indirect ways in which social media and generative AI adversely impact the sociopolitical conditions required to address the climate crisis.
April 2024 – Viola Jasmine Provost and Hamish van der Ven will be presenting research at the ISA 2024 Annual Convention – April 3rd – 6th 2024 in San Francisco. View the program here: https://www.isanet.org/Conferences/ISA2024.
October 2023 – Viola Jasmine Provost and Muh Syukron will be presenting research at the 2023 Radboud Conference on Earth System Governance in Nijmegen, The Netherlands. View the program here: https://www.earthsystemgovernance.org/2023radboud/.