Developing Quanti-Quali Approaches to Study Social Media Visuals

Studying cultures via social media often requires incorporating automated and interpretive approaches to visual (and multimodal) content. Whether you are researching identity performance, influencer work, meaning making, creator economies, or discourse in itself, in relation to climate change, disinformation, racism, or misogyny, to name just a few issues, you are confronted with the task of making sense of images.

In this session, we will discuss ways to develop research by combining elements of cultural analytics, visual network analysis and interpretive work. The session will incorporate a live demonstration of how to use Gephi network analysis and visualisation software to map image networks, and to apply interpretive techniques to make sense of these networks. For instance, we will discuss the use of these techniques to identify visual genres and interpret their meaning in relation to specific lines of enquiry.

In the final part of the session, those attending the training will be able to access guidance material, try Gephi with a given dataset of images, share questions and discuss their work.

Outcomes:

Participants in the workshop will:

• Understand the meaning of ‘quanti-quali’;
• Be able to design quanti-quali research;
• Be able to apply basic network analysis techniques;
• Be able to use Gephi and Image Sorter to analyse an image dataset.

Contributors:

Dr Warren Pearce is Senior Lecturer in Digital Methods, Science and Society at University of Sheffield. Warren’s research is engaged with ‘science in public’: how science is organised, presented and reported by government, experts and media. His research has been published in a range of leading academic journals, such as Nature Climate Change; Information, Communication & Society; Public Understanding of Science; WIREs Climate Change; Environmental Communication.

Dr Stefania Vicari is Senior Lecturer in Digital Sociology at the University of Sheffield. Her research focuses on participatory cultures, advocacy and methodological innovation, especially in the context of digital research. She studies the role that digital traces (e.g., social media content) and technologies (e.g., digital platforms and their systems) play in advancing or constraining social change. Stefania uses a range of digital methods techniques informed by network theory and textual analysis (frame analysis, critical discourse analysis) and is specifically interested in developing combinations of ‘quanti’ and ‘quali’ methodological steps in digital methods designs. is a Lecturer in Quantitative Social Science and Deputy Director of Advanced Data Analytics at the Sheffield Methods Institute, School of Education, University of Sheffield. He is Deputy Director of Advanced Data Analytics (ADA) for the WRDTP.

Important:

• This is an in-person event at The Wave, University of Sheffield (lunch and refreshments will be provided).
• Bookings will close at 9.00am on Monday 26th January.
• When booking, we ask that you use your institutional (.ac.uk) email address and complete all fields of the booking form. Thank you for your understanding.

Please note: The WRDTP is committed to sustainability and to reducing the waste from excess catering at events. A key challenge here is non-attendance at events. From October 1st 2025, the WRDTP will be changing the way we manage the non-attendance of PGR students who have booked place/s at WRDTP Training events. Any PGR student who does not inform the WRDTP (via dHJhaW5pbmcgfCB3cmR0cCAhIGFjICEgdWs=) that they will not be able to attend a WRDTP event at least 3 working days before the event takes place will have the cost of their place deducted from their RTSG (if a WRDTP-funded student), or have this charged to their department (if not funded by the WRDTP). This will allow us to better plan for events and to avoid catering waste. Thank you in advance for your cooperation on this matter.

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