17th International Conference on Social Computing, Behavioral-Cultural Modeling, & Prediction and Behavior Representation in Modeling and Simulation
September 18-20, 2024, Hybrid.
Gates Hillman Complex, 4902 Forbes Ave, Pittsburgh, PA 15213
Keynote Speaker(s)
Wednesday, September 18, 2024 5:00pm - 6:00pm In-Person
Keynote 1: Don Adjeroh, Professor and Associate Chair, Lane Department of Computer Science and Electrical Engineering, West Virginia University, Morgantown, West Virginia
Title: Bodymetrics, Social Media, and Artificial Intelligence in Human Health
Abstract: The explosion of different types of social media platforms has made it possible to cheaply collect different types of information from diverse participants. The various types of networks inherent in considering such platforms, either singly, or in combination, provides a significant wealth of information for analyzing different types of patterns. At the same time, the diversity of sources, incompleteness, and potential inconsistencies raise a significant issue in terms of the reliability and credibility of such sources as a foundation for decision making on critical issues, such as important health-related decisions. In this talk, we will trace our journey in the area of network analysis and its applications in soft biometrics and human health. In particular, we will summarize our findings in drug safety surveillance using social media traces, and how we verify some related adverse drug event signals using biological information at the molecular level. We will end the talk with a brief discussion on our recent study on health disinformation based on multimodal analysis of social media data.
Bio: Dr. Don Adjeroh is a Professor, Associate Departmental Chair, and Graduate Coordinator of Computer Science at the Lane Department of Computer Science and Electrical Engineering, West Virginia University (WVU), Morgantown, WV, USA. He is the Founding Director of the WVU AI+Health Engineering Center. His research interests include machine learning, artificial intelligence (AI), search data structures, bioinformatics, and digital health. His research results have appeared in over 200 peer re-viewed publications, including papers in several reputable conferences and journals, such as the IEEE Transactions series, top journals in theoretical computer science, and renowned journals in bioinformatics and biomedicine. Since 2019, he has served as the Founding Chair for the IEEE BIBM annual Workshop on Long Non-Coding RNAs (BIBM LncRNA). He also served as the Program Co-Chair for the 2022 IEEE International Conference on Bioinformatics and Biomedicine (BIBM) held in two locations, Las Vegas, USA, and Changsha, China, on Dec. 6–-9, 2022. He has served as the Publicity Chair for SBP-BRiMS since 2012. Dr. Adjeroh’s research has been funded by various federal funding agencies in the USA, such as the NSF, NASA, DHS, DoD/ONR, and DoJ/NIJ, including a current NSF RII Track-2 award, and another current NSF NRT project on Bridges in Digital Health, for both of which he serves as the PI. He obtained his PhD in computer science from The Chinese University of Hong Kong in 1997. He received the Department of Energy (DOE) CAREER award in 2002, the best paper award at the 25th Workshop on Information Technology and Systems (WITS 2015), the WVU Statler Outstanding Researcher award in 2009, and 2012, the WVU Statler Excellence in Research award in 2018, 2021, and 2024, and the WVU Statler Researcher of the Year award in 2021 and 2024. Dr. Adjeroh is the author of The Burrows Wheeler Transform: Data Compression, Suffix Arrays and Pattern Matching, Springer NY, 2028, and an Associate Editor of IEEE/ACM Transactions on Computational Biology and Bioinformatics (TCBB).
Friday, September 20, 2024 10:00am - 11:20am In-Person
Keynote 2: Patricia Aufderheide, University Professor, School of Communication, American University
Title: Public Broadcasting: A Bulwark against Disinformation?
Abstract: The “Disinformation Age" (Bennett and Livingston 2021) is a Frankenstein result of several deep and decades-old political currents (Brown 2019). The problem of disinformation brings together media, technology, and democracy. This is as much a political problem as it is a technological one, and the economics of media matter for any redress. While the digital affordances of social media platforms have offered unprecedented amplification and resonance of any messaging, social media activity is typically fueled by analog mass media (Benkler, Faris et al. 2018). While partisan and emotion-soaked messages blast out from organizations such as Sinclair Media and Fox, echoed in social-media platforms, fact-checked reporting and public service media also play an active role in fueling social-media activity. Public broadcasters have the strongest brands commanding public trust in the U.S.: NPR and PBS. Public broadcasters also showcase the work of some of the most trusted media-makers: independent documentarians such as Kartemquin filmmakers (Aufderheide, 2024). In this moment, can public broadcasting be a resource for democratic public-making and civil society?
Bio: Patricia Aufderheide is University Professor of Communication Studies in the School of Communication at American University in Washington, D.C. She founded the School's Center for Media & Social Impact, where she continues as Senior Research Fellow. She is also affiliate faculty in the School of International Service and the History department at American University, and a member of the Film and Media Arts division in the School of Communication. Her books include Reclaiming Fair Use: How to Put Balance Back in Copyright (University of Chicago), with Peter Jaszi; Documentary: A Very Short Introduction (Oxford), The Daily Planet (University of Minnesota Press), and Communications Policy in the Public Interest (Guilford Press). She has been a Fulbright Research Fellow twice, in Brazil (1994-5) and Australia (2017). She is also a John Simon Guggenheim fellow (1994) and has served as a juror at the Sundance Film Festival among others. Aufderheide has received numerous journalism and scholarly awards, including the George Stoney award for service to documentary from the University Film and Video Association in 2015, the International Communication Association's 2010 for Communication Research as an Agent of Change Award, Woman of Vision award from Women in Film and Video (DC) in 2010, a career achievement award in 2008 from the International Digital Media and Arts Association and the Scholarship and Preservation Award in 2006 from the International Documentary Association.