The
Awkarin Index: a Measure of Asymmetry Between a Scholar’s Social Media Profile
and Publication
Abstract
I propose the ‘Awkarin Index’ (Λ-index), a
measure of asymmetry between a scholar’s social media profile and publication record
based on the direct comparison of numbers of citations and social media
followers. It was because in the era of social media there are now many different
ways that a scholar can build their public profile; the publication of high-quality
scientific papers being just one. While social media is a valuable tool for outreach
and the sharing of ideas, there is a danger that this form of communication is gaining
too high a value and that we are losing sight of key metrics of scientific value,
such as citation indices. This work proposes the ‘Awkarin Index’ (Λ-index)
to help quantify this case.
Keywords: Λ-index; citations; publication; social media;
 |
| Karin Novilda as known as Awkarin (Source: Twitter @awkarin) |
1. Introduction
What is the social value of social media exposure
by influencers? Do said influencers deserved to be publicly praised or shamed for
proposing exposure? Those are questions that have grappled Indonesia’s netizens
since one of the country’s most famous influencers Karin Novilda as known as Awkarin
brought 3,000 lunch boxes to student protesters outside the House of Representatives
(DPR) compound in Senayan, Central Jakarta.[1] Then Awkarin tweeted about being aware of the
environment.[2]
Consider Karin Novilda as known as Awkarin; she
comes from a privileged background and, despite having not achieved anything consequential
in science, politics or the arts—although apparently she does have a scientific
mind [3], she is one of the most followed people on social
media and among the most searched-for person on Google. While herself describes
her as a internet celebrity (also known as an influencer, cyber star, key opinion
leader (KOL), internet personality, online celebrity, blogebrity, or micro-celebrity),
this is due most likely to her fame generating considerable income through brand
endorsements.
So you could say that her celebrity buys success,
which buys greater celebrity. Her fame has meant that comments by Awkarin on issues
such as environmental awareness have been widely reported in the press [4]. Sadly, her interjection on the environmental
challenges has not yet led to a let-up in the number of crisis, which include climate
change, global warming, droughts, water scarcity, floods, and pollution.
I am concerned that phenomena similar to that
of Awkarin may also exist in the scientific community. I think it is possible that
there are individuals who are famous for being famous (or, to put it in science
jargon, renowned for being renowned). We are all aware that certain people are seemingly
invited as keynote speakers, not because of their contributions to the published
literature but because of who they are.
In the age of social media there are people who
have high-profile scientific blogs or social media feeds but have not actually published
many peer-reviewed papers of significance—in essence, scholars who are seen as leaders
in their field simply because of their notoriety. I was recently involved in a discussion
where it was suggested that someone should be invited to speak at a meeting ‘because
they will tweet about it and more people will come’. If that is not the research
community equivalent of buying a Awkarin endorsement I don’t know what is.
I don’t blame Awkarin or her science equivalents
for exploiting their fame, who wouldn’t? By the way, I am a fans of Awkarin. I think,
however, it’s time that we develop a metric that will clearly indicate if a scholar
has an overblown public profile so that we can adjust our expectations of them accordingly.
In order to quantify the problem and to devise
a solution, I have compared the numbers of followers that scholars have on social
media with the number of citations they have for their peer-reviewed work. This
analysis has identified clear outliers, or Awkarins, within the scientific community.
I propose a new metric, which I call the ‘Awkarin Index’ or ‘Λ-index’, which
allows a simple quantification of the over, or under, performance of a scholar on
social media and scientific society.
2. Methods
In this preliminary proof-of-concept study, I
selected research scholars and recorded their number of followers. I did not devise
a clever way of doing this randomly (after all this is just a bit of fun) but tried
to pick a randomish selection of 40 scholars. I used Microsoft Academic (academic.microsoft.com)
to get citation metrics on these individuals—I were not used Google Scholar
(scholar.google.com), since this site is not reliable for me as an academic search
engine. Obviously, there are caveats, as I may not have found them all if they have
a common name or they have changed address, but I did my best. I tried to pick only
individuals who have been on social media by focused on Twitter. I also captured
whether the scholars were men or women. I had intended to collect more data but
it took a long time and I therefore decided 40 would be enough to make a point.
Please don’t take this as representative of my normal research rigor.
3. Results
I took the number of media social followers as
a measure of ‘celebrity’ while the number of citations was taken as a measure of
‘scientific value’ (we can argue about that another time). The data gathered are
shown in Figure 1. Figure 1 shows media social followers versus number of scientific
citations for a sort-of-random sample of researcher tweeters. Red crosses represent
female tweeters and blue crosses represent male tweeters. The black trendline describes
the best fit to the data. Those individuals with a highly overinflated number of
followers (when compared with the number predicted by the trendline) are highlighted
by the area labeled ‘Awkarins’.
While aware that the analysis is flawed and lacks
statistical rigor, it is a relief to see that there is some kind of positive trend
in scientific value when compared with celebrity. The trend can be described by
Equation 1:
F= 43,3C0,32
Here F is the number of media social followers
and C is the number of citations. As a typical number of followers can now
be calculated using this formula, I propose that the Awkarin Index (Λ-index)
can be calculated as follows in Equation 2:
Λ-index= (F)(C-1)
Where F is the actual number of social
media followers of some researcher and C is the number these researcher should
have given their citations. Hence a high Λ-index is a warning to the community
that some scholar or researcher may have built their public profile on shaky foundations,
while a very low Λ-index suggests that a scholar is being undervalued. Here,
I propose that those people whose Λ-index is greater than 5 can be considered
‘Awkarins Scholar’; these individuals are highlighted in Figure 1.
 |
Figure
1. Media social followers versus number of scientific
citations
4. Discussion
There are many scholars who, with hindsight, did
not get much recognition for their achievements while they were alive. Consider
Augusta Ada Lovelace, a mathematician who is credited with writing the first ever
computer program for the Analytical Engine, a mechanical computer designed by Charles
Babbage.[5] Despite her contribution, and obvious genius,
she is much less well known than her male contemporaries. Or Mary Anning, a palaeontologist
who lived in the early 19th century.[6] Her meticulous recording and prolific findings
contributed to the fundamental changes in our understanding of natural history,
including the accepted view of extinction events. Yet, because of her sex and religious
beliefs, much of her work was never recognized by her peers, and I expect you have
never heard of her. For a long time, the same could be said of Rosalind Elsie
Franklin, whose work on determining the structure of DNA was largely ignored until
years after her death.[7] It may be no coincidence that all of these overlooked
heroes were women, however their work is being undervalued in our society.[8] I will return to this part later in conclusion.
In an age dominated by the cult of celebrity we,
as scholars, need to protect ourselves from mindlessly lauding shallow popularity
and take an informed and critical view of the value we place on the opinion of our
peers. Social media makes it very easy for people to build a seemingly impressive
persona by essentially ‘shouting louder’ than others. Having an opinion on something
does not make one an expert. But on Twitter, for example, the ‘trending topic’ on
any given subject will not necessarily come from an expert, it will come from the
most followed person. If Awkarin commented on the value of the environmental awareness,
her tweet would get more retweets and favorites than the rest of the scientific
community combined. Experts on the environmental science will tell you how frustrating
that can be.
I propose that all scholars calculate their own
Λ-index on an annual basis and include it in their Twitter profile. Not only
does this help others decide how much weight they should give to someone’s 140 character
wisdom, it can also be an incentive—if your Λ-index gets above 5, then it’s
time to get off Twitter and write those papers.
Based on Equation 2, I calculated Λ-index
for Lisa Randall, as my role model in physics that have Twitter’s account
@lirarandall.[9] Here my calculation:
Λ-index= (F)(C-1)
Λ-index= (58358)(
37624-1)
Λ-index= 1.551084414
As a result, I get Λ-index for Lisa
Randall is 1.551084414, that means she built their public profile in social
media but her work is not being undervalued. It’s a good news for us—or for me
as Lisa Randall’s fans.
5. Conclusion
My discussion highlights the fact that women have a history
of being ignored by the scientific community. Interestingly, in my analysis, very
few women (only one in fact) had a highly inflated Twitter following, while most
(13/17) had fewer followers than would be expected. Hence, most Awkarins are men!
This work does not prove that we, as a community, are continuing to ignore women,
or if women are less likely to engage in self-promotion, but it is consistent with
either or both of these scenarios.
Acknowledgement
Let me record that
most of this work was written during my daily listen BLACKPINK''s songs, and I
would like to acknowledge Roseanne Park (Rosé), an amazing vocalist for making
the hobby of writing in everyplace on everytime such an enjoyable battle at my
neuron. Don‘t know what to do without you... Rosé in my ear-eye aaa. I also
acknowledges Karin Novilda (Awkarin) for her inspiration to write this work.
References
[1] Novilda, Karin. (2019, 24 September). Instagram post. Instagram.com/awkarin.
URL: https://www.instagram.com/p/B2yczGhJBZK
[2] Novilda, Karin. (2019, 10 October). Twitter post. Twitter.com/awkarin.
URL: https://twitter.com/awkarin/status/1182213064134758401
[3] Setiawan, Adib Rifqi. (2018, 20 May). Awkarin bicara pendidikan (bersama
Cania Citta). YouTube.com/alobatnic. URL: https://youtu.be/8CIsYzItUCA
[4] Victory, Elisabeth Glory. (2019, 14 October). Menyepelekan ‘Sensasi’ Kebaikan
Kecil dari Awkarin Adalah Kekeliruan. Vice.com. URL: https://www.vice.com/id_id/article/d3a5wa/menyepelekan-sensasi-kebaikan-kecil-dari-awkarin-adalah-kekeliruan-budiman-sudjatmiko-sindir-karin-novilda-selebgram
[5]
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[6]
Dickens, Charles. (1865,
11 February). All the Year Round (volume 13), pp. 60. Charles Dickens.
URL: https://books.google.co.id/books?id=_ZHNAAAAMAAJ&hl=id&pg=PA60#v=onepage&q&f=false
[7]
Maddox, Brenda. (2003,
23 January). The double helix and the ‘wronged heroine’. Nature, 421:
407-408. URL: http://www.biomath.nyu.edu/index/course/hw_articles/nature4.pdf
[8]
Setiawan, Adib Rifqi. (2017,
03 June). Meniti Ilmuwati — catatan peran perempuan dalam pembahasan alam. alobatnic.blogspot.com.
URL: http://alobatnic.blogspot.com/2017/06/meniti-ilmuwati-scholaristi.html
[9]
Setiawan, Adib Rifqi. (2019, 30 September
30). An Interview with the Physicist that Her Head in the Universe and Both
Feet on the Earth. INA-Rxiv. DOI: https://dx.doi.org/10.31227/osf.io/mfv4e