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Dr. Rosta Farzan
School of Computing and Information, University of Pittsburgh, Pittsburgh, PA 15213, USA

Basic Info

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Research Keywords & Expertise

0 Hyperlocal online communities
0 Information technologies for marginalized communities
0 Sustainability of socio-technical systems
0 Participation and commitment in online communities
0 Social navigation and social information filtering

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Ecscw contribution
Published: 25 May 2021 in Computer Supported Cooperative Work (CSCW)
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People are not always able to respond immediately to incoming messages on their mobile devices, either due to engagement in another task or simply because the moment is inconvenient for them. This delay in responding could affect social relationships, as there are often expectations associated with mobile messaging and people may experience a lingering pressure to attend to their messages. In this work, we investigate an approach for generating automated contextual responses on behalf of message recipients when they are not available to respond. We first identify several types of contextual information that can be obtained from a user’s smartphone and explore whether those can be used to explain unavailability. We then assess users’ perception of the usefulness of these sensor-based categories and their level of comfort with sharing such information through a Mechanical Turk survey study. Our results show emergent groups with varying preferences with regards to the usefulness and comfort in sharing two types of contextual information: user state and device state. Further, we also observed a strong influence of message context (i.e., message urgency and social tie strength) in users’ perceptions of these auto-generated messages. Our research provides understanding of users’ perceptions of sharing context through an autonomous agent that can help design and create effective approaches towards enabling communication awareness.

ACS Style

Pranut Jain; Rosta Farzan; Adam J. Lee. Context-based Automated Responses of Unavailability in Mobile Messaging. Computer Supported Cooperative Work (CSCW) 2021, 1 -43.

AMA Style

Pranut Jain, Rosta Farzan, Adam J. Lee. Context-based Automated Responses of Unavailability in Mobile Messaging. Computer Supported Cooperative Work (CSCW). 2021; ():1-43.

Chicago/Turabian Style

Pranut Jain; Rosta Farzan; Adam J. Lee. 2021. "Context-based Automated Responses of Unavailability in Mobile Messaging." Computer Supported Cooperative Work (CSCW) , no. : 1-43.

Conference paper
Published: 20 September 2018 in Transactions on Petri Nets and Other Models of Concurrency XV
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Online production communities such as Wikipedia and OpenStreetMap play an important role in connecting the public with major events in society. The popularity of a major event, together with the popularity of online communities brings the general public to collaborate on and co-create knowledge about the event. The high level of interest in capturing what draws the attention of society can particularly help online production communities meet one of the essential challenges they face: attracting and retaining newcomers. In this work, we explore how newcomers in such communities respond to knowledge production around major societal events. Analysis of the participation of 506 newcomers to Wikipedia articles related to three highly popular events shows that the popularity of the events attracts a new wave of users to the online community. These newcomers provide valuable contributions to the community, however, at a differing level depending on their initial motivation and experiences. Those participants who joined the online community solely to contribute to one topic or event are more likely to face challenges in contribution and leave Wikipedia after limited contribution. We discuss factors and patterns of newcomers’ early and longer-term participation in Wikipedia in relation to three popular events.

ACS Style

Ang Li; Rosta Farzan. Keeping up on Current Events! A Case Study of Newcomers to Wikipedia. Transactions on Petri Nets and Other Models of Concurrency XV 2018, 348 -369.

AMA Style

Ang Li, Rosta Farzan. Keeping up on Current Events! A Case Study of Newcomers to Wikipedia. Transactions on Petri Nets and Other Models of Concurrency XV. 2018; ():348-369.

Chicago/Turabian Style

Ang Li; Rosta Farzan. 2018. "Keeping up on Current Events! A Case Study of Newcomers to Wikipedia." Transactions on Petri Nets and Other Models of Concurrency XV , no. : 348-369.

Conference paper
Published: 20 September 2018 in Transactions on Petri Nets and Other Models of Concurrency XV
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Most non-profits maintain a social media presence with the hope to increase their popularity and achieve goals, such as to collect donations or recruit volunteers. While there is a strong vibe about the popularity of social media, there is very little empirical evidence on whether and how nonprofits can benefit from social media participation. We propose a method to quantify and assess the relationship between public social media attention and the amount of donations non-profits receive as a measure of success. We aim to address an essential limitation of prior research which has focused on studying the impact of social media on non-profits in isolation. To do so, we conducted a study of the Facebook participation of 76 non-profit organizations in Chile. Our results highlight factors that contribute to competition for public attention and show at what level social media attention relates to donation support.

ACS Style

Rosta Farzan; Claudia López. Assessing Competition for Social Media Attention Among Non-profits. Transactions on Petri Nets and Other Models of Concurrency XV 2018, 196 -211.

AMA Style

Rosta Farzan, Claudia López. Assessing Competition for Social Media Attention Among Non-profits. Transactions on Petri Nets and Other Models of Concurrency XV. 2018; ():196-211.

Chicago/Turabian Style

Rosta Farzan; Claudia López. 2018. "Assessing Competition for Social Media Attention Among Non-profits." Transactions on Petri Nets and Other Models of Concurrency XV , no. : 196-211.

Chapter
Published: 03 May 2018 in Transactions on Petri Nets and Other Models of Concurrency XV
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In this chapter we present one of the pioneer approaches in supporting users in navigating the complex information spaces, social navigation support. Social navigation support is inspired by natural tendencies of individuals to follow traces of each other in exploring the world, especially when dealing with uncertainties. In this chapter, we cover details on various approaches in implementing social navigation support in the information space as we also connect the concept to supporting theories. The first part of this chapter reviews related theories and introduces the design space of social navigation support through a series of example applications. The second part of the chapter discusses the common challenges in design and implementation of social navigation support, demonstrates how these challenges have been addressed, and reviews more recent direction of social navigation support. Furthermore, as social navigation support has been an inspirational approach to various other social information access approaches we discuss how social navigation support can be integrated with those approaches. We conclude with a review of evaluation methods for social navigation support and remarks about its current state.

ACS Style

Rosta Farzan; Peter Brusilovsky. Social Navigation. Transactions on Petri Nets and Other Models of Concurrency XV 2018, 142 -180.

AMA Style

Rosta Farzan, Peter Brusilovsky. Social Navigation. Transactions on Petri Nets and Other Models of Concurrency XV. 2018; ():142-180.

Chicago/Turabian Style

Rosta Farzan; Peter Brusilovsky. 2018. "Social Navigation." Transactions on Petri Nets and Other Models of Concurrency XV , no. : 142-180.

Conference paper
Published: 15 March 2018 in Transactions on Petri Nets and Other Models of Concurrency XV
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Online health support groups have been gaining prominence in supporting patients and their caregivers. However, it stays as a challenge to understand the role they play in the life of their members. In this paper, we propose a novel approach in utilizing sentiment analysis to explore the dynamics and impact of online health support groups. We present our sentiment analysis model designed for social media support groups and our preliminary results in utilizing the model to understand a Facebook support group for patients with Sickle Cell Disease.

ACS Style

Keyang Zheng; Ang Li; Rosta Farzan. Exploration of Online Health Support Groups Through the Lens of Sentiment Analysis. Transactions on Petri Nets and Other Models of Concurrency XV 2018, 145 -151.

AMA Style

Keyang Zheng, Ang Li, Rosta Farzan. Exploration of Online Health Support Groups Through the Lens of Sentiment Analysis. Transactions on Petri Nets and Other Models of Concurrency XV. 2018; ():145-151.

Chicago/Turabian Style

Keyang Zheng; Ang Li; Rosta Farzan. 2018. "Exploration of Online Health Support Groups Through the Lens of Sentiment Analysis." Transactions on Petri Nets and Other Models of Concurrency XV , no. : 145-151.

Conference paper
Published: 23 October 2016 in Computer Vision
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Success of online production communities such as Wikipedia highly relies on a continuous stream of newcomers to replace the inevitable high turnover and to bring on board new sources of ideas and labor. However, these communities have been struggling with attracting newcomers, especially from a diverse population of users. In this work, we conducted a case study on how organizing an offline co-located event over a short period of time contributes to involving newcomers in the online community. We present results of our multiple-source quantitative analysis of Wikipedia Art+Feminism edit-a-thon as a case of such events. The results of our analysis shows that such offline events are successful in attracting a large number of newcomers; however, retention of the newcomers stays as a challenge.

ACS Style

Rosta Farzan; Saiph Savage; Claudia Flores Saviaga. Bring on Board New Enthusiasts! A Case Study of Impact of Wikipedia Art + Feminism Edit-A-Thon Events on Newcomers. Computer Vision 2016, 24 -40.

AMA Style

Rosta Farzan, Saiph Savage, Claudia Flores Saviaga. Bring on Board New Enthusiasts! A Case Study of Impact of Wikipedia Art + Feminism Edit-A-Thon Events on Newcomers. Computer Vision. 2016; ():24-40.

Chicago/Turabian Style

Rosta Farzan; Saiph Savage; Claudia Flores Saviaga. 2016. "Bring on Board New Enthusiasts! A Case Study of Impact of Wikipedia Art + Feminism Edit-A-Thon Events on Newcomers." Computer Vision , no. : 24-40.