Having large numbers of widely cited publications has no bearing on the Twitter popularity of academics in the interventional cardiology community, a new study has found.
The study, by Davide Capodanno, MD, PhD, Azienda Ospedaliero-Universitaria Policlinico “G Rodolico-San Marco” in Catania, Italy, and colleagues, found that academic impact through papers and citations, as calculated by the Hirsch index (or h-index) was found to be unrelated to whether or not academics were in the top quartile of Twitter followers (> 736 followers).
“Indeed, accounts generating a stream of valuable content are more likely to be followed. In addition, some accounts may take advantage of celebrity to amplify their success, in a kind of incremental cycle,” wrote the authors.
Rather, Twitter followers were defined by factors mostly related to time and effort spent on the platform.
Having abundant tweets (> 505 tweets, adjusted OR 16.39), along with individual charisma (‘Kardashian index’ >5, adjusted OR 8.66), were the most significant predictors. Large number of accounts user follows (> 309 following), tweet rate (> 2.6 tweets per week), a large cooperation network and being affiliated to the US were also predictive of the heart doctors’ Twitter popularity.
“Indeed, accounts generating a stream of valuable content are more likely to be followed. In addition, some accounts may take advantage of celebrity to amplify their success, in a kind of incremental cycle,” according to the authors.
Individual charisma per the ‘Kardashian index‘, which measures discrepancy between social media reputation and publication record, was not a significant factor in the rate at which someone amassed followers.
“In aggregate, our results suggest that a prediction rule for durable popularity on Twitter is to be active and generate valuable contents rather than relying on individual academic or social reputation,” Capodanno’s team concluded.
An earlier study had shown that the reverse was true; the more Twitter followers, the greater their academic standing.
Limitations include not being able to account for anonymous or pseudonym accounts, and the results may not be generalisable to the interventional cardiology community as a whole.
Source: MedPage Today
Journal information: D’Arrigo P, et al “Determinants of popularity and natural history of social media accounts in interventional cardiology” JACC Cardiovasc Interv 2021; DOI: 10.1016/j.jcin.2021.01.021.
