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When love outgrows hate on twitter

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IANS London
Last Updated : May 23 2014 | 1:13 PM IST

Do you begin your day with a friendly, lovable tweet? You are among millions who are spreading the message of love on twitter - slowing the flow of hateful messages on the social media platform.

According to British researchers, positive tweets after any terror attack are far greater in number.

"Our findings show social media platforms, in particular Twitter, may self-regulate, slowing the flow of negative and hateful information following terrorist and similar events of national interest," explained researchers from Cardiff University.

To reach this conclusion, researchers collected tweets immediately after extremists killed British soldier Lee Rigby May 22, 2013.

They found that tweets with hateful content were statistically less likely to be retweeted than those with positive sentiments.

"Social media platforms are not havens for those spreading hateful and social disruptive online content," the researchers added in a paper reported in the journal Social Network Analysis and Mining.

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First Published: May 23 2014 | 12:58 PM IST

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