Social media companies should gain more in-house knowledge about mental health to realize the impact of recommendation algorithms on users with mental illness
IT'S TROUBLING ENOUGH that British teenager Molly Russell sought out images of suicide and self-harm online before she took her own life in 2017. Tweets: @jvitak , @marylgray , @johndcook , and @wired Tweets: Dr. Jessica Vitak / @jvitak : This is a great discussion by @TarletonG & @ysabelgerrard of the challenges to building algorithms/recommender systems that can distinguish between positive/neutral activities and problematic ones (e.g., self-harm). When Algorithms Think You Want to Die http://www.wired.com/... Mary L. Gray / @marylgray : This! By @ysabelgerrard and @TarletonG gives us good reason to invest in sound approaches to content moderation (vs whack-a-mole attempts to automate it away). It's important work that deserves better work conditions and demands domain experts in health, among other things. http://twitter.com/... John D. Cook / @johndcook : Algorithms recommend content you appear to want. That can lead to a literal death spiral. http://www.wired.com/... @wired : “Platforms need to better recognize when content is right for some and not for others, when finding what you searched for is not the same as being invited to see more, and when what's good for the individual may not be good for the public as a whole.” http://www.wired.com/...