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January 2024
What does Reddit have to do with health science research? More than you’d think. The social news-aggregation website known as Reddit is a place where users can post content and vote up or down on what is shared by other members. Among the plethora of topics on Reddit there is a strong vein of health-related content.
Researchers at BYU’s Computational Health Science Research Collaborative are crunching data to see how Reddit users search for and sift through medical information and how this has changed since the COVID-19 pandemic.
Chase Westhoff, a recent graduate in computer science, participated on the interdisciplinary team that is conducting the research. “Working with Dr. Christophe Giraud-Carrier on this project allowed me to learn about data scraping, data analysis, and project planning,” Westhoff says. “Being on this team has helped me better understand the research process and the difference I can make as a researcher.”
“I am extremely grateful for the support of generous donors. Without it, I would not have been able to participate,” Westhoff says. He is now a graduate student pursuing a master’s degree in computer science at BYU.
When Walter Barrus experienced devastating hardships, Brigham Young University helped transform his life for the better. Margaret Barrus’s BYU degree, earned later in life, opened doors for her as a computer programmer. Today, they are using a planned gift to improve the lives of others at BYU and beyond.
When Kika Londoño was eight years old, her family moved from Utah to Colombia for a year and a half. During this formative time, she came to love Latin America and the Spanish language.
Many students benefit from mentoring opportunities on campus that are sponsored by donors. And although Katie King knew that her scholarship and many of the facilities at BYU were provided by donors, she was surprised to learn that her job is donor-funded as well.
For many students receiving a scholarship or other financial assistance from donors is a blessing. For others it can only be described as “life-changing”.
Researchers at BYU’s Computational Health Science Research Collaborative are crunching data to see how Reddit users search for and sift through medical information and how this has changed since the COVID-19 pandemic.