A national Washington Post-ABC News poll earlier this month asked Americans what issue is most important in their vote — with no options provided — and found 28 percent naming the economy and jobs. That was followed by terrorism and foreign policy (12 percent), immigration (11 percent), ethics (8 percent) and a slew of others. …
Tapping into a random sample of ordinary political conversations is practically impossible, but it is feasible to analyze what issues people are talking about on social media networks. While the public and self-selected nature of social media interactions gives greater voice to those who are most politically engaged and technologically capable, the sheer volume and interconnected nature of discussions make them worth a look.
To investigate, we asked the data scientists at MIT’s Laboratory for Social Machines to analyze Twitter conversation data during the same period the poll was conducted — March 3-6. CONT.
Scott Clement, Washington Post