Title: What is the public opinion about universities and sustainability? a social media analysis among 'Spain' and across the world

Authors: Cecilia Elizabeth Bayas Aldaz; David Duran-Rodas; Leyla Angélica Sandoval Hamón

Addresses: Department of Business Organization, Universidad Autónoma de Madrid, C/Francisco Tomás y Valiente, 5, 28049, Madrid, Spain ' Mobil. LAB Doctoral Research Group, Technical University of Munich, Arcisstraße 21, 80333 München, Germany ' Department of Business Organization, Universidad Autónoma de Madrid, C/Francisco Tomás y Valiente, 5, 28049, Madrid, Spain

Abstract: This exploratory study aims to identify, to cluster, and to set an emotional value of the content of tweets including 'university' and sustainability-related terms in Spain in comparison to the rest of the world. For six months, in Spain, 2370 tweets were collected and 53,567 tweets in the rest of the world (English language). To carry out this research, sentiment and topic clustering analyses were applied. The results present key factors that involve the environment, research, and innovation through the role of universities in communities. The outcome also adds an entrepreneurship vision and practical implication of academic knowledge in industries. The conclusions of the present study can be useful to evidence the contribution of universities in their pursuit of a sustainable environment. Our findings will also define important questions to be addressed through the main mission of universities as part of an innovative process of answering new challenges.

Keywords: Twitter; sustainability; social media; university; sentiment analysis; text mining; public opinion; environment.

DOI: 10.1504/IJISD.2021.118377

International Journal of Innovation and Sustainable Development, 2021 Vol.15 No.4, pp.438 - 457

Received: 07 Mar 2019
Accepted: 30 Mar 2020
Published online: 25 Oct 2021 *

Full-text access for editors Full-text access for subscribers Purchase this article Comment on this article