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Volume 16
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This is an early access version, the complete PDF, HTML, and XML versions will be available soon.
Article

Transformer-Based Emotion and Conflict Analysis of Disaster-Related Social Media: An Actor-Aware Decision Support Framework

by
Mesut Toğaçar
1,*,
Serpil Aslan
2,
Ayşe Meydanoğlu
3,
Emirhan Denizyol
4,
Abdurrezzak Ekidi
4,
Tuncay Karateke
5,
Yunus Emre Temiz
6,
Beyzade Nadir Çetin
7,
Ramazan Erten
5,
Hatice Çakmak
8 and
Enes Saylan
9
1
Department of Management Information Systems, Faculty of Economics and Administrative Sciences, Fırat University, 23119 Elazığ, Türkiye
2
Department of Software Engineering, Faculty of Engineering and Natural Sciences, Malatya Turgut Özal University, 44210 Malatya, Türkiye
3
Department of Basic Islamic Sciences, Arabic Language and Rhetoric Division, Faculty of Divinity, Fırat University, 23119 Elazığ, Türkiye
4
Department of Software Engineering, Institute of Graduate Education, Malatya Turgut Özal University, 44210 Malatya, Türkiye
5
Department of Philosophy and Religious Sciences, Religious Education Division, Faculty of Divinity, Fırat University, 23119 Elazığ, Türkiye
6
Department of Philosophy and Religious Studies, Religious Psychology Division, Faculty of Divinity, İnönü University, 44280 Malatya, Türkiye
7
Department of Sociology, Socio-Metrics Division, Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences, Fırat University, 23119 Elazığ, Türkiye
8
Faculty of Human and Social Sciences, Modern Turkish Dialects and Literatures, Institute Of Social Sciences, Fırat University, 23119 Elazığ, Türkiye
9
Department of Basic Islamic Sciences, Institute of Social Sciences, Fırat University, 23119 Elazığ, Türkiye
*
Author to whom correspondence should be addressed.
Appl. Sci. 2026, 16(8), 3877; https://doi.org/10.3390/app16083877
Submission received: 1 March 2026 / Revised: 8 April 2026 / Accepted: 8 April 2026 / Published: 16 April 2026
(This article belongs to the Section Computing and Artificial Intelligence)
Versions Notes

Abstract

Social media platforms have become critical communication environments during disasters, where individuals express emotions, share information, and engage in public discourse. These platforms also reflect heterogeneous communication patterns shaped by different actor groups. However, existing studies predominantly focus on emotion classification and often overlook the combined role of actor identity and conflict dynamics. To address this gap, this study proposes an integrated AI-based analytical framework for actor-aware emotion and conflict analysis in post-disaster social media. An expert-annotated Turkish tweet dataset was constructed based on Ekman’s emotion model, including anger, fear, sadness, happiness, and surprise, along with an additional irrelevant/off-topic category and conflict-level labels. A Transformer-based model (BERTurk) was fine-tuned for multi-class emotion classification. Experimental results show that the proposed model achieves strong classification performance, with an accuracy of 0.931 and an F1-score of 0.912, outperforming conventional machine learning and deep learning baselines. Actor-based analysis reveals systematic differences in emotional and conflict patterns across groups. Scientists, journalists, and individual users exhibit higher levels of conflict and more pronounced negative emotional expressions, whereas institutionally oriented actors display comparatively balanced and supportive communication patterns. In addition, a web-based decision support system was developed to enable interactive visualization and actor-level exploration of emotional and conflict dynamics. Overall, the proposed framework provides a scalable, analytically robust approach to understanding social media discourse in disaster contexts and offers practical implications for AI-driven crisis communication and decision-support systems.
Keywords: transformer-based emotion classification; social media analytics; actor-based analysis; conflict detection; disaster-related social media; decision support systems transformer-based emotion classification; social media analytics; actor-based analysis; conflict detection; disaster-related social media; decision support systems

Share and Cite

MDPI and ACS Style

Toğaçar, M.; Aslan, S.; Meydanoğlu, A.; Denizyol, E.; Ekidi, A.; Karateke, T.; Temiz, Y.E.; Çetin, B.N.; Erten, R.; Çakmak, H.; et al. Transformer-Based Emotion and Conflict Analysis of Disaster-Related Social Media: An Actor-Aware Decision Support Framework. Appl. Sci. 2026, 16, 3877. https://doi.org/10.3390/app16083877

AMA Style

Toğaçar M, Aslan S, Meydanoğlu A, Denizyol E, Ekidi A, Karateke T, Temiz YE, Çetin BN, Erten R, Çakmak H, et al. Transformer-Based Emotion and Conflict Analysis of Disaster-Related Social Media: An Actor-Aware Decision Support Framework. Applied Sciences. 2026; 16(8):3877. https://doi.org/10.3390/app16083877

Chicago/Turabian Style

Toğaçar, Mesut, Serpil Aslan, Ayşe Meydanoğlu, Emirhan Denizyol, Abdurrezzak Ekidi, Tuncay Karateke, Yunus Emre Temiz, Beyzade Nadir Çetin, Ramazan Erten, Hatice Çakmak, and et al. 2026. "Transformer-Based Emotion and Conflict Analysis of Disaster-Related Social Media: An Actor-Aware Decision Support Framework" Applied Sciences 16, no. 8: 3877. https://doi.org/10.3390/app16083877

APA Style

Toğaçar, M., Aslan, S., Meydanoğlu, A., Denizyol, E., Ekidi, A., Karateke, T., Temiz, Y. E., Çetin, B. N., Erten, R., Çakmak, H., & Saylan, E. (2026). Transformer-Based Emotion and Conflict Analysis of Disaster-Related Social Media: An Actor-Aware Decision Support Framework. Applied Sciences, 16(8), 3877. https://doi.org/10.3390/app16083877

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