Exploring repost features of police-generated microblogs through topic and sentiment analysis

Purpose This study aims to explore the repost features of microblogs acting to promote the information diffusion of government-generated content on social media. Design/methodology/approach This study proposes a topic-sentiment analysis using a mixed social media analytics framework to analyse the microblogs collected from the Sina Weibo accounts of 30 Chinese provincial police departments. On the basis of this analysis, this study presents the distribution of reposted microblogs and reveals the reposting characteristics of police-generated microblogs (PGMs). Findings The experimental results indicate that children's safety and crime-related PGMs with a positive sentiment can achieve a high level of online information diffusion. Originality/value This study is novel, as it reveals the reposting features of PGMs from both a topic and sentiment perspectives, and provides new findings that can inspire users' reposting behaviour.