Course: Big Data: Measuring And Predicting Human Behaviour

How do you analyse a billion records of Oyster card tap-ins and tap-outs? Tobias talks to Michael Batty, Chair of the Centre for Advanced Spatial Analysis at UCL, about how …

Can we describe cities with mathematical laws? Watch this video for an introduction to the mathematics of cities, and an overview of how new data sources allowing us to quantify …

In Week 8, we began to explore how big data might help reduce the impact of disasters, and how new data sources can help us understand how people move around. …

We’ve seen that data from mobile phones can help us understand where people are. Can we use the same data to predict where people are going? Mirco Musolesi presents new …

When protests or political gatherings take place, how do organisers estimate how many people have attended? And why is this number often different to what the police report? In this …

In Week 7, we began to explore how big data might help us measure and improve our happiness. Here’s a brief summary to help you prepare for Week 8. You …

So far, we’ve discussed various examples of how data from Google, Wikipedia and Twitter might give us new insight into human behaviour. Increasingly however, the information we are uploading to …

In 2010, an earthquake of catastrophic magnitude hit Haiti, with devastating results. To deliver the aid required, aid workers needed the best possible understanding of the layout of the island, …

We often hear that big data sets which describe our behaviour have been “anonymised” to protect our privacy. Does this really work? Is it really impossible to re-identify an individual …

Can we measure happiness on a global scale by analysing the messages which people post to services such as Twitter and Facebook? Watch this video to hear how Facebook data …

We’ve discussed how big data might help us generate better estimates of how many people have an illness right now, rather than one or two weeks ago. Beyond estimating how …

Traditional measurements of the number of people who currently have the flu rely on flu patients visiting their doctor, and their doctor reporting flu cases to a central health authority, …

In Week 5, you had a chance to catch up, but also worked with us to crowdsource some new data. A big thanks to everyone who took part! By playing …

The Internet has now become a central source of information for many. How might searches for information about a company online be related to trading of that company’s stocks? Watch …

We all know that large stock market falls can happen, and that when they do, they can impact the wellbeing of people around the world. However, such events are rare. …