In this paper we study a dozen of rumors on Twitter to find new insights in user characteristics and macro patterns in the process of rumor spreading. The collection and curation of data has left us with 12 rumor datasets out of 56,852 tweets from 43,919 users. The analysis over data shows users with lower ratio of following-to-follower are more probable to spark the rumor diffusion while users with the higher ratio are those who keep the flame alive. Furthermore, most users participate in the process of rumor spreading only once which implies the nature of rumor spreading is not a recurrent activity. However, among those users who engage with multi posts, the extreme change of state from rumor spreader to anti-rumor spreader happens to users with higher ratio of following-to-follower. We discuss these findings by employing the theory of planned behavior. Finally, analyzing the process of rumor spreading at the macro level revealed the existence of two distinctive patterns. Further investigations showed the extent of time gap between the beginning of rumor and anti-rumor diffusion plays the major role in emerging of these patterns. This phenomenon is explained by the shift in subjective norm toward rumors on social media.

在本文中，我们研究了Twitter上的许多谣言，以在谣言传播过程中找到有关用户特征和宏模式的新见解。数据的收集和整理已使来自43,919位用户的56,852条推文中有12个谣言数据集。对数据的分析表明，追随者比例较低的用户更有可能引发谣言扩散，而追随者比例较高的用户则是保持火焰活跃的用户。此外，大多数用户仅参与一次谣言传播过程，这意味着谣言传播的本质不是周期性活动。但是，在从事多个职位的用户中，从谣言传播者到反谣言传播者的状态发生极端变化的情况是追随者比率较高的用户。我们通过运用计划行为理论讨论这些发现。最后，从宏观层面分析谣言传播的过程，发现存在两种独特的模式。进一步的研究表明，谣言开始和反谣言传播之间的时间间隔程度在这些模式的产生中起主要作用。这种现象可以通过主观规范向社交媒体上的谣言转变来解释。