Online Tree Holes and Sentiment Analysis: A Case Study of Weibo Blogs

Tree holes are traditionally for people to pour out feelings in order to seek a psychological comfort. Online tree holes have been increasingly reviving in social media. Social media are reconstructing our relationship with the deceased, especially in the special context of Covid-19 pandemic. This project focuses on exploring netizens’ communication features and language sentiments in a popular online tree hole (i.e., Dr. Li Wenliang’s blog) in Weibo, which is a major Chinese social media platform. We analyze the commentors ’sentiments (i.e., positive vs. negative attitude) across the following eight areas: 1) Work, 2) Study, 3) Family & Romance, 4) Personal Feelings, 5) News, 6) Covid Pandemic, 7) Olympic Games, and 8) Greetings, and discuss these netizens’ sociopsychology and the social functions of online tree holes especially in the Covid-19 period.