AI confirms the obvious: The pandemic bummed people out

Mood is a unique way for researchers to try to measure the impact of natural or unnatural disasters on people. However, it's simply impractical to ask every single person in the world how they're feeling in the aftermath of a sweeping event. But scientists from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, the Chinese Academy of Sciences, and the Max Planck Institute for Human Development found a workaround. They used machine learning techniques to scan social media for sentiment shifts following the first wave of COVID-19 in 100 different countries and get real-time reads on how happy or sad the events related to the pandemic made people across the world. Think of the process as an AI-powered mood ring, but for millions of people.