Retweet: A popular information diffusion mechanism - A survey paper

Retweeting or reposting a message is considered as an easily available information diffusion mechanism provided by Twitter or any other social network sites. By finding out why a user retweets a tweet, or predicting whether a tweet will be retweeted by a user, we can not only understand user's behavior or interest better, but also understand how information is diffused on the online social network. In this survey paper, we have explored various research works related to retweet prediction and retweeting behavior analysis, investigated the underlying reasons for spreading information in forms of retweets, and discussed the challenges of retweet related research. The purpose of the paper is to provide an overview of researches in retweet prediction area, which can be used as an introductory guide for future researchers in this field.