Negativity drives online news consumption

Abstract

Online media is important for society in informing and shaping opinions, hence raising the question of what drives online news consumption. Here we analyse the causal effect of negative and emotional words on news consumption using a large online dataset of viral news stories. Specifically, we conducted our analyses using a series of randomized controlled trials (N = 22,743). Our dataset comprises ~105,000 different variations of news stories from Upworthy.com that generated ∼5.7 million clicks across more than 370 million overall impressions. Although positive words were slightly more prevalent than negative words, we found that negative words in news headlines increased consumption rates (and positive words decreased consumption rates). For a headline of average length, each additional negative word increased the click-through rate by 2.3%. Our results contribute to a better understanding of why users engage with online media.

Curiosity in news consumption

“…A separate literature on valence (e.g., Ito et al, 1998;Rozin & Royzman, 2001) also suggests that negative information tends to attract more attention. While people tend to avoid negative information about themselves (Golman et al, 2017), they may be attracted to negative information in the news (Robertson et al, 2023;Soroka et al, 2019;Trussler & Soroka, 2014). We now operationalize these concepts for our specific setting where people choose whether or not to read news articles based on headlines, aiming to test whether variables capturing information-gap salience, importance, surprisingness, and negativity predict news consumption.…”

Expert Bias and Democratic Erosion: Assessing Expert Perceptions of Contemporary American Democracy

“…Twitter is a relevant platform for this test because of its role as a digital "town square" for academic communities, including the political science community (Bisbee, Larson, and Munger 2022). It is plausible that excessive pessimism regarding the state of American democracy may attract a substantial audience, given the propensity to consume negative news (Robertson et al 2023;Sacerdote, Sehgal, and Cook 2020).…”

The penetration of Russian disinformation related to the war in Ukraine: Evidence from Poland, the Czech Republic and Slovakia

“…Media consumers are characterized by a generalized preference for negative information, as such information has a stronger impact, and its effects last longer (Soroka and McAdams, 2015). In addition, negative information attracts more attention and is considered more informative than positive information (Robertson et al, 2023); it is also subject to more scrutiny by the recipient, thus proving more persuasive than positive information (Jaffé and Greifeneder, 2021).…”