The effects of social information on the enjoyment of online videos: An eye tracking study on the role of attention

Abstract

Recent experiments showed that the valence of user comments (i.e., social information) presented alongside online videos can alter viewers' enjoyment of videos. However, it is unclear how much attention video viewers pay to social information and whether the effects found in previous studies occur if participants are not forced to view the social information. Therefore, this study investigated how the valence of social information presented alongside online videos affects viewers' enjoyment when viewers are free to determine whether and how much attention they pay to social information. Using an eye tracker, we found that most video viewers pay attention to social information which then elicits a valence effect on their enjoyment. Results also showed that a negativity bias occurred: Participants paid most attention to negative social information. Accordingly, the effect of social information on enjoyment was stronger for negative social information. This study is the first to show that social information of online videos affects the experiences of video viewers in settings where viewers are in charge of how much attention they pay to social information.On social media platforms, users are not only exposed to content created by professional content providers, they are also exposed to content created by average users, notably, to evaluative information in the form of comments and (dis)likes. This evaluative information is referred to as social information.

Watching television in a home environment: effects on children’s attention, problem solving and comprehension

“…Consequently, when significant interactions were followed up using simple effects analysis a Bonferroni correction was used to reduce the chances of obtaining false-positive results (type I errors). This is consistent with the analytical approach used in similar research (Landrum et al, 2019;Möller et al, 2019). Trends are reported when effect sizes, calculated using partial eta squared, are medium to large.…”

Online social environments and their impact on video viewers: The effects of user comments on entertainment experiences and knowledge gain during political satire consumption

“…Thus, it seems that especially a negative valence of comments can diminish viewers' experiences of videos as a source of fun, appreciation and learning at the same time. This suggests that a negativity bias occurs in the processing of user comments as was previously, for example, also found in the context of news consumption (Damstra and Boukes, 2021), entertainment (Möller et al, 2021), or human responses in general (Ito et al, 1998).…”

“…Many people watch political satire videos via social media (Baym and Shah, 2011; Yang and Jiang, 2015), which embed these videos in a social context consisting of user comments and (dis)likes. Extant research investigated the potential consequences of this social environment; these studies found that user comments more so than statistics about likes or dislikes affected viewers when they watch online videos (Möller et al, 2021; Winter et al, 2015). However, the effects of user comments on viewers’ experiences of political satire videos, in particular, are still unknown.…”

“…Extant research shows that the user comments in particular influence viewers’ experiences of videos as well as their attitudes toward the topics discussed in them (e.g. Hsueh et al, 2015; Krämer et al, 2019; Möller et al, 2021; Winter et al, 2015, 2018). Hence, the shift from watching audio-visual content via social media rather than on television introduces a new, more social way of consuming video material.…”

“…First, scholars have predominantly focused on the effects of comments’ valence , which refers to their positivity or negativity (i.e. Krämer et al, 2019; Möller et al, 2021; Waddell and Bailey, 2019; Waddell and Sundar, 2017; Winter et al, 2018). These studies found that media consumption leads audiences to feel more entertained when the message is accompanied by positive (compared to negative) comments.…”