#thisshowsucks! The Overpowering Influence of Negative Social Media Comments on Television Viewers

Waddell, T. Franklin; Sundar, S. Shyam

doi:10.1080/08838151.2017.1309414

Cited by 40 publications

(52 citation statements)

References 26 publications

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“…Multiple studies have demonstrated the effect of the valence of social information on viewers' self-reported video enjoyment (Waddell & Sundar, 2017;Winter et al, 2018). Their results are consistent: While video viewers who are exposed to positive social information experience more enjoyment of a video, video viewers who are exposed to negative social information experience less enjoyment (Waddell & Sundar, 2017;Winter et al, 2018). Two explanations for this finding are offered by researchers.…”

Section: Video Viewers' Attention To Social Informationmentioning

confidence: 86%

“…Recently, scholars have investigated how the valence of social information affects the enjoyment of people watching online videos (Waddell & Sundar, 2017;Winter et al, 2018). In their studies, researchers typically assumed that people pay attention to social information and notice its valence.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…These expectations then guide people's attention to those elements of the main content that are in line with their expectations, thus changing people's experience of the main media content. Alternatively, Waddell and Sundar (2017) suggest that, by noticing the valence of social information, video viewers become aware of others' opinions of a video. This makes them adjust their own video evaluations because people have a tendency to adjust their evaluations to that of the group.…”

Section: Video Viewers' Attention To Social Informationmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…This makes them adjust their own video evaluations because people have a tendency to adjust their evaluations to that of the group. Thus, while Shedlosky-Shoemaker et al (2011) argue that social information can alter individuals' actual experiences of media content, Waddell and Sundar (2017) suggest that social information only alters individuals' evaluations of media content. Although these are two different explanations, both imply that the valence of social information is an important predictor of viewer responses.…”

Section: Video Viewers' Attention To Social Informationmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…The influence of social information's valence on the experiences of video viewers has mainly been studied in experimental settings (e.g., Cameron & Geidner, 2014;Waddell & Sundar, 2017;Walther et al, 2010). These experiments are somewhat limited in their ecological validity: Either they embed the social information into the online videos (Cameron & Geidner, 2014;Waddell & Sundar, 2017) or they explicitly instruct participants to examine the social information Walther et al, 2010). Thus, these experiments are forced-exposure designs in which it is certain that video viewers pay attention to the social information.…”

mentioning

confidence: 99%

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

et al. 2019

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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.

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