Effects of Media Features and Content Features on User Experience in the Context of Social Media Videos

Danielle Ka Lai Lee

doi:10.7273/000005353

As more media features are incessantly developed by social media companies, it is beneficial both theoretically and practically to understand their effects on user experience. Among different media features, audiovisual effects are highly focused by the social media companies and yet to receive more scholarly attention. As such, situated in the context of videoblogging (also known as “vlogging”) on YouTube, this dissertation aimed to understand how the media feature (i.e., audiovisual effects) would play a role in individual processing, and how the media feature would interact with a common content feature (i.e., narrative) in contributing to viewers’ engagement and message endorsement. With the help of Message Interpretation Process (MIP) model, study 1 adopted survey approach and examined how the presence of audiovisual effects served as a contingent factor that amplified the individual processing in resulting in positive perception pertinent to message endorsement (i.e., perceived message credibility) for different gender groups. Upon verifying that audiovisual effects would indeed contribute to viewers’ experience, study 2 further brought the investigation closer to an ecological real-life setting, capturing how audiovisual effects acted in parallel with a common content feature (i.e., narrative) in influencing viewers’ experience. With this, study 2 set the context to influenza vaccination promotion on videoblog (as known as “vlog”), and it adopted an experimental approach to examine the concurrent effects of the media feature (i.e., audiovisual effects) and the content feature (i.e., narrative) on vlog in influencing user engagement and self-efficacy which is pertaining to message endorsement. Participants of the two studies were recruited from Mechanical Turk. Results of study 1 highlighted the imposing roles of the MIP variables (i.e., perceived desirability and wishful identification) in facilitating positive perception, and the strength of the associations was amplified in the presence of audiovisual effects when viewers and videobloggers (also known as “vloggers”) were of the same gender. Informed by study 1 that gender of the vloggers and the viewers matter, study 2 curated an experiment in which the gender effects were controlled. Results of study 2 suggested that the audiovisual effects were in general helpful for both narrative and non-narrative conditions in facilitating user engagement. Whereas for message endorsement, matching of construal levels of the content feature and the media feature was needed. The study indicated that user engagement does not necessarily equate with endorsement, and strategic message designs should fit the goals of the messages for better user experience.

Effects of Media Features and Content Features on User Experience in the Context of Social Media Videos

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