Humor and camera view on mobile short-form video apps influence user experience and technology-adoption intent, an example of TikTok (DouYin)

Highlights

• Mobile short-form videos have the potential to persuade new technology-adoption.

• Mobile videos engage viewers' sense of Immersion, Social Presence and Entertainment.

• First-person camera view elevates viewers' Immersion, Social Presence, Entertainment.

• Humor has mixed effects on the social interaction between users and mobile apps.

Abstract

Mobile short-form videos on social media apps are increasingly popular. Human-Computer Interaction (HCI) theories may be extended to short-form video apps to understand and improve app user experience, as well as to persuade new technology-adoption. The present study examined the psychological responses and persuasive outcomes associated with short-form videos on a mobile social media app. In a 2 (low- V.S. high-level humor) X 2 (first- V.S. third-person view) between-subject experimental design, participants (N = 81) were randomly assigned one of the four sets of videos about smart homes; post-viewing, they filled out an online questionnaire. Results of ANCOVA demonstrated significant effects of videos' humor and camera view on the viewer perceptions of Immersion, Social Presence and Entertainment but not on Spatial Presence and Perceptual Realism: Humor had mixed effects on the interaction between users and the mobile app; the first-person camera view elevated viewers' Immersion, Social Presence, Entertainment. As a PROCESS mediation test showed, Social Presence mediated (by 56.78%) the indirect link between the level of humor getting from a video and the viewers’ post-viewing intent to adopt the technology depicted in the video. The study demonstrated values of extending HCI theories to mobile short-form video apps. Implications were discussed in terms of using appropriate humor and camera view for improving user experience and persuading serious agenda.

Introduction

Whether on the metro or at home, numerous people are burying their heads in the “sand” of mobile screens. Mobile devices enable users to immerse themselves into a mediated world, one that psychologically removes them from where they are physically situated. Instances of such temporary mental getaways include interactions with distant friends as if those interactions were face-to-face. This is achieved through social media, single- or multi-player mobile video gaming, and the consumption of mobile videos.

Prior research suggests that mobile videos, given humor and appropriate camera views (e.g., first-person), may promote new technology adoption (Maredia et al., 2018). On top of traditional social media, public healthcare sectors are starting to leverage short-form video-sharing apps for comminuting health-related information to local communities, hoping for public health behavioral changes (Zhu, Xu, Zhang, Chen, & Evans, 2020). Mobile video-sharing app users, even on serious topics, prefer not only content shorter than 60 s but also content in cartoons or documentary style (Zhu et al., 2020). As to understand the underlying mechanism of whether and how short-form videos influence and persuade app users around a certain agenda, this study aims to take a Human-Computer Interaction (HCI) Approach and examine the associations between video characteristics and user responses. By testing several theory-driven models, this study also attempts to extend theories of immersion and presence to mobile social media platforms. Particularly, it studies short-form videos as a popular phenomenon, using TikTok as an example. By April 2019, TikTok has gained 200% market-share in a two-year growth period (Lee & Nass, 2005): The app had 1.17 million ratings on iPhone app store, 9.67 million ratings on Google Play (2019 April), and over 9.67 million downloads. With a fast-growing popularity and acceptance, social video-sharing apps may foster an ecology at the intersection of Snapchat and Instagram and shape unique user experience.

At mobile terminals, short-form videos are gaining increasing popularity through social media. As of 2010, most videos on YouTube had been under 10 min in length (Davidson et al., 2010). In 2017, however, social media users would already associate YouTube with an impression of longer (10-, 20-min) videos in contrast to Facebook, Instagram, and Snapchat, which they considered to typically provide shorter-form videos (Wright, 2017). On Instagram, for instance, users can watch short-form videos through “Feed”, “Stories”, and “Explore”. The posts feed congregates content from the accounts that a particular user follows; “Stories” allow users to share video-status no longer than 15 s (as of February 2020); the “Explore” page recommends posts from interesting accounts based on users’ previous in-app activities. According to Instagram (2020), more than 500 million accounts use the feature of “Stories” daily. The trend of consuming increasingly shorter videos may, to some extent, result from the fast pace of modern life. In a prior study (Wright, 2017), social media users explained that their preference for social media with short-form videos was due to convenience; in the meantime, users enjoyed content curation, through which the algorithm garners all posts but only presents a selection of curated content to the user. Indeed, a content curation strategy would very likely to tailor social media content for users, creating more app traffics in shorter intervals of time.

Apart from the trend for shorter video length, mobile videos on social media are also becoming increasingly overarching in content. For example, a lot of bloggers would endorse beauty products through short-form video apps; they often have the potential to persuade followers into purchases (Wright, 2017). Despite a length limit of 15 s, short-form videos can be substantial in content. With all user-generated content, users follow and interact with each other by viewing, liking, commenting, and sharing videos. Social media influencers and their followers, especially, may form a para-social bond, which promotes the sales of ideas, services, and products. On China-based social video-sharing app, TikTok (or “Dou Yin”), for example, mobile videos cover numerous aspects of life, e.g. beauty, cooking, cinema, education, health, and technology. Unlike Instagram (which is primarily a lifestyle photo-sharing app), TikTok positions itself to focused on quirky videos, most of which were not too professionally or aesthetically produced. While its international versions primarily targets at youth via singing, dancing, and funny viral videos, its Chinese version targets at older adults of a wide age range; majority of the videos are about daily life. Because of the different app versions, its Chinese version is used in this study for extracting natural, user-generated videos that can provide more substantial content on a comparatively more serious topic – possibly still in a humorous way.

Previous research has shown the promise of social media in marketing new technologies (Erkan & Evans, 2016; Iyengar, Van den Bulte, & Valente, 2011; Pentina, Koh, & Le, 2012) and the power of humor in persuasion (English, Sweetser, & Ancu, 2011). Humor is often a powerful psychological cue in persuasive technology design (Cialdini, 2007, Fogg, 2002, Khooshabeh et al., 2011, Morkes et al., 1999). Humorous and persuasive messages may significantly elevate the sense of presence (i.e., the sensation of being in a mediated environment) and sequentially facilitate message recall (Skalski, Tamborini, Glazer, & Smith, 2009). TikTok, likewise, may be used as a powerful tool to disseminate entertaining content that persuades people to adopt particular new technologies.

Among the numerous new ideas and technologies depicted on mobile video platforms, the smart home is no doubt under heated discussion. Since the early days, numerous animations and science fiction have depicted homes of the future. Among the variety of futuristic imaginations is the smart home, embedded with robots and automation systems. On TikTok, hundreds of user-generated videos are already showcasing real, existing smart homes. They include demonstration videos about automatic systems – fingerprint lock, window shades/curtains that can open and close according to indoor lighting needs, voice-controlled lighting/TV/music players, and thermostatically responsive systems. This diffusion trend of social media content on smart home technologies and the Internet of Things (i.e., IoT) is likely to expand and extend with the increasing prevalence of 5G, or the 5th generation of wireless communications, which started to emerge in 2019. Based on the above reasons, this study considers smart home technology as a readily available example, which is well suited for surveying users’ adoption intent after viewing mobile videos that depict smart homes.

In cyberspace and popular electronic media, Immersion, Involvement, and Presence are some common psychological outcomes of media effects. Other common media effects include enjoyment or entertainment and persuasion (Bracken & Skalski, 2010, pp. 5–8). These concepts appear in a plethora of communication research. For example, social presence has been observed in Computer-mediated Communication (CMC) through telephone or emails (Short, Williams, & Christie, 1976; Rice, 1993), with intelligent virtual agents such as those in online video games (Bailey, Wise, & Bolls, 2009) or in e-commerce sites (Lee & Nass), and through television (Freeman, Avons, Pearson, & IJsselsteijn, 1999). Few studies, if any, examined Immersion, Involvement, and Presence in the context of short-form videos on social media at mobile terminals. This study, hence, aims to fill in this gap in research. It will draw on research on television since television viewing is perhaps the most similar media experience comparable to viewing short-form videos on mobile devices.

While “presence” and “immersion” are often used interchangeably and seen together (McMahan, 2003), they underline different aspects of experience in a virtual or mediated environment. Ever since Jonathan Steuer coined the term “telepresence” in 1992 in an article published in the Journal of Communication, “(tele)presence” has been researched by numerous scholars from different fields including psychology, computer science, as well as communication. “(Tele)presence” is defined as “the extent to which one feels present in the mediated environment.” (Steuer, 1992, p. 76). In comparison, “immersion is a psychological state characterized by perceiving oneself to be enveloped by, included in, and interacting with an environment that provides a continuous stream of stimuli and experiences,” or “the degree to which an individual feels absorbed by or engrossed in a particular experience.” (Witmer & Singer, 1998, p. 227). According to McMahan (2003), the most accepted definition of immersion was from Janet Murray and Murray (2017): “the physical experience of being submerged in water.” It is the original, literal meaning of immersion, from which its metaphorical meaning derived to describe a subjective, psychological experience of being surrounded by another environment.

Apart from “presence” and “immersion,” one's engagement with virtual media content may often also relate to the notion of “involvement.” “Involvement is a psychological state experienced as a consequence of focusing one's energy and attention on a coherent set of stimuli or meaningfully related activities and events.” An individual attaches significance or meaning to the stimuli, activities, or events, the level of which affects their level of involvement. (Witmer & Singer, 1998, p. 227). However, the attentional attribute of this state should fall into the domain of Social Presence according to Nichols, Haldane, and Wilson (2000) – involvement was thereafter part of the measurement of presence in some studies (e.g., Lee, Park, & Song, 2005; Turner, Turner, & McGregor, 2007).

Apart from the definitions mentioned above, some researchers also consider presence as the following psychological state after “immersion” and “involvement.” It is “the subjective experience of being in one place or environment, even when one is physically situated in another” (Witmer & Singer, 1998, p. 225). When an individual is mediated by technology, her/his presence in the cyberspace is two-folded (Bailey et al., 2009): Physical presence and social presence. Physical presence is the feeling as if transcending the medium. Social Presence is the feeling of social interaction. According to Biocca (1997), social presence is a relational term in a mediated communication environment. It is one's feeling of coexisting and interacting with other intelligent social actors despite the physical division. The degree of social presence is associated with one's feeling of access to the other social actors in the shared space, and their form, behavior, and sensory experience, which carries intelligence, intentions, and sensory impressions. (Biocca, 1997).

As discussed, these concepts above may overlap in their implications. In this study, the concepts will be reorganized in the actual measurement to generate a much clearer division of dimensional meanings in media content viewing experience.

Previous research suggests that camera angles may influence how people engage and interact with media content, hence creating more persuasive power to incur positive outcomes. According to McMahan (2003), camera perspectives or views may influence viewer response to the same scene. Between a first-person perspective and an isometric (i.e., “constant measurements”) perspective where all objects receive equal emphasis, the first-person perspective may be more immersive, engaging, and thus afford a higher level of presence. In an evaluation study of several interactive simulation systems, the camera view was found to influence user performance in virtual driving simulators (Bateman et al., 2011). The four views tested were overhead, first-person, third-person-high, and third-person-low. Results indicated that performance with overhead views was significantly worse than with first-person or third-person views. No performance differences were found between first-person and third-person views in any study reported by Bateman et al. (2011). While previous research implied an effect of camera perspectives or views on user outcomes, findings differed regarding the specific direction of effect from the various views. The conflicting findings may result from the varied nature of the technology devices used because each technology device can afford different functionality and usability. Hence, this study posits that mobile smartphone applications (e.g., mobile video streaming social media apps like TikTok), may also generate unique psychological experiences of Immersion, Presence, Perceived Realism, and Entertainment, some of which may be amplified through specific camera angles. Overall, this study builds upon previous research and hypothesizes as follows.

H1

A higher level of Humor Use provides more sense of Immersion (a), Spatial Presence (b), Social Presence (c), Perceptual Realism (d), and Entertainment (e) than the third-person angle in short-form mobile videos on social media.

H2

The first-person angle provides more sense of Immersion (a), Spatial Presence (b), Social Presence (c), Perceptual Realism (d), and Entertainment (e) than the third-person angle in short-form mobile videos on social media.

H3

Immersion (a), Spatial Presence (b), Social Presence (c), Perceptual Realism (d), and Entertainment (e) influence Intent to adopt smart home technologies.

H4

The indirect effect of Humor Use on Intent to adopt smart home technologies is mediated by Immersion (a), Spatial Presence (b), Social Presence (c), Perceptual Realism (d), and Entertainment (e).

H5

The indirect effect of Camera view on Intent to adopt smart home technologies is mediated by Immersion (a), Spatial Presence (b), Social Presence (c), Perceptual Realism (d), and Entertainment (e).

Namely, as Fig. 1 shows, this study proposes a mediation model on Intent to adopt smart home technologies post-viewing related mobile short-form videos. The effects of Camera view and Humor use on Intent to adopt are examined through possible psychological mediators of Immersion, Spatial presence, Social presence, Perceptual realism, and Entertainment.