Headlines, Pictures, Likes: Attention to Social Media Newsfeed Post Elements on Smartphones and in Public

Scrolling through a social media newsfeed has become almost ubiquitous. Yet, it remains unknown what specific post elements people pay attention to and whether this varies depending on how they access social media newsfeeds. In an eye-tracking experiment among university students (N = 201), we compare user attention to specific post elements like source, title, or picture, in a dynamic Facebook newsfeed by device (desktop vs. mobile) and smartphone usage environment (private vs. public). Significant attentional differences occur at the level of the newsfeed post elements. Users pay less attention to visual information on the mobile newsfeed and more attention to textual post elements in a public setting

Awareness and Perceived Appropriateness of Synced Advertising in Dutch Adults

This study provides insight into Dutch adults’ awareness and perceptions of cross-media personalized advertising with a focus on synced advertising (SA). A survey among a representative sample of the Dutch population (N = 1,994) shows that the majority of people (>70%) are familiar with the collection, use, and sharing of information about their media behavior. People are less familiar with SA, which involves presenting targeted ads to consumers based on their current media behavior. Less than half of our sample (45%) were familiar with SA, and only 29% had ever experienced SA. The majority (75%) found SA (very) inappropriate. Moreover, our results showed that adults with low conspiracy mentality, those not concerned about their privacy, older adults, less-educated adults, and women are less aware of the collection, use, and sharing of media behavior and are less familiar with SA, and thus could benefit from literacy interventions to improve their understanding and resilience

The Validation of the Perceived Surveillance Scale

Data-driven practices, such as personalized communication, computational advertising, and algorithmic decision making, are now commonplace. However, they have been criticized for (mis)uses of personal data and invasions of people's privacy. Recently, scholars have started to examine the concept of perceived surveillance to obtain more insight into the perceptions and effectiveness of data-driven communication. Despite the growing research interest in perceived surveillance, there is no validated scale to measure this concept. This study aimed to validate the Perceived Surveillance Scale. The reliability and validity of the scale were tested in two surveys (N = 137 and N = 1,008) and one experiment (N = 527). In all three studies, the scale showed good reliability. Regarding construct validity, the results showed that, as expected, the Perceived Surveillance Scale was positively related to privacy concerns, privacy risk perception, perceived vulnerability, perceived severity, creepiness, surveillance concerns, and perceived personalization. In line with the predictions, the scale was negatively related to personalization attitudes. The Perceived Surveillance Scale can assess differences in perceptions of or responses to data-driven communication in different communication domains

Headlines, Pictures, Likes: Attention to Social Media Newsfeed Post Elements on Smartphones and in Public

Scrolling through a social media newsfeed has become almost ubiquitous. Yet, it remains unknown what specific post elements people pay attention to and whether this varies depending on how they access social media newsfeeds. In an eye-tracking experiment among university students ( N  = 201), we compare user attention to specific post elements like source, title, or picture, in a dynamic Facebook newsfeed by device (desktop vs. mobile) and smartphone usage environment (private vs. public). Significant attentional differences occur at the level of the newsfeed post elements. Users pay less attention to visual information on the mobile newsfeed and more attention to textual post elements in a public setting

A Literature Review of Personalization Transparency and Control: Introducing the Transparency-Awareness-Control Framework

Through various online activities, individuals produce large amounts of data that are collected by companies for the purpose of providing users with personalized communication. In the light of this mass collection of personal data, the transparency and control paradigm for personalized communication has led to increased attention from legislators and academics. However, in the scientific literature no clear definition of personalization transparency and control exists, which could lead to reliability and validity issues, impeding knowledge accumulation in academic research. In a literature review, we analyzed 31 articles and observed that: 1) no clear definitions of personalization transparency or control exist; 2) they are used interchangeably in the literature; 3) collection, processing, and sharing of data are the three objects of transparency and control; and 4) increased transparency does not automatically increase control because first awareness needs to be raised in the individual. Also, the relationship between awareness and control depends on the ability and the desire to control. This study contributes to the field of algorithmic communication by creating a common understanding of the transparency and control paradigm and thus improves validity of the results. Further, it progresses research on the issue by synthesizing existing studies on the topic, presenting the transparency-awareness-control framework, and formulating propositions to guide future research

When you realize that big brother is watching : How informing consumers affects synced advertising effectiveness

New personalization technologies have made it possible to deliver personalized messages to consumers based on their offline media usage in real time, which is known as synced advertising. These developments go hand-in-hand with a rise in concerns related to consumers’ privacy. The aim of this study is to examine the effects of increasing consumer knowledge of synced advertising (SA) on resistance through critical attitudes and perceived surveillance. In two online experiments, we found that increased SA awareness and knowledge generates more critical attitudes and a greater level of perceived surveillance, which leads to more resistance to a synced ad. For consumers without prior SA experience (e.g., through education, work), providing technical information on SA is the most effective in increasing SA knowledge (both objective and subjective knowledge), but personally relevant information could help increase confidence in SA knowledge (i.e., subjective knowledge). These results advance theories of persuasion knowledge, as well as the underlying mechanism of synced advertising effects on consumer empowerment. The results contribute to literacy programs by showing what type of information could help consumers make informed decisions about this new personalization strategy

The Underlying Mechanisms of Multiscreening Effects

Multiscreening, a relatively new form of media multitasking in which people use multiple screens simultaneously, has implications for the effects of persuasive messages due to limited cognitive capacities of people and concurrent modalities of the screens (i.e., both visual). The aim of the study is to examine underlying mechanisms (i.e., recognition, counterarguing, and enjoyment) of the effect of multiscreening on evaluative outcomes (i.e., brand attitude, message attitude, and purchase intention). The experiment (N = 182) showed that both recognition and counterarguing are underlying mechanisms of the effect of multiscreening on evaluative outcomes. Multiscreening has a negative effect on evaluative outcomes by recognition and a positive effect on evaluative outcomes by counterarguing