Exaggerated and Questioning Clickbait Headlines and Their Influence on Media Learning

Headlines that are incongruous with article content can negatively impact media learning outcomes. Clickbait headlines intentionally misrepresent news content, often in sensational ways to increase click-throughs and ad revenue. To evaluate the impact of clickbait headlines on media learning and art...

Full description

Saved in:
Bibliographic Details
Published in:Journal of media psychology 2022, Vol.34 (1), p.30-41
Main Authors: Carcioppolo, Nick, Lun, Di, McFarlane, Soroya Julian
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Cognitive Mediation
Female
Human
Learning
Male
Media Exposure
Mental Models
Neoplasms
News Media
Reading Comprehension
Citations: Items that this one cites
Items that cite this one
Online Access:Get full text
Tags: Add Tag
No Tags, Be the first to tag this record!
Description
Summary:Headlines that are incongruous with article content can negatively impact media learning outcomes. Clickbait headlines intentionally misrepresent news content, often in sensational ways to increase click-throughs and ad revenue. To evaluate the impact of clickbait headlines on media learning and article-related beliefs, we conducted two online experiments, each testing a 3 (headline-type: accurate, clickbait-question, clickbait-exaggerated) × 2 (exposure: headline-only, full article) factorial. In Study 1, an online sample of US adults (N = 629) was randomly assigned to one of six news message conditions. Study 2 (N = 1,674) was a replication study across three news contexts and testing a mediator to explain how exposure to a clickbait headline can influence learning. Key results suggest that reading the full article with an accurate headline resulted in the highest recognition and comprehension, and reading correcting information within an article is likely not enough to overcome the deleterious impact of a clickbait headline. Theoretical and practical recommendations are discussed.
ISSN:1864-1105
2151-2388
DOI:10.1027/1864-1105/a000298