‘What lies behind the filter?’ Uncovering the motivations for using augmented reality (AR) face filters on social media and their effect on well-being

Examining attitudes about the virtual workplace: Associations between zoom fatigue, impression management, and virtual meeting adoption intent

Impression management is a crucial tactic within the workplace milieu. This study establishes a connection between impression management and the negative self-evaluation stemming from heightened self-monitoring during virtual meetings (VM), which manifests in the form of Zoom (VM) fatigue. We conducted a cross-sectional survey, by recruiting 2,448 U.S.-based workers. Our survey results revealed that facial appearance dissatisfaction is associated with VM fatigue, resulting in lower intention to adopt VM technologies due to decreased perceived usefulness of VM technologies. Furthermore, building upon the Uses and Gratification (UG) perspective and the assumptions of the Social Information Processing (SIP) theory and the Hyperpersonal Model, our findings illuminate that VM fatigue prompts the use of impression management behaviors by using VM features closely linked to dissatisfaction with one's facial appearance. The results suggest that utilization of impression management features in VMs is driven by needs related to facial appearance concerns, which is associated with impression management. This study extends the concept of impression management to VM environments in the workplace, underscoring the importance of addressing workers' needs and well-being to foster worker-friendly VM communication environments and promote VM acceptance. This study identifies external factors within the Technology Acceptance Model by integrating the UG perspective, the SIP theory, and the Hyperpersonal Model to understand the mechanisms underlying VM fatigue and adoption in the emerging virtual workplace.

Social media incidental appearance exposure and young people's body image: A conceptual review

Research has shown that young people manage their body image by relying on appearance-ideals conveyed by social media and such use of social media maintains and/or reinforces existing body image issues. While useful, this research exclusively focuses on intentional social media exposure/use: the purposeful use of appearance-related social media content to fulfill particular needs. However, oftentimes young people incidentally encounter appearance content without actively searching for it; i.e., incidental appearance social media exposure. To date, research has yet to differentiate between incidental and intentional appearance exposure and investigate how each of these relates to body image. This review addresses this gap by identifying different ways in which social media incidental exposure may relate to young people's body image. We first explain the potential of incidental social media exposure to promote positive body image, focusing on exposure diversity (exposure to diverse appearance content). Then we reflect upon conditions under which social media incidental exposure may facilitate exposure diversity. Lastly, we discuss how cognitive response states mediate the relationship between social media incidental exposure and body image outcomes, and the role of social identities. We conclude with recommendations for how to include social media incidental appearance exposure in future body image research.

Aligning the smiles of dating dyads causally increases attraction

Social interaction research is lacking an experimental paradigm enabling researchers to make causal inferences in free social interactions. For instance, the expressive signals that causally modulate the emergence of romantic attraction during interactions remain unknown. To disentangle causality in the wealth of covarying factors that govern social interactions, we developed an open-source video-conference platform enabling researchers to covertly manipulate the social signals produced by participants during interactions. Using this platform, we performed a speed-dating experiment where we aligned or misaligned the facial smiles of participants in real time with face transformation algorithms. Even though participants remained totally unaware that their faces were being manipulated, aligning their smiles causally enhanced the romantic attraction they felt toward each other, compared to unaligned scenarios. Manipulations also influenced how participants synchronized and vocally reacted to each other. This paradigm causally manipulates the emergence of romantic attraction in free social interactions. Moreover, our methodology opens the possibility to perform causal inferences during free social interactions.

The Bumble motivations framework- exploring a dating App's uses by emerging adults in India

Researchers have called for a better understanding of the differing motivations of dating app users. Whereas these have been described for Tinder, Grinder and Hinge in the Anglosphere, no research examples could be found for Indian users of Bumble. In response, this paper's pathfinder study helps close the gap by developing a Bumble motivation scale. Six primary motivations for using Bumble were identified through the exploratory factor analysis: Love, Socialisation, Ease of communication, Distraction, Trendiness, and Sexual experience. Notably, socialisation and love motivations emerged as more significant drivers for Bumble usage than sexual experiences, which contrasted with prior findings on dating apps. Additionally, age and biological sex differences were observed in the motivations reported by the participants. Men were more likely to use Bumble for sexual experiences, while women were more motivated by ease of communication. Furthermore, age was found to positively relate to motivations linked to love, distraction, trendiness, and sexual experiences. Moreover, the motivations of Love, socialisation, and trendiness were found to positively predict the frequency of Bumble usage. Among these motivations, Love, socialisation, and trendiness emerged as significant predictors of offline dating behaviour among the participants. These findings contribute to a better understanding of the factors influencing the adoption and engagement with Bumble among emerging adults in India. The implications of these findings may aid in refining dating app features and marketing strategies targeted at this specific demographic.

A reflexive thematic analysis of #WhatIEatInADay on TikTok

Eating-related content is common on TikTok, a popular video-based social media platform, but studies of eating-related content on TikTok are limited. Given the documented association between social media use and disordered eating, investigation of eating-related content on TikTok is needed. One subset of popular eating-related content is "What I Eat in a Day" (#WhatIEatInADay), in which a creator documents the food they eat over the assumed span of a single day. We sought to evaluate the content of TikTok #WhatIEatInADay videos (N = 100) using reflexive thematic analysis. Two primary types of videos emerged. First, Lifestyle videos (N = 60), which included aesthetic elements, presentations of clean eating, stylized meals, promotion of weight loss and the thin ideal, normalization of eating as a fat woman, and disordered eating content. Second, Eating Only videos (N = 40), which were primarily focused on food, and included upbeat music, an emphasis on highly palatable foods, displays of irony, emojis, and excessive consumption of food. Because viewing eating-related social media content has been associated with disordered eating, both types of TikTok #WhatIEatInADay videos may be harmful to vulnerable youth. Given the popularity of TikTok and #WhatIEatinADay, clinicians and researchers should consider the potential impact of this trend. Future research should examine the impact of viewing TikTok #WhatIEatInADay videos on disordered eating risk factors and behaviors.

Exploring the Darkverse: A Multi-Perspective Analysis of the Negative Societal Impacts of the Metaverse

The Metaverse has the potential to form the next pervasive computing archetype that can transform many aspects of work and life at a societal level. Despite the many forecasted benefits from the metaverse, its negative outcomes have remained relatively unexplored with the majority of views grounded on logical thoughts derived from prior data points linked with similar technologies, somewhat lacking academic and expert perspective. This study responds to the dark side perspectives through informed and multifaceted narratives provided by invited leading academics and experts from diverse disciplinary backgrounds. The metaverse dark side perspectives covered include: technological and consumer vulnerability, privacy, and diminished reality, human-computer interface, identity theft, invasive advertising, misinformation, propaganda, phishing, financial crimes, terrorist activities, abuse, pornography, social inclusion, mental health, sexual harassment and metaverse-triggered unintended consequences. The paper concludes with a synthesis of common themes, formulating propositions, and presenting implications for practice and policy.

Intervening on Social Comparisons on Social Media: Electronic Daily Diary Pilot Study

BACKGROUND

Literature has underscored the dark aspects of social media use, including associations with depressive symptoms, feelings of social isolation, and diminished self-esteem. Social comparison, the process of evaluating oneself relative to another person, is thought to contribute to these negative experiences such that people with a stronger tendency to compare themselves with others are particularly susceptible to the detrimental effects of social media. Social media as a form of social connection and communication is nevertheless an inevitable-and arguably integral-part of life, particularly for young adults. Therefore, there is a need to investigate strategies that could alter the manner in which people interact with social media to minimize its detrimental effects and maximize the feelings of affiliation and connection.

OBJECTIVE

This pilot study examined the feasibility, acceptability, and effectiveness of a brief web-based intervention designed to alter engagement with social media and promote psychological well-being by encouraging social savoring as an alternative to social comparison. Social savoring was operationalized as experiencing joyful emotions related to the happiness of someone else's experiences (ie, feeling happy for someone else).

METHODS

Following an intensive longitudinal design, 55 college students (mean age 19.29, SD 0.93 years; n=43, 78% women and n=23, 42% White) completed baseline measures (individual differences, psychological well-being, connectedness, and social media use) and then 14 days of daily surveys on their social media activity and well-being. On day 8, the group that was randomized to receive the intervention watched a video instructing them on the skill of social savoring and was asked to practice this skill during days 8 to 14.

RESULTS

Overall, participants reported positive perceptions of the intervention. Participants who watched the intervention video reported significantly higher performance self-esteem (P=.02) at posttest than those in the control condition, after controlling for baseline levels. Participants also reported significantly higher state self-esteem (P=.01) on days in which they engaged in more social savoring while using social media, and the use of social savoring increased significantly (P=.01) over time, suggesting that participants found it helpful. Participants in both conditions reported significantly lower levels of social comparison (control: P=.01; intervention: P=.002) and higher levels of connectedness (control: P<.001; intervention: P=.001) at posttest than at baseline.

CONCLUSIONS

Initial evidence from this pilot study suggests that a web-based social savoring intervention may help minimize the potentially harmful consequences of social media use, at least in some domains. Future work is needed to examine the effectiveness and acceptance of this intervention in different age groups and in clinical samples that are in part characterized by higher levels of comparison with others (eg, people with eating disorders).

Acceptability of a Health Care App With 3 User Interfaces for Older Adults and Their Caregivers: Design and Evaluation Study

BACKGROUND

The older population needs solutions for independent living and reducing the burden on caregivers while maintaining the quality and dignity of life.

OBJECTIVE

The aim of this study was to design, develop, and evaluate an older adult health care app that supports trained caregivers (ie, formal caregivers) and relatives (ie, informal caregivers). We aimed to identify the factors that affect user acceptance of interfaces depending on the user's role.

METHODS

We designed and developed an app with 3 user interfaces that enable remote sensing of an older adult's daily activities and behaviors. We conducted user evaluations (N=25) with older adults and their formal and informal caregivers to obtain an overall impression of the health care monitoring app in terms of user experience and usability. In our design study, the participants had firsthand experience with our app, followed by a questionnaire and individual interview to express their opinions on the app. Through the interview, we also identified their views on each user interface and interaction modality to identify the relationship between the user's role and their acceptance of a particular interface. The questionnaire answers were statistically analyzed, and we coded the interview answers based on keywords related to a participant's experience, for example, ease of use and usefulness.

RESULTS

We obtained overall positive results in the user evaluation of our app regarding key aspects such as efficiency, perspicuity, dependability, stimulation, and novelty, with an average between 1.74 (SD 1.02) and 2.18 (SD 0.93) on a scale of -3.0 to 3.0. The overall impression of our app was favorable, and we identified that "simple" and "intuitive" were the main factors affecting older adults' and caregivers' preference for the user interface and interaction modality. We also identified a positive user acceptance of the use of augmented reality by 91% (10/11) of the older adults to share information with their formal and informal caregivers.

CONCLUSIONS

To address the need for a study to evaluate the user experience and user acceptance by older adults as well as both formal and informal caregivers regarding the user interfaces with multimodal interaction in the context of health monitoring, we designed, developed, and conducted user evaluations with the target user groups. Our results through this design study show important implications for designing future health monitoring apps with multiple interaction modalities and intuitive user interfaces in the older adult health care domain.

Consumer Consciousness in Multisensory Extended Reality

The reality-virtuality continuum encompasses a multitude of objects, events and environments ranging from real-world multisensory inputs to interactive multisensory virtual simulators, in which sensory integration can involve very different combinations of both physical and digital inputs. These different ways of stimulating the senses can affect the consumer's consciousness, potentially altering their judgements and behaviours. In this perspective paper, we explore how technologies such as Augmented Reality (AR) and Virtual Reality (VR) can, by generating and modifying the human sensorium, act on consumer consciousness. We discuss the potential impact of this altered consciousness for consumer behaviour while, at the same time, considering how it may pave the way for further research.