Media Effects Research Lab - Research Archive
How does user location affect viewers’ affective and cognitive responses to self-disclosure on social media? The mediating role of perceived homophily
Student Researcher(s)
Yansheng Liu (Ph.D Candidate);
Jingshi Kang (visiting scholar) ( Candidate);
Faculty Supervisor
INTRODUCTION
In March 2022, China’s government released a policy requiring social media platforms to reveal users’ approximate geospatial location. To understand the psychological implication of this policy, this study investigated how user location displayed on social media posts affects audiences psychologically. Specifically, we chose the context of online self-disclosure on mental health issues to illustrate how user location shapes viewers’ affective and cognitive responses related to online social support, including source liking, empathy, message credibility, perceived social distance, and intention to interact with the message. We also examined whether perceived homophily and/or perceived spatial distance mediates the relationship between user location and these outcome variables.
RESEARCH QUESTION / HYPOTHESES
H1: User location affects (H1a) general homophily, as well as the three specific dimensions: (H1b) attitude homophily, (H1c) value homophily, (h1d) background homophily.
H2: User location affects (H2a) source liking, (H2b) empathy, (H2c) message credibility, (H2d) perceived social distance, and (H2e) intention to interact with the message.
H3: Perceived homophily mediates the relationship between location cue and (H3a) source liking, (H3b) empathy, (H3c) message credibility, (H3d) perceived social distance, and (H3e) intention to interact with the message.
H4: Perceived spatial distance mediates the relationship between location cue and (H4a) source liking, (H4b) empathy, (H4c) message credibility, (H4d) perceived social distance, and (H4e) intention to interact with the message.
METHOD
A 4 (user location: Beijing vs. Guizhou vs. US vs. Control) × 2 (topic: family of origin vs. peer pressure) between-subjects online experiment was designed to test the proposed hypotheses. Participants (N = 240) were recruited in China through the online survey platform Credamo.
RESULTS
We found that user location significantly affects perceived homophily towards the information source, which in turn affects viewers’ affective evaluations such as source liking, empathy, and perceived social distance. However, we did not find any main effect of user location on any outcome variables. In addition, although previous research suggests that perceived spatial distance matters in social impact, our study did not find support for the hypothesis that perceived spatial distance mediates the effect of user location on any outcome variables
CONCLUSIONS/DISCUSSION
This study shows that viewers’ perceived homophily varies both across different locations within China and between China and another country – the US, and perceived homophily mediates the relationship between user location and audiences' affective responses toward the source. This suggests that user location serves as an agency cue that triggers homophily heuristic. Also, our testing of theoretical models demonstrates that it is the perceived homophily, instead of perceived spatial distance, that matters in how user location influences viewers’ psychologically. Finally, this study also has policy implications by revealing that displaying user location might trigger some unwanted consequences (e.g., relativelyless liking and empathy) towards users from certain locations through the mechanism of perceived homophily.
For more details regarding the study contact
Dr. S. Shyam Sundar by e-mail at sss12@psu.edu or by telephone at (814) 865-2173