Day: May 11, 2020

The following has been adapted from a live presentation from Edwin Wong, Vox Media’s SVP of Insights & Innovation during a weekly ‘Smart Solutions for Extraordinary Times’ discussion. You can view the webinar here. When I was a child, I wasn’t the healthiest of children. There was a span of two years where I would only eat McDonald’s Happy Meals every meal, and it had a profound impact on my health. At this point, everyone reading this recognizes that eating fast food for two meals a day is not ideal for health. In a similar way, are we currently in the first inning of understanding our digital diets? Many of us have been feeling uneasy for years, and it’s time to figure out why. We are all part of the collective Borg If any of us believes we are not addicted to our devices and digital media experiences, we are kidding ourselves. We spoke to over 4,000 people who represent the digital U.S. population, and found that more than half (52%) pick up their devices at least once every waking hour. Not surprisingly, the younger we are, the more likely this behavior exists. 65% of 18-34 years look at their devices every hour 61% of 35-44 years look at their devices every hour 54% 45-54 years look at their devices every hour The gap is not as big as you would think. Therefore, we have to question whether this is a learned behavior like a Pavlovian response. The algorithm is driven by YOU…sort of It’s obvious that the addictive nature of our smartphones is rooted in our apps, and marketers are eager to capture those eyeballs. In fact, eMarketer tells us that 75% of every digital dollar spent will be on social platforms like Google and Facebook. But as an industry that values context, consumer mindset, and ad effectiveness, have we ever taken a step back to wonder what creates the magic that drives this behavior? I’m sure most have a basic understanding that algorithms are based on some form of time/recency, closeness/friendship, personal interest, and optimized to engagement/behavior. They are tuned to you to ensnarl you in engaging with content. In fact, I remember my early days working at Yahoo when people would yell at me that they hated seeing so many Britney Spears and Kim Kardashian articles on their homepage feed and I should tell my product people to STOP. I didn’t have the heart to tell them, you are the one clicking! Similarly, algorithms today feed off user behavior whether or not it is passive, subconscious or negative. The passive: we love the feed because of SURPRISES! The creation of the feed, thanks to Twitter, really helped revolutionize everything. We know humans like surprises. It’s proven by neurology. In a study by Emory and Baylor universities, scientists conducted experiments to measure the human brain’s reaction to different stimuli when it was predictable vs. unpredictable. Contrary to the scientists’ expectations, the human reward pathways in the brain responds most strongly to the unpredictable sequence of squirts. “We find that so-called pleasure centers in the brain do not react equally to any pleasurable substance, but instead react more strongly when the pleasures are unexpected,” Berns said. “This means that the brain finds unexpected pleasures more rewarding than expected ones, and it may have little to do with what people say they like.” Which would have us all posit that when we actually have no clue what may come up in our feeds, the surprise is why we keep coming back. The subconscious: the digital haze Currently, many would agree these apps and platforms are so popular because it’s about the discovery, causes, and connections. In a very general way, consumers are satisfied with their digital experiences: 83% helps me discover new thing 64% helps me connect better with the real world 64% helps me supports causes I care about However, when we brought it back to the 5 specific apps they use daily, we began to see some interesting findings. We narrowed down the choices and asked consumers to choose just 3 of these 5 basic reasons they use these apps. While most of the reasons do align with the general answers above, a very interesting 4th answer was around “I just feel addicted to checking.”   When we pick up our phones and do that same couch scrolling, how many of us feel drugged, dull, ambivalent, foggy, not functioning, tired, disconnected after the experience? The negative: anger & disgust drive visceral & measurable reaction We live in a digital space based entirely on response. It’s a known fact that in more recent years, app builders are beginning to use thinking developed by Robert Plutchik, a thought leader in the study of emotions. Humans have classified over 34,000 emotions that we feel, which he categorized into 8 emotion rings. He put polar emotions on opposite sides. As an example: Disgust is the opposite of trust, joy is the opposite of sadness, and anticipation is the opposite of surprise. I want you to hold on to this—the opposite to anger/disgust is trust. From this research, we know anger is classified as an active, not passive emotion. Therefore, when we look at the feed, optimizing to anger is an easy and crude way to get people to respond, comment, share, etc. When we asked consumers to tell us when they felt angry or surprised with their digital media experiences, they told us it was usually around fake/false content and lies. While overall most of us say we are satisfied with digital experience, consumers also describe unease: Only 31% say digital media is honest; 39% strongly disagree that this is an honest place Only 36% would trust digital media Only 39% feel that digital media is authentic 69% don’t always know “if what I see in my social feed is accurate or misleading” When algorithms are optimized to fake content that breeds the most negative of “engagements,” especially when it’s set off