AEJMC 2022: Wednesday Highlights
TV Viewing Habits, Advertising in XR & Media in the Robotic Age
I was honored to be an invited speaker at the 2022 conference hosted in Detroit by the Association for Education in Journalism and Mass Communication (AEJMC). There were more sessions than any one person could attend and I had the good fortune—and relentless determination—to attend as many sessions related to media and entertainment as I was able.
What follows is a summary of my favorite things that I learned on the first day of the conference. Additional posts—one for each subsequent day—will follow. The conference ran Wednesday, Aug. 3 through Saturday, Aug. 6.
Television Viewing Habits in the Streaming Age
Chun Shao from Arizona State University gave a fascinating presentation titled Television Viewing Habits Revisited: The Role of Audience Habits in the Streaming Age. His research question was whether habit influences audiences’ streaming media consumption.
In an attempt to answer that question, he used a three-step research process:
- He conducted pre-test interviews with 31 Netflix users in the US
- He installed a browser extension on participants’ browsers and had participants submit screenshots of their viewing activities for a week
- He conducted post-test interviews with participants to discuss their viewing activities
After a discussion of his analytic strategy, he shared his findings. In short, while “Netflix and Chill” may be the idiomatic aphorism that’s gotten the most attention, it may not be the most reflective of audiences actual habits. Here are three more duos that have less innuendo and, likely, more truth:
Netflix and Sleep
Watching Netflix before bed is an integral part of participants’ sleep routines. More than half of the participants said they typically watch Netflix in the evening before going to sleep.
Neftlix and Snack
Many participants eat food when watching Netflix, not necessarily because they are hungry, but simply because they have come to associate streaming media with eating. Shao postulates that it “may contribute to a more enjoyable and relaxed viewing experience.”
Netflix and Ignore
Despite the myriad shows Netflix pumps out—even going so far as to use algorithms to determine what its audiences want—the truth is, sometimes what audiences want is merely background noise. Many participants indicated they used Netflix to fill the silence… and keep them company.
“Often, I’ll be listening to it passively in the background ... If I’m cleaning the house or cooking food, I like to have TV shows in the background.” —Participant #24
It’s About Time
Shao also analyzed participants’ screenshots to identify the specific shows they watched and also when and how long they watched. While his primary intention was to make sure that participants’ were accurately reporting their behaviors, he also learned a few things along the way:
Prime Time is Still Prime
Primetime is still the most important part of the day for people watching live, even across all platforms.
It’s the Freakin’ Weekend, Baby!
More people watch more Netflix on Fridays, Saturdays and Sundays.
Netflix vs. Nurture
Participants viewing behavior determines not only when they watch, but also how they watch and what they watch. Their viewing environment is a factor in what type of show they select.
TV Advertising in XR & Transmedia Engagement
University of Connecticut’s Professor Carolyn Lin shared the results of her study, Digital Advertising in the Augmented Reality Environment: The Future Is Now. She opened with a great explanation of augmented reality (AR) and an overview of its usage in recent years. Case studies she shared included Kit Kat, Esquire’s Augmented Reality Issue with Robert Downey Jr. on the cover, and Microsoft Mesh. Then, she went on to explain her work that specifically looked at the Sherwin Williams’ AR app (which, at the time of writing, is available to consumers).
In the end, Lin found that purchasing intention was higher in study participants who used a web-based tool for AR visualization than in those who used a mobile app tool. Addressing why this might be the case, she noted that it is largely because apps these days can still be a bit clunky.
As part of her concluding statements, Lin mentioned that as technology and user interface improve, and latency declines, the benefits of AR should only increase. AR provides several important affordances: (1) control, (2) concentration of attention, (3) heightened interest, and (4) curiosity. And Lin shared that all of these affordances contribute to flow. As a result, she feels that it is likely for AR apps to become even more effective than web-based tools as the user experience improves.
VR and Climate Change
I had a great conversation with Shravana Iyer from Rutgers University during his poster session. He was sharing the research and analysis he’s done for his forthcoming paper, Virtual Reality and Climate Change: Understanding How the United Nations VR Content Productions Uses Experiential Media in Climate Change Storytelling.
He examined several pieces of 360 content and I was glad to be able to introduce him to the Taxonomy of Experience, which seems quite relevant to the amazing work he’s doing.
Media, Automation, Robotics and AI
Finally, I attended a panel discussion, Media in the Age of Automation, Robotics and Artificial Intelligence. It was moderated by Kelly Kaufhold and featured Seth Lewis from University of Oregon, Sabine Baumann from Jade University of Applied Sciences, and T. Makana Chock from Syracuse University. Below are a few points that stood out to me.
Seth Lewis
Lewis, working with a graduate student, is building on Rasmussen Nielsen’s 2017 piece, The One Thing Journalism Just Might do for Democracy. “I would strongly recommend it to you,” he says, “In that article he outlines what he calls a democratically realistic approach” and says that one thing journalism just might do for democracy is provide people with relatively accurate, accessible, diverse, relevant, and timely independently produced information about public affairs.
Lewis goes on to say, “We can imagine ways in which AI can contribute in a positive way to helping to potentially reduce both objective as well as objective types of errors. So, errors that occur because of misspellings, as well as errors that occur because of the language being too bloated or certain terms being—perhaps you’re setting a certain expectation or assumption.”
In his opinion, AI presents opportunities to make the journalistic process itself open, transparent, and more accessible to people, including the disabled. Think about user experience and accessibility. He also mentions potential value for diversity, saying that AI could help to surface alternative, oppositional, critical, disadvantaged and marginal viewpoints.
T. Makana Chock
Chock shared that, “predictions right now from work and research are that the metaverse market will reach a billion dollars by 2020.” Talking about AI, she says that some use cases are obvious—one example she gives is how helpful it would be to have an AI travel guide. She also brought up the topic of physiological data collection and the possibility of some devices—for example, VR devices—measuring your heartbeat and taking that data into consideration.
I appreciated that she acknowledged that there are “aspects of how, as media creators and storytellers, we can use this to develop new ways of telling stories and narratives and experiences.” And she addresses that there are also new challenges to the actual content creation process that these new platforms present.
Highlights from AEJMC 2022 continue…
with Thursday highlights.
