Not in It for the Long Run: The Impact of Immersive Journalism on News Avoidance Behaviour

Declining audience numbers and increasing news avoidance have inspired news organizations to investigate innovative ways to retain the audience’s interest. One of these innovations is immersive journalism. Despite the trend of this innovation toning down after 2018, the medium is expected to make a comeback in the future. Expectations for immersive journalism are high in terms of immersion and engagement but worries also exist about the experience of heightened emotions resulting in news avoidance. This article examines how news consumption using immersive technologies impacts news avoidance. A laboratory experiment (N=61) following a two-factorial between-subject design including four conditions (VR high/low arousal negative valence, 2D high/low arousal negative valence) was constructed. The skip intention of participants was measured across all four conditions, and the impact of novelty was investigated by comparing the news avoidance of participants with and without prior VR...Show moreDeclining audience numbers and increasing news avoidance have inspired news organizations to investigate innovative ways to retain the audience’s interest. One of these innovations is immersive journalism. Despite the trend of this innovation toning down after 2018, the medium is expected to make a comeback in the future. Expectations for immersive journalism are high in terms of immersion and engagement but worries also exist about the experience of heightened emotions resulting in news avoidance. This article examines how news consumption using immersive technologies impacts news avoidance. A laboratory experiment (N=61) following a two-factorial between-subject design including four conditions (VR high/low arousal negative valence, 2D high/low arousal negative valence) was constructed. The skip intention of participants was measured across all four conditions, and the impact of novelty was investigated by comparing the news avoidance of participants with and without prior VR experience. Although results show that skip intention overall is highest among those watching 2D news videos, skip intention increases most during the video sequence for those watching in VR. Thus, these results suggest that novelty plays a large role in the avoidance of immersive news stories, especially when watching high-arousal VR videos. The results carry implications for understanding how immersive journalism can trigger or counter news avoidance. A carefully considered mix of high and low-arousal news content is needed to prevent a ‘shock’ moment and make immersive journalism live up to its potential to engage the audience.Show less

Leiden University Student Repository

Documents

In Collections

Not in It for the Long Run: The Impact of Immersive Journalism on News Avoidance Behaviour