'Friend' or 'icon' indicating 'connection' urges information sharing, 'pictures' is not good

by OpenClipart-Vectors

Studies showed that icons indicating "other people are participating" and "connected with people" are effective in order for the Internet forum to increase participants and encourage users to revisit . In particular, it seems that it has a strong influence for the group who has experience which was less talked about in the forum and wishes to "create a community".

Subtle visual cues nudge users to reveal more in online forums | Penn State University
https://news.psu.edu/story/543000/2018/11/06/research/subtle-visual-cues-nudge-users-reveal-more-online-forums

The research team at Penn State University College University Park found that if the site displays icons of "people gathering" showing "friends" and "crowds" and "network" icons showing people's connections, Users who visit the site tend to share more information. On the other hand, group photographs, pictures of hands, etc. did not affect the user's information sharing.

The icon actually displayed is like this. These icons were randomly displayed for the subjects.

According to a report published at the CSCW 2018 conference in New Jersey, researchers used the Sexual Health Forum to test icons. In sexual health, people tend not to share their information with others, but in fact it is thought that those who published the information can access a lot of information and make better decisions.

"It is difficult for people in the group who have been lightened and condemned to reveal private information and discuss it, but once a person is" with the other person on the same ship "or "I feel connected to everyone on the network", I want to reveal my private information and I want to visit the forum again. "What we have discovered is a very fundamental solution to increase the number of participants in the group "Said Andrew Gambino, a Ph.D. student at the University of Pennsylvania.

This method is particularly effective in a small group with a weakened and accused experience. In particular, users of sites trying to share information to create a community tend to release very sensitive information when seeing the two icons "people gathering" and "connecting with people" Says.

by Westfrisco

Specifically, researchers randomly assigned one of six websites to 218 subjects who gathered using Amazon Mechanical Turk . There were six websites below.

· There are icons of "People's gathering" · Those who do not have "icon of people" icon · Those with icon of "Person's connection" · Those without "icon of people" icon · There is a picture of community Things · Those without community photos

All the sites said that "It is a community open to all those interested in learning sexuality and learning sexual health and well-being ," and participants were required to participate in the community. Subjects were asked to share information on their own sexual behavior and health, and this information was explained to be used to find people similar to you in the community and connect them with users.

Users were also able to choose the option "not disclose information" in all the questions, and at the same time indicated that they could leave the website at any time. It seems that the option to make such information public / private is created to bring it closer to the real world web and smartphone.

Researchers say that such icons create a strong online community and let community participants disclose personal information. According to S. Shyam Sundar, one of the researchers, "This forum loses value and loses its vitality unless people reveal the information," the research results said, "Small changes have been made to sites like the online health forum It helps survival and shows that it supports users. " On the other hand, if the spam site uses such a method, the site can obtain delicate information of the user and there is a possibility that it can be abused.

by nastya_gepp

Although this research was conducted in a form specialized to "website", researchers are planning to investigate whether the same thing can be said also in other types of media such as social media from now on.