Over the last few years, significant research has been conducted to examine the impact of web interactivity. However, mixed results have been found regarding why and how web interactivity could affect users’ attitudes and other psychological responses. This meta-analysis reviewed prior research that examined the extent to which web interactivity could affect various psychological outcomes and how such effects would differ due to several moderating variables. Our analysis of the results in 63 studies (N = 13,484) suggested that across studies, web interactivity was significantly correlated with user enjoyment, positive attitudes, and desirable behavioral intentions. However, interactivity did not necessarily increase cognitive elaboration, knowledge acquisition, and information recall. While modality interactivity appeared to be more effective than source interactivity and message interactivity, perceived interactivity was significantly more effective than objective interactivity. Furthermore, extremely high levels of web interactivity were not as effective as have been anticipated.

Star worship is an ever-growing phenomenon around the globe. Across various social media platforms in China, a new idol–fan relationship model has emerged, such that the fans have stepped up from merely worshipping the idols to being able to co-cultivate their idols, including their public images, the scope of their work, and even their personal lives. Based on a grounded theory approach, this study utilized text analysis and in-depth interviews to explore parakin relationships between fans and idols and proposed a dual motivation model to explain the motivations of fans for forming such a relationship. The findings extend current fandom literature by exploring a new front of fan–idol interactions in the context of social media. Theoretical and practical implications are discussed.

The Covid pandemic had turned the world upside down, but not much is known about how people’s empathy toward others in difficult situations might be affected by the pandemic. Based on a nationally representative sample ( N = 943) from China, this study first let participants read three real scenarios and then measured: (1) how empathy toward others might be influenced by the perceived social support people obtained by using social media (i.e., WeChat); and (2) how different demographics such as age and gender as well as lockdown situations may affect preserving empathetic during the Covid outbreak. Results show that perceived social support via WeChat not only positively impacted empathy but also interacted with anxiety in influencing the degree to which participants could maintain empathy toward others. Those living in cities or towns with higher incomes were more empathetic to others. While anxiety does not necessarily decrease empathy, those who reported gaining more social support on social media showed more empathy toward others despite their elevated levels of anxiety. Age negatively predicted empathy, but gender and lockdown conditions did not impact empathy. This study contributes to the literature by identifying the critical role empathy plays in people’s affective response to others during a public health crisis.

Rampant fake news on social media has drawn significant attention. Yet, much remains unknown as to how such imbalanced evaluations of self versus others could shape social media users’ perceptions and their subsequent attitudes and behavioral intentions regarding social media news. An online survey (N = 335) was conducted to examine the third person effect (TPE) in fake news on social media and suggested that users perceived a greater influence of fake news on others than on themselves. However, although users evaluated fake news as socially undesirable, they were still unsupportive of government censorship as a remedy. In addition, the perceived prevalence of fake news leads audiences to reported significantly less willingness to share all news on social media either online or offline.

Longitudinal social network analyses were conducted to examine social support exchange among patients with irritable bowel syndrome (IBS) on an online health forum. The analyses of 90,965 messages posted by 9,369 patients from 2008 to 2012 suggest that both receiving and offering support significantly encourage continuous social support exchange. Patients, however, were less likely to offer further social support when they kept reciprocating support only with certain individuals on the forum. Sentiment analysis indicates that self-disclosing one’s emotions during support seeking serves as a significant predictor for the amount of social support the support-seeker could obtain. Theoretical and practical implications are discussed.

This study examines traditional and social media news use in relation to political knowledge from the perspective of the Dunning-Kruger effect. Data from a two-wave panel survey show that social media use for news is positively related to knowledge miscalibration, or a mismatch between subjective and factual political knowledge. That is, respondents who use social media for news often tend to overestimate their levels of knowledge. In contrast, traditional news use is negatively associated with knowledge miscalibration. These results seem attributable to the role of social media news use in fostering subjective political knowledge and traditional news use in facilitating factual learning. Implications are discussed for the role of news consumption in the political process.