Norms of online expressions of emotion: Comparing Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and WhatsApp

By Sophie F. Waterloo, Susanne E. Baumgartner, Jochen Peter, Patti M. Valkenburg. New Media & Society, 2017

497 citations recorded by the source corpus.

The main aim of this study was to examine the norms of expressing emotions on social media. Specifically, the perceived appropriateness (i.e. injunctive norms) of expressing six discrete emotions (i.e. sadness, anger, disappointment, worry, joy, and pride) was investigated across four different social media platforms. Drawing on data collected in March 2016 among 1201 young Dutch users (15–25 years), we found that positive expressions were generally perceived as more appropriate than negative expressions across all platforms. In line with the objective of the study, some platform differences were found. The expression of negative emotions was rated as most appropriate for WhatsApp, followed by Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram. For positive emotion expression, perceived appropriateness was highest for WhatsApp, followed by Instagram, Facebook, and Twitter. Additionally, some gender differences were found, while age showed little variations. Overall, the results contribute to a more informed understanding of emotion expression online.

Subfields: Communication, Sociology and Political Science, Human-Computer Interaction

View Paper: https://www.semanticscholar.org/paper/8cfa5906ab4a32ccfc523cc11e12b9b848c2d6b2

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In Communication

1. Chloé Briggs
2. A. Schoemann
3. Derrick Wirtz
4. Amanda Tucker

In Sociology and Political Science

1. Chloé Briggs
2. A. Schoemann
3. Derrick Wirtz
4. Amanda Tucker

Citations in the corpus

• Social Media Use and Adolescents’ Well-Being: Developing a Typology of Person-Specific Effect Patterns (2020, unknown): “In addition, private social media use generally encourages more “honest” interactions than public social media use, such that it is more normative to share both positive and negative emotions in private use than in public use (Waterloo et al., 2018).”
• How and Why Social Media Affect Subjective Well-Being: Multi-Site Use and Social Comparison as Predictors of Change Across Time (2020, background): “On its own, this relation between Instagram use and global affect might lead one to conclude that its use improves well-being (obscuring its tendency to also increase negative affect).”