Curiosity And Successful Content
The fact that you scrolled down is a testament to the awesome power of curiosity.
When faced with something unresolved, we are hardwired to want to know what happens. We humans love ‘closure’.
Very few of us can resist a mystery prize.
In fact, in a paper published in the Child and Behaviour Therapy journal, researchers found that curiosity was a highly-effective means for getting children to bed. Each morning, children in the study were told that, if they had spent less than ten minutes out of bed the night before, they could reach into a bag and pull out one of the mystery prizes. One child spent an average of over two hours a night out of bed before the intervention; afterwards; this dropped to eight minutes.
Research has consistently shown that emotional engagement is a powerful predictor of successful video content. A review of advertising effectiveness by marketing scientists Les Binet and Peter Field found that the best adverts are emotional. The most effective ads have little or no rational content at all.
We at CrowdEmotion know that despite mankind’s technological sophistication. We humans are very much driven by subconscious forces like instinct and emotion.
“Where thought conflicts with emotion, the latter is designed by the neural circuitry In our brains to win” — Carter and Frith, Mapping the Mind
What are the best emotions for great content? The BBC test.
We worked with the BBC to test the emotional engagement for fourteen TV show trailers. These diverse shows ranged from Sherlock to Life is Toff. Webcams were used to record over eight thousand face videos, which allowed us to analyse viewers’ emotional engagement with the trailers.
The results.
A relaxed, neutral facial expression was a strong (p<.001) negative predictor of liking. In other words, an emotional video is better than a more rational one.
More specifically, happiness and surprise were moderately significant (p<.05) positive predictors of liking — the more happy and surprising the show, the more people liked it.
However, also important was puzzlement. It was a strong (p<.001) and positive predictor of liking. As cognitive interest in the video goes up, so too does appreciation for that video.
These results are consistent with previous academic research which states that a video needs to hook viewers in the first instance with surprise. Then maintain and capitalise on that by engaging the heart, through happiness, or the mind, through puzzlement.
So we know what makes an engaging trailer. But can we predict what content will be successful?
The BBC also provided us with real-market data on how the shows performed — that is, their ratings (i.e. share of television audience).
Looking at the ratings data (r=.471, p<.05) puzzlement was the only emotion to significantly predict ratings.
In conclusion; puzzlement could be used to predict ratings.
We humans love to be puzzled. Comedy has offbeat punchlines, music has jazz, visual art has countless movements that try to break the rules of the previous one. We naturally have an instinct to look for patterns and make connections on a rational and subconscious level. So when those patterns are broken we can’t help but take notice.
When we think of successful TV. We think of Game Of Thrones, Mad Men, Dr Who and Planet Earth. These shows are full of cliffhangers, plot twists deep characters and intrigue.
So for great video content, puzzlement works because people always want to know what happens next.
To ask about CrowdEmotion’s emotional analytics get in touch at info@crowdemotion.co.uk.
To unlock emotion recognition, interpretation and response visit our API Demo.
Or find out more at our site www.crowdemotion.co.uk.
