What Does Your Netflix Queue Say About You?
The psychology of streaming
The latest studies indicate that Netflix traffic consumes 15% of the world’s Internet traffic.
That’s a lot of streaming, meaning that people reveal a lot of their likes and dislikes to Netflix. Does the company know you better than you know yourself?
If you’re interested in learning more about yourself, a good first step might be to examine the content in your Netflix queue.
The Netflix business model depends on at least two powerful psychological concepts
Netflix is a large company. As of 2024, its market capitalization (the total market value of a publicly traded company’s outstanding shares) is 383 billion dollars, making it the world’s 25th most valuable company.
The company didn’t get there by just guessing at what its customers want to stream and watch.
Netflix uses a variety of psychological concepts to better understand its users. One is the “cocktail party effect,” called that because it suggests that, at a cocktail party, most people will only hear or focus on information that’s important to them.
The company uses this principle to drive its focus on its recommendation engine and its…
