Testing the Role of Social Norm Cues in the Narrative Enjoyment and Appreciation Rationale

What affects the appeal of media consumed in the presence of other people: the story resolution, others’ opinions, or both? Two studies leveraged the narrative enjoyment and appreciation rationale (NEAR) to demonstrate how social norm cues reinforce or conflict with content cues to influence narrative appraisals. Participants read stories with positive, mixed, or negative endings accompanied by norm cues that indicated others’ opinions. Among positive endings, reinforcing social cues (e.g. others’ liking of positive endings) increased intuitive enjoyment of the narrative, whereas conflicting social cues (e.g. others’ disliking of positive endings) elicited slower evaluations and less enjoyment. These effects were reversed among negative endings: Reinforcing cues promoted disliking and conflicting cues increased liking. When endings were mixed, appraisals aligned with others’ opinions. This study informs our understanding of how we consume media in social contexts, and what influence others’ opinions have on our own appreciation for stories.