TY - GEN
T1 - The illusion of control
T2 - 2018 CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems, CHI 2018
AU - Vaccaro, Kristen
AU - Huang, Dylan
AU - Eslami, Motahhare
AU - Sandvig, Christian
AU - Hamilton, Kevin
AU - Karahalios, Karrie
N1 - Publisher Copyright:
© 2018 Copyright is held by the owner/author(s).
Copyright:
Copyright 2020 Elsevier B.V., All rights reserved.
PY - 2018/4/20
Y1 - 2018/4/20
N2 - Algorithmic prioritization is a growing focus for social media users. Control settings are one way for users to adjust the prioritization of their news feeds, but they prioritize feed content in a way that can be difficult to judge objectively. In this work, we study how users engage with difficult-to-validate controls. Via two paired studies using an experimental system - one interview and one online study - we found that control settings functioned as placebos. Viewers felt more satisfied with their feed when controls were present, whether they worked or not. We also examine how people engage in sensemaking around control settings, finding that users often take responsibility for violated expectations - for both real and randomly functioning controls. Finally, we studied how users controlled their social media feeds in the wild. The use of existing social media controls had little impact on user's satisfaction with the feed; instead, users often turned to improvised solutions, like scrolling quickly, to see what they want.
AB - Algorithmic prioritization is a growing focus for social media users. Control settings are one way for users to adjust the prioritization of their news feeds, but they prioritize feed content in a way that can be difficult to judge objectively. In this work, we study how users engage with difficult-to-validate controls. Via two paired studies using an experimental system - one interview and one online study - we found that control settings functioned as placebos. Viewers felt more satisfied with their feed when controls were present, whether they worked or not. We also examine how people engage in sensemaking around control settings, finding that users often take responsibility for violated expectations - for both real and randomly functioning controls. Finally, we studied how users controlled their social media feeds in the wild. The use of existing social media controls had little impact on user's satisfaction with the feed; instead, users often turned to improvised solutions, like scrolling quickly, to see what they want.
KW - Control settings
KW - Placebo effect
KW - Sensemaking
KW - Social media
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85046941195&partnerID=8YFLogxK
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/citedby.url?scp=85046941195&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1145/3173574.3173590
DO - 10.1145/3173574.3173590
M3 - Conference contribution
AN - SCOPUS:85046941195
T3 - Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems - Proceedings
BT - CHI 2018 - Extended Abstracts of the 2018 CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems
PB - Association for Computing Machinery
Y2 - 21 April 2018 through 26 April 2018
ER -