"It's Funny Because It's True!" an Investigation into the Effects of Comedic Videos for Serious Social Change

Theoretical Background and research questions/hypothesis:  As Americans increasingly favor digital and entertaniment media over traditional media sources, such as live television and news, alternative communication channels are needed to promote public health and positive social messages. In our media-saturated environment, Americans are also inundated with advertising, and are taking steps to screen out undesirable content. This poses a challenge to public health promoters, who have relied heavily on traditional public service announcements and other social marketing techniques. Drawing from the extant academic literature on entertainment education, narrative persuasion, and message perpetuation, which suggests that entertaining narratives may have a persuasive effect on audiences, the researcher proposed that a popular media format - short, comedic videos - should be investigated for their potential to engage audiences in public health issues. Research Questions: 1. Does the comedic or dramatic video condition have more of an effect on participants' attitudes and/of beliefs about street harassment? 2. Does the perceived strength of the social message of the videos vary by condition and/or gender?

Methods and Results (informing the conceptual analysis):  This study compared the effects of two short digital videos about street harassment (one comedic and one dramatic) on 244 adult participants in an online experiment. The data was analyzed using independent-sample T-tests to detect significant differences by video condition, and by video condition within subject gender. The results suggest that the dramatic video was slightly more persuasive and its message taken more seriously, while the comedic was rated as more entertaining, but tended to be characterized as "just a joke." Men reported that their friends would be more interested in viewing a similar comedic video on social media. An interaction effect was found for participant gender that is consistent with the academic literature.  

Conclusions:  Entertaining digital videos may be an impactful tool for increasing the reach of public health campaigns, and improving campaign outcomes. This study found that most participants watch videos online to be entertained, and that many avoid serious/dramatic content online. This experiment serves as a jumping off point to assist public health professionals in designing digital content that audiences will actually watch, enjoy, and even share. It also brings up a crucial point about message design: the overall tone of the message may directly impactthe persuasive effect, as well as the viewer's desire to perpetuate it. 

Implications for research and/or practice:  It is not yet well understood how emotions and narratives can affect our opinions, and under what circumstances, but it is clear that given the changing media landscape, new methods are needed to reach audiences with important public health messages. In order to create more impactful public health campaign content, public health professionals should concentrate more resources to test digital campaign content that will have a positive effect on viewers, and will break through the noise of the saturated media landscape to effect positive social change.