Why Millions Of Teens Are Up All Hours Of The Night!

What were your first thoughts upon reading that title? Curiosity? Shock? Intrigue? Maybe all of the above? But why would a title make these feelings occur and even more so why would this make you want to read this article? Clickbait– the number one reason for procrastination and time wasting.

Clickbait in exact terms is a title or headline that sparks intrigue. Now you may be thinking “Isn’t that the point for every title?” and in some cases you would be correct. However, clickbaiting is more than just that, it is more like exaggerating something. The entire point is to draw attention and be read, or, for lack of a better word, clicked on.

Now, one of the main questions about clickbait is– How does this affect the people reading the articles or scrolling through them? Well, for many they will spend hours on these intriguing sites reading article after article. This is because of the factors that influence your brain such as semantic congruity, resolution, curiosity, numbers, affirmation, relevancy, and shock value. These factors are all carefully used in entertainment titles to stimulate your brain and make you want to read or watch more. Take the title “Korea Finally Learns Secret US Launch Codes”(this is not in any way true as far as we know). You would automatically be pulled to the article like a magnet. The use of curiosity, relevancy, and affirmation are all parts that have influenced this drive. But what do all of these reasons mean or entail?

Semantic congruity: how your brain affiliates words in specific order to predict and insert upcoming words. Think of it this way, semantic congruity is how your mind knows what is going to be said before it is said. For example “ it’s raining cats and ___”. You probably figured out from past knowledge that the last word is dogs. This is simply because your brain is able to relate what you are reading to previous texts and therefore you have already “read” the word before you have even stumbled upon it. This creates a predictability. For example, “I’m going to the ____”. You most likely said store, which again is based on predictability. This predictability then would create interest to see if the article really does have that sense of comfort that you thought it would.

Resolution– finding out that the predictability of the article is what you expected. This is an extremely important factor in clickbait. It’s what makes you get the feeling of curiosity. “Is that article what I think it’s about?”, “Is that what I think it is?”, these are some questions people often think of after reading a title. Of course these questions are not legitimately asked but have came up in your cognitive process. This, then makes the reader feel the need to click on the article to find comfort in the fact that the expected answer is the true answer.

Affirmation: being told your choices are right. This will influence a reader’s decision because everyone likes to be told they are right. For example if you read the title “Why All That Junk Food You Ate Will Save You”, you are likely to be intrigued by the fact that what was considered “bad” or “wrong” is now good proving you were in the right. Adding these contributions to an article will increase the luer factor and draw a reader in.

Curiosity: the desire to know or learn something. This factor is what clickbait is based on. The whole point of clickbait is to capture your attention and just factor in intrigue. Some examples of article titles clearly trying to get your attention would be “You Won’t BELIEVE What This Kid Did to Pass Her AP Exams!” or even “5 Teachers That Deserved the SGA Prize… Teacher 4 is SHOCKING!” You can clearly see that the use of capitalization and bolding captures your interest. Not all ways of using curiosity are extremely obvious. The whole point of curiosity is to get your attention and then make you want to know what happened. You want, and need, resolution and that’s how clickbait thrives from your curiosity.

Numbers. Numbers are given in lists which draws your eyes to them. The fact that things could be organized into simple lists or numbers just absolutely amazes us. Not only that, but they are more impactful. For example, saying that journalists make $5 for every 500 clicks or 1 cent for every one click that they get on their article(this is true for online magazine Slant). Another example would be “100 Movies that Got Banned From France!” Your mind would most likely say, “Wow! Is there really 100?”

Relevancy: the quality of being connected to something. Relevancy in clickbait is very similar to Semantic Congruity. The idea of relevancy is that your mind will finish the rest of the information for you and gain your attention. It also relies on what you are interested in and the fact that your mind will compare it to your other interests. For example, if you are interested in Harry Potter, they will name their articles something like “Harry Potter: A Musical (with Daniel Radcliffe)!”

Shock: A sudden event or surprise. This is also a huge reason! You enjoy being shocked and finding out unexpected things. An example would be, “Jennifer Lawrence Has a SECRET Daughter That We NEVER Knew About!”

All of these factors contribute to an articles entice and are ultimately why you are glued to your phone and/or computer for hours. A surefire way to prevent this, is avoiding all media online, but that seems impossible and unlikely. The best(and the most reasonable) way is to just be aware.

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Why Millions Of Teens Are Up All Hours Of The Night!

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