Karolien Poels

University of Antwerp | UA · Department of Communication Studies

Abstaining from social media has become a popular digital disconnection strategy of individuals to enhance their well-being. To date, it is unclear whether social media abstinences are truly effective in improving well-being, however, as studies produce inconsistent outcomes. This preregistered systematic review and meta-analysis therefore aims to...

Purpose Since buying slow fashion can be both a rational choice and socially reactive behavior, this study adopts the prototype willingness model to predict Flemish young adults’ slow fashion consumption. Design/methodology/approach An online survey was administered to consumers aged 18–25 years old ( N = 264). Confirmatory factor analysis and str...

Background This study focuses on the Budd app, a mobile health intervention designed for gay, bisexual, and other men who have sex with men who participate in chemsex. Chemsex, the use of psychoactive drugs in a sexual context, presents substantial health risks including increased HIV transmission and mental health issues. Addressing these risks re...

Influencer advertising on Instagram effectively brings products to the attention of young, engaged audiences. Though brands often select Instagram influencers with green expertise for eco-friendly product endorsements, this study argues that generic lifestyle influencers are also suitable endorsers, expanding the reach to wider, more diverse young...

Online hate speech (OHS) is a prevalent issue on social media with harmful consequences for individuals and society. Counteracting this issue requires a better understanding of the factors that drive behaviors such as posting hate speech or making hateful comments. The present study contributes to this need by investigating the personal, social, an...

Digital disconnection has emerged as a concept describing the actions people take to limit their digital connectivity to enhance their well-being. To date, evidence on its effectiveness is mixed, leading to calls for greater consideration of why, how, when, and for whom digital disconnection works. This article responds to these calls, presenting a...

BACKGROUND This study focuses on the Budd app, a mobile health intervention designed for gay, bisexual, and other men who have sex with men who participate in chemsex. Chemsex, the use of psychoactive drugs in a sexual context, presents substantial health risks including increased HIV transmission and mental health issues. Addressing these risks re...

Background A well-studied internal barrier to regular physical activity, and more specifically brisk walking, is cognitive fatigue. However, thus far little research examined how cognitively fatigued individuals can be motivated to exercise, more specifically to engage in brisk walking. This study investigates whether humorous intervention messages...

Communicating about new or unknown health risks is challenging because it requires audiences to engage with and process novel and often complex health information. This study examines how texts can convey awareness and increase knowledge about health risks people are unaware of. The focus is on how text genre (narrative, expository, and mixed-genre...

Background The COVID-19 pandemic has revealed the fragility of the global food system, sending shockwaves across countries' societies and economy. This has presented formidable challenges to sustaining a healthy and resilient lifestyle. The objective of this study is to examine the food consumption patterns and assess diet diversity indicators, pri...

Background: Reducing the spread of infectious diseases through vaccination faces the challenge of vaccine hesitancy: referring to questions, concerns and doubts arising when making a vaccine-related decision. A motivational state often arising within people exposed to health messages supporting informed decision making is psychological reactance,...

Chemsex refers to the intentional use of drugs before or during sex in a specific context, typically involving prolonged sex sessions with multiple partners. Engaging in chemsex is associated with a wide range of health risks and related risk behaviors. We developed a mobile phone application (‘Budd-app’) to support and inform chemsex participants,...

Online hate speech on social media platforms causes harm to those who are victimized as well as society at large. The prevalence of hateful content has, thus, prompted numerous calls for improved countermeasures and prevention. For such interventions to be effective, it is necessary to gain a nuanced understanding of influences that facilitate the...

Temporary and permanent disconnection from digital devices, platforms, or tools has gained traction from users and, subsequently, in academic discourse. A rapidly growing body of research focuses on so-called digital disconnection practices. However, the literature is highly scattered, with limited comprehensive work and consensus on essential foun...

This study investigates an evolutionary hypothesis of gossip postulating that in humans it serves a similar function as social grooming in other primates. It examines whether gossip decreases physiological markers of stress and increases markers of positive emotionality and sociability. Dyads of friends (N = 66) recruited at the university, partici...

The rise of online sexual harassment in recent years has spurred discussions both within the European Union and internationally. To effectively address this issue, it is imperative to foster collaboration among various sectors, including government entities, nongovernmental organizations, educational institutions, media outlets, and technology comp...

Online sexual harassment (OSH) can impact victims' mental health. When faced with OSH, some victims seek support on social media platforms like Reddit. The anonymity, "weak tie" networks, decentralized moderation, and free-speech discussion culture of Reddit afford victims of OSH a unique online environment to talk about their distressing experienc...

Background Chemsex refers to the intentional use of drugs before or during sex among men who have sex with men (MSM). Engaging in chemsex has been linked to significant negative impacts on physical, psychological, and social well-being. However, no evidence-based support tools have addressed either these harms or the care needs of MSM who engage in...

The advertising field has witnessed a dramatic transformation over the past decade. This contribution to the IJA 40th anniversary special issue deals with (digital) branded content; any output fully/partly funded or at least endorsed by the legal owner of the brand which promotes the owner’s brand values, and makes audiences choose to engage with t...

Physical inactivity and sedentary behaviours are leading risk factors for preventable health problems worldwide. Therefore, several smartphone-based interventions have tried to enhance physical activity (PA) through goal reminders based on relatively stable characteristics. However, time-varying factors, such as cognitive fatigue, may act as barrie...

Empirical studies have persistently reported negative attitudes of meat eaters toward vegetarians and vegans (veg*ns), but scant attention has been paid to veg*ns' attitudes toward meat eaters. We aimed to investigate the attitudes of meat eaters and veg*ns from both perspectives. In addition, we explored the attitudes of occasional meat eaters. We...

The use of reflective interfaces has been proposed as a useful strategy to reduce cyber harassment amongst adolescents on social networking sites (SNS). By using machine-learning techniques, harassing online messages can be detected before a user submits it online, whereafter a message prompts the user to reconsider the post. This study builds furt...

There is an abundance of messages on food and health communicated nowadays by diverse stakeholders, including nutrition and health experts, food industries, celebrity chefs, and food influencers, among others. If each of these stakeholders has different interests and uses other communication strategies, confusion and polarization about food and hea...

Despite the substantial amount of literature concerning adolescent bystanders of online hate and cyberbullying, relatively little attention has been devoted to studying the same issue in adults. Similarly, the determinants of the effectiveness of different messages to support the victims or counter hate have also been understudied. The existing pie...

Combining the transactional model of stress and coping and expressive writing theory, this research studied whether writing on one’s personal experiences with the COVID-19 pandemic may improve young people’s emotional reactions to the situation. A standard expressive writing instruction was compared to a positive writing instruction (writing about...

Boredom is a prevalent and relevant, yet understudied, negative emotion in the field of media psychology. This paper proposes novel theoretical foundations to study boredom as an emotion and its related regulation strategies in the context of mobile media. Due to their pervasive nature, mobile media allow for boredom regulation via passive and (int...

During the workshop, we will firstly present a roadmap of the co-designing process, followed by some case studies showing how exactly these design stages have been employed in practice. Next, we show a step-by-step plan of how to employ this co-design in the context of designing an efficient and effective interface to support victims cope positivel...

ICT have exceptionally facilitated new forms of sexual harassment in the digital environment. Over half of the women in the world experienced abusive language, sexist, or misogynist comments online. Above half of the female victims experience lower self-esteem, self-confidence, or feel emotionally stressed after being exposed to online harassment....

This study explores what emerging adults value in food media, i.e. food-focused content and personae in media. Emerging adults (18–25) are an important target group for food media as they transition toward nutritional independence and consume media substantially. Seven semi-structured focus groups were conducted with thirty-seven Belgian participan...

This research investigates to what extent message sidedness and advertiser credibility can positively influence readers’ perceptions of native advertisements, advertisers and news websites, once readers are aware that they are looking at an advertisement. The results show that a native advertisement from a high-credibility commercial organization w...

The measures to fight the spread of the COVID-19 pandemic have been concentrated on inviting people to stay at home. This has reduced opportunities to exercise while also shedding some light on the importance of physical health. Based on an online survey, this paper investigated physical activity behaviours of a Belgians sample (n = 427) during the...

This handbook provides a strong collection of communication- and psychology-based theories and models on media entertainment, which can be used as a knowledge resource for any academic and applied purpose. Its 41 chapters offer explanations of entertainment that audiences find in any kind of ‘old’ and ‘new’ media, from classic novels to VR video ga...

This study investigates whether healthy food can be made more appealing by looking at the pleasure induced by the social context in which food is eaten (eating alone, eating together, or sharing food), assuming that pleasure affects food appeal. Whereas unhealthy food is often considered a source of pleasure, healthy food is not. The pleasure induc...

Sharing, reading and responding to personal narratives on peer-to-peer support websites may provide adolescents with informational and emotional support to feel more confident in coping with stressful events. However, their use may also pose a threat to adolescents’ coping self-efficacy. Principles of expressive writing, social sharing of emotions,...

Personalization is about conveying the right message at the right time to the right person. Since the beginning of trade, offline sellers already establish personalized experiences by learning things about their loyal customers (i.e., name, preferences), and by implementing this knowledge in interactions with them (i.e., call them by name, offer pe...

Whereas, past research has shown that using environmental arguments to reduce meat intake are unsuccessful in awareness campaigns, popular documentaries might have the potential to successfully change the public awareness of the environmental implications of meat consumption today. This preliminary study aimed to provide first empirical evidence of...

The literature has advocated the use of a clear and unambiguous label to inform adolescents of advertisements on social media. In this study, we introduce a norm-based label and determine its effects. In a series of three studies, we test a label that triggers the bandwagon heuristic (i.e., “your friends know this is sponsored”) and compare its eff...

Purpose This study aims to investigate the development of adolescents’ advertising literacy and privacy protection strategies in the context of targeted advertisements on social networking sites (SNSs). Design/methodology/approach A survey was conducted among 374 adolescents between 12 and 17 years of age, and 469 young adults (18–25 years) served...

Purpose This paper aims to investigate the role of five highly relevant advertiser- (i.e. personalization and ad placement) and consumer-controlled (i.e. privacy concerns, perceived relevance and Facebook motives) factors in the evaluation and perceived outcomes of personalized Facebook advertising as well as how these factors interrelate. Design/...

Citizens’ privacy concerns and participation needs in the smart city Antwerp This article explores the interrelation between privacy concerns and participation needs with citizens of the smart city Antwerp. This research makes use of the privacy framework by Van Zoonen (2016) to frame five applications of the smart city Antwerp, differing by use of...

BACKGROUND Wearable trackers for monitoring physical activity (PA) and total sleep time (TST) are increasingly popular. These devices are not only used by consumers to monitor their behavior, but also by researchers to track the behavior of large samples and health professionals to implement interventions aimed at health promotion and to remotely m...

Background: Wearable trackers for monitoring physical activity (PA) and total sleep time (TST) are increasingly popular. These devices are not only used by consumers to monitor their behavior but also by researchers to track the behavior of large samples and by health professionals to implement interventions aimed at health promotion and to remote...

Nowadays, children are confronted with a considerable amount of advertising, not only through traditional media channels, but also through a wide range of (new) digital formats such as advergames, social media advertising, and product placements. This raises the important issue of whether children are able to critically recognize and understand the...

Emotions play a central role in advertising. Starting from the extensive and ever-developing literature on the role of emotions in human information processing and behavior, as studied within general psychology, we discuss how advertising literature has tackled this topic throughout the years. This review reveals that the potential of direct behavi...

Abstract Chatbots on social networking sites are a recent innovation in computer-mediated marketing communication. In this study, 245 Facebook users between 18 and 35 years of age (Mage = 25.97, SD = 4.92) were asked to order tickets for the movies through Cinebot, a Facebook chatbot specifically built for the study. Afterwards, they were asked to...

As readers often do not recognize the commercial nature of native advertising on news websites, clear disclosures are required to prevent deception. The present study therefore tests whether and how providing disclosures with more detailed information about both the authorship of native ads and the importance of advertising revenue for news media’s...

Mobile news consumption is rising quickly, just as the appearance of native advertisements on mobile news platforms, yet little is known about readers’ mobile native advertising recognition and perceptions. This qualitative study, therefore, explores how readers recognise and perceive in-feed native advertisements in a mobile news app. Usability te...

Adolescents often seek and provide peer support as an effective strategy for countering cyberbullying victimization. Little is known about the actual content of such peer support, however, partly due to limitations inherent to survey, interview or focus group research. The current study examined online peer support that had been sought and provided...

Samenvatting Een steekproef bij 400 Vlaamse jongere personen van 16 tot 30 jaar toont aan dat de attitude tegenover ad blockers de meest belangrijke voorspeller vormt om verschillen te verklaren in de intentie om ad blockers te gebruiken. Minder bezorgdheden omtrent privacy, minder storing en minder data en kosten vormen de meest belangrijke gedrag...

Given that adolescents continuously interact with the user interface of a social networking site, it might be a strategic place to address privacy-related issues. This study investigates whether and how privacy control features embedded in Facebook’s user interface could serve as a cue to influence adolescents in their critical processing and perce...

As chatbots have become increasingly popular over the past years, most social networking sites have recognized their far-reaching potential for commercial purposes. Their rapid and widespread usage warrants a better understanding. This study examines the effectiveness of chatbots on Facebook for brands. The study proposes and tests a model based on...

Digital games are firmly ingrained in our culture. From the 1970s onwards, they have gradually evolved into an extremely popular entertainment medium. 2.2 billion people from all socio-demographic backgrounds are now spending more and more of their leisure time playing games. As a consequence, revenues from the global games industry are expected to...

Cyberpsychology: Journal of Psychosocial Research on Cyberspace launches a call for papers to be included in a special issue devoted to digital advertising and consumer empowerment. The special issue will be published in March 2019 and guest edited by Liselot Hudders (Ghent University), Karolien Poels (University of Antwerp) and Eva van Reijmersdal...

Facebook users do not visit the social networking site to see advertising. They are either just surfing the platform or searching for information. Therefore, advertising content is vulnerable to ad avoidance. In this study, the effect of two Facebook ad placements, sidebar ads and message stream ads, on ad avoidance intention was investigated throu...

This paper describes the items, scale validity and scale reliability of a self-report questionnaire that measures bystander behavior in cyberbullying incidents among adolescents, and its behavioral determinants. Determinants included behavioral intention, behavioral attitudes, moral disengagement attitudes, outcome expectations, self-efficacy, subj...

This article examines how peer communication among adolescents (14–16 years) affects the evaluation of social advertising (i.e. targeted ad that adopts the social proof heuristic by using an individual’s social ties as endorsers for a brand) on social networking sites (SNSs). More precisely, the focus lies on how engaging in online peer chatting on...

The practice of slut-shaming became rampant with the advent of social networking sites (SNS). This chapter will discuss how these platforms pose additional risks for female adolescents to be slut-shamed. It will be argued that SNS have expanded the impact and scope of slut-shaming through, for example, the easy replication and persistence of public...

This article examines whether individual differences in chronic regulatory focus (prevention vs. promotion focus) among adolescents influences the way they evaluate targeted advertising on social networking sites. Study 1 (survey) reveals that adolescents with a promotion focus (who are oriented toward achieving positive outcomes) have a more posit...

Ad blocking – the use of browser extensions such as Adblock (Plus) or Ublock – is becoming mainstream, particularly amongst young web users. This automated form of advertising avoidance has attracted significant attention due to the loss of advertising revenues. Insights in this type of ad avoidance behavior are indispensable. By applying the theor...

This paper starts from the premise that crisis is a perception and that one of the best ways to conquer a crisis is not to allow it to develop in the first place. By detecting or perceiving a crisis before other stakeholders do, an organisation can prevent or mitigate a crisis. Few studies have considered the question of whether organisations put t...

Cyberbullying is a social phenomenon which can bring severe harm to victims. Bystanders can show positive bystander behavior (e.g. defending) and decrease cyberbullying and its harm, or negative behavior (e.g. passive bystanding, joining) and sustain cyberbullying and its negative effects. Few interventions have currently targeted bystanders and ev...

While several studies have focused on native advertisements' disclosures, little research has been conducted on native advertisements' content. Therefore, this study investigated the influence of both disclosure recognition and brand presence on readers' persuasion knowledge (PK) and subsequent evaluations. Results of an online study (N = 290) show...

Advertisements on social networking sites are typically unrequested messages placed in between the user-generated content. What makes users accept these ads (or not)? A factorial survey was conducted to uncover the impact of different factors related to the use of personal data (e.g., sensitivity of personal data) and advertising place (e.g., ad lo...

The online media and advertising landscape has quickly changed in the past few years, and both media and advertisers are facing several major challenges. Consumers are more trained than ever to ignore traditional banner advertisements (Hill, 2013), and the amount of internet users with an ad blocker have been going up fast (Adobe, 2015). At the sam...

Adolescents are regularly exposed to commercial messages on social networking sites. There is scant knowledge of how they interact with marketing communications on these social platforms. This study examines how advertising on Facebook is associated with adolescents' ad skepticism, and how this influences their purchase intentions. Also, the modera...

Introduction. Cyberbullying is a social phenomenon which can bring severe harm to victims. Bystanders can show positive bystander behavior (e.g. defending) and decrease cyberbullying and its harm, or negative behavior (e.g. passive bystanding, joining) and sustain cyberbullying and its negative effects. Few interventions have currently targeted bys...

The chapter aims to give an elaborate introduction to in-game advertising. It starts by providing a definition of the practice, an overview of its benefits and drawbacks, and a review of the research that has been conducted on its effectiveness. Additionally, it presents the results of a case study investigating how players respond towards differen...

Children’s advertising literacy is a well-documented research area. Yet, the literature on how to measure advertising literacy is not straightforward due to conceptual and operational differences in the existing studies. This has led to inconsistent results with regard to the development, possession and application of advertising literacy. The aim...

Purpose Digital gaming has become one of the largest entertainment sectors worldwide, increasingly turning the medium into an attractive vehicle for the communication of advertising messages. As a result, the incorporation of products or brands in digital games or in-game advertising (IGA) is expected to grow steadily over the course of the followi...

The chapter takes as its main object of study (Calleja’s (2011) In-game: from immersion to incorporation. MIT Press, Cambridge, MA) Player Involvement Model, an analytical framework designed to understand player experience developed through qualitative research. The model identifies six dimensions of involvement in digital games, namely kinesthetic...

The present study investigates how the perceived congruity (the perceived level of fit between the execution of the in-game ad and the game environment) of in-game advertising (IGA) in fantasy games affects both players’ attitude towards the IGA and their play intention of the fantasy game in which it is embedded, and how these effects are moderate...

Native advertising in online news media is on the rise. This experimental study investigates the reactions of readers towards native advertisements, compared to another type of hybrid advertising in online news media: advertorials. Results indicated that readers react most positively towards native advertising; the most editorial advertising techni...

Increasingly, personal data posted by users of social network sites (SNSs) can be used to personalize advertising. The present study investigates how adolescents respond to personalized ads in terms of attitude toward the ad, brand engagement and intention to forward, and whether privacy concerns moderate their responses. According to pretest resul...

Automatic monitoring of user-generated content on social networking sites (SNSs) aims at detecting potential harm for adolescents by means of text and image mining techniques and subsequent actions by the providers (e.g. blocking users, legal action). Evidently, current research is primarily focused on its technological development. However, involv...

The purpose of the present study was to examine whether (repeated) exposure to cyberbullying as a bystander has an impact on early adolescents' moral evaluations in terms of a decrease in empathy and a shift towards a more tolerant attitude towards cyberbullying. A two-wave panel study with a 6-month time interval was conducted among a sample of 14...

Background Positive bystander behavior in cyberbullying among adolescents may effectively mitigate cyberbullying and its harm for the victim. Limited, scattered, and sometimes only qualitative research is available on predictors of positive (e.g. defending, comforting or reporting) and negative (e.g. passive bystanding, joining, reinforcing) bystan...