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Feeling ostracised, that is, feeling ignored and excluded, in a social media environment causes negative affect and threatens fundamental human needs. Socially anxious people are especially fearful of social exclusion and may—if they feel ostracised—suffer even more when they do not have low-risk coping options such as using the Like button. Using the Online Ostracism tool, in a 2 (Ostracism vs. Inclusion) × 2 (Coping Deprivation vs. Control) experimental design, individuals with various social anxiety levels (N = 131) engaged in an online group task. Coping deprivation was operationalised via a disabled Like button. Compared to included participants, those who were ostracised reported significantly more threatened needs and worse mood. Needs were mostly threatened when ostracised ones encountered a disabled Like button. Social anxiety did not moderate this Ostracism × Coping interaction effect. However, the more socially anxious ostracised individuals were, the more they used the Like button. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Democracies around the world are struggling with the decline of civic and political engagement. At the same time, new forms of engagement such as lifestyle politics, Internet activism, and political consumerism are on the rise. In this introduction to the Special Section, we argue that citizens are increasingly engaging through informal, creative, and digitally networked activities, thereby moving political engagement into the domain of entertainment and personalized communication on the Internet and in social media. Moreover, we advocate a cross-cultural approach to explore how media use contributes to political participation in a globalized, mediatized world. The studies assembled in this Special Section show that political engagement through using media hinges on cultural parameters such as political structures, political leaders, press freedom, neo-tribes, degrees of tightness, postmaterialist values, norms, and localized versus centralized patterns of information disorder, to mention a few. Implications of the studies and suggestions for future research direction are discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Mobile phones, television, internet services, games, and social media offer diverse and numerous opportunities for coping with stress in everyday life. Different disciplines have contributed to answering how these media are used for coping. Consequently, fragmented and disconnected research perspectives have evolved. To improve integration, we conducted a scoping review. A total of 318 articles met the inclusion criteria. Three main perspectives on media use for coping were identified: (1) stress and coping, (2) mood management and emotion regulation, and (3) media addiction and problematic media use. Each perspective has contributed to different aspects of the use of media for coping. Six advancements are proposed, which attempt to integrate perspectives and to guide future research on coping using media. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

When posting content in social media, users can feel excluded due to lacking (cyber-ostracism) or negative (cyber-rejection) feedback. Referring to the temporal need-threat model, this study examined the impact that both exclusion experiences have on social media users' need threat and on their online coping behavior to fortify threatened needs. For this purpose, a pre-registered between-subjects experiment (N = 211) was conducted by manipulating the type of social exclusion on three levels (ostracism; rejection; inclusion). Results indicated that both types of exclusion threatened media users' needs for belonging, self-esteem, meaningful existence, and control. Compared to ostracized users, rejected ones were more threatened in their needs for belonging and self-esteem, but equally threatened in their needs for meaningful existence and control. Regarding social media users' coping behavior, ostracized users showed more prosocial behavior, whereas rejected ones rather withdrew from social interactions. Material, code, and data can be found at . [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Research on parasocial interaction (PSI) has a long tradition in noninteractive environments such as watching TV or listening to radio speakers. In the past years, researchers have started to apply PSI on videogame streaming environments, where the audience can interact with the observed media persona and get immediate feedback on their messages and requests. In a 3 × 2 online experiment (N = 251), we manipulated how a streamer addressed participants (individual vs. collective vs. no addressing) and whether he paid attention to and answered messages in the chat (attention vs. no attention to the chat). Findings show that the more individually participants were addressed and whether the streamer reacted to messages in the chat affected experiences of PSI. Furthermore, alongside their overall enjoyment, PSI predicted viewers' commitment to social norms. We discuss these findings regarding their implications for the conceptualization of PSI in light of interactive novel technologies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The paper looks at the symbolic interactions on social networking sites, such as Likes on Facebook, and their role in users' sense of social in- or exclusion. In an online experiment, users of Facebook were asked to write a possible status update and then received note about the numbers of hypothetical Likes they received (zero, two, or thirty) and who (close friends or acquaintances) pressed the Like button. Multivariate analysis of variances showed that belongingness and self-esteem needs are threatened when people do not receive Likes. In contrast, more Likes seem to satisfy these needs better. The influence of who gives the Likes is minor compared to the sheer number of Likes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In times of being always online and connected, cyberostracism—the feeling of being ignored or excluded over the Internet—is a serious threat to fundamental human needs: belonging, self-esteem, control, and meaningful existence. According to the temporal need-threat model, responses to ostracism lead to immediate and universal experiences of negative emotions as well as to thwarted need satisfaction. In two experiments ( N 1 = 105; N 2 = 85), we investigated these effects using a new computerized tool, Ostracism Online (Wolf et al., 2015). In both studies we found that ostracism negatively affected emotional states, belongingness, self-esteem, and meaningful existence but not control. Furthermore, Facebook use as a coping strategy after being excluded had no significant impact on need restoration. In sum, our findings highlight that Ostracism Online is a useful tool to connect the research area of social media and ostracism. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

When people feel socially threatened and excluded, they could use their mobile phones to reconnect with others and feel better. We assumed that such positive results can occur even if mobile phones are not actively used. Rather, it may suffice if users believe that carrying a mobile phone ensures social connection. This mindset may help users recover a sense of belonging during self-threatening situations. In two experiments, we asked whether the smartphone as a physical device or its symbolic representation can aid in everyday self-threatening situations. In Study 1 (N = 74), participants with their smartphones in their pockets experienced less threatened belongingness than those who were deprived of their smartphones. In Study 2 (N = 419), participants who encountered a smartphone symbol with social apps after feeling socially excluded recovered better than those who encountered a symbol with informational apps, but showed no difference in recovery compared to those who encountered no symbol at all. Findings support the idea that smartphones can 'physically' buffer against social threats and partially serve as subtle reminders of social bonds. • Smartphones as physical devices and symbols represent social bonds and affiliation. • Beyond mere use, they can help users deal with feeling ostracized. • With smartphones in the pocket, users felt less socially threatened than without. • Social app cues reduced feeling ostracized better than information app cues. • Social app cues reduced feeling ostracized not better than providing no cues at all. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

An online survey ( N = 207) investigated how the seen-function influences users’ answering behavior in Facebook chatting. The seen-function is a chat-feature that provides more transparency over the course of a chat conversation and thus may also intensify the mutual awareness of chat partners. Based on the need to belong and fear of ostracism as motivators for user behavior it was hypothesized that users with a higher value of these personality traits would have a higher expectation for others to answer immediately and a higher perceived obligation to answer immediately. Indeed, fear of ostracism and need to belong were positively related to perceived obligations to answer and expectations toward chat partners. However, the perceived obligation to answer immediately was higher than the average expectation toward others to do so. Looking for different clusters of users, we found three groups of users in the data set that differ in terms of their expectations and perceived obligations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]