information and happiness

Ian Ruthvenand various of his clever students

University of Strathclyde

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introduction• rapid growth in available content people access purely

for pleasure• at same time rise in depression and related conditions

with consequent demand on health services• many searching for alternative ways to increase

happiness– ‘Poetry on prescription’ services– ‘United Nations International Day of Happiness’ seeking to

“spread happiness to millions of people”• information science has investigated leisure

information activities– but said little about how people instrumentally use

information to make themselves happy

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introduction• have been conducting small studies into this

use of information– information sharing of ‘happy’ information– information seeking of ‘happy’ information– happy information and stress/coping behaviours

• focus here much more on first topic, bit on the second and draw some general conclusions/directions from other studies

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outline of study• sharing ‘happy’ information

• central research question addressed in this study was:– what are the factors that motivate and impact upon individuals’ sharing behaviour of

happy information?

• investigated through the following research questions:– how do individuals share happy information: what do they share or not share; with

whom; and by which methods?– why do individuals share/not share this information; share with which people; share by

which methods?– how does individuals' happy information sharing behaviour correspond to their affective

states?

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background

• previous task- and work-based information sharing has shown that–sharing is often important to maintaining relationships–expectation of reciprocity is important–positive emotions lead to more information sharing–roles such as ‘gift-giving’ and ‘super-sharers’ can be seen in information sharing

• but little research has been conducted investigating:–information sharing of non-task-related information within a leisure environment (except within hobby groups)–affective element (as opposed to the cognitive aspects) of individuals’ information behaviour

• so we decided to carry out quite an exploratory study to examine behaviours in casual leisure environments

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participants• exploratory study; not attempting to represent any particular demographic

• 30 Participants; recruited via email, Facebook and word of mouth

• non-representative sampling, with the following exceptions:– all aged 18+– required to be frequent internet users, to permit balanced investigation of both offline and

online sharing habits– deliberate effort to maintain equal numbers of male and female participants

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• 11 participants (approx. 37%) had moved abroad and were currently living away from their families in a country other than their place of birth

• sharing here was seen by these participants as an important way of maintaining social relationships

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data collection• semi-structured interview around 4 key themes of what leads them

to share, what channels do they use, do they feel the need to share, how sharing impacts on them and their happiness

• participants were requested prior to interviews to consider examples of their happy information sharing which could be used in discussion

• explained to participants that the ‘happy information’ should not be work-related, study-related, or task-based

• left to individuals to determine what they considered to be ‘happy information’– didn’t want to force a definition of what happiness meant on

participants– understanding what they perceived as ‘happy’ information was itself

interesting

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data analysis• interviews were transcribed and summarised

• data was collated and organised using a bottom-up approach, sorting associated data together into groupings:–motivations for sharing and not sharing–recipients and relationships–choice of channel–sharing and increasing happiness

–also (only briefly covering here)• reactions to responses from sharing• how people use happy information to portray representations of themselves

• “interesting” or “significant” behaviours were selected for further discussion

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• most participants shared happy information frequently

• and a variety of types of information

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motivations for sharing and not sharing• most common reasons for sharing– perceived interest to recipient

• not conscious decision-making, reacting to information that comes to hand

• most felt targeting was important rather than general broadcasting• super-sharers were often seen negatively

– feeling a need to share• ‘I must tell…’, ‘… will appreciate this’

– shared interests, habitual sharing (in-kind)– validation of experiences, desire to discover more about

someone else, provocation • most common reasons for not sharing– perceived lack of interest (no-one to share with),

information too trivial (unless becomes relevant in conversation), moment has gone

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comparisons• like other studies– relevance, known mutual interests and need for

validation were important– ‘needing’ to share was new to this study• information here was often trivial and sharing was

reactive rather than planned• but there is a cumulative effect of lots of small

information sharing in relationship building

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recipients and relationships• who is information shared with:– family, close friends, partners, social media followers

mentioned commonly– close relationships were perceived as better targets

• less risk of judgment• less risk of causing offence• there people are more interested in you

– trivial information was also seen as a good ‘soft-contact’• and a maintenance technique to keep relationships going

– also a way of testing relationships• how similar are we/have we become

• like other studies strong relationships encourage more sharing however our participants felt that more frequent contact (rather than strength of relationship ) encouraged more sharing

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choice of channels• face-face sharing as common as texting– as were facebook, phones, email, skype, twitter

• most participants chose the person to share with then the most appropriate channel to reach that person

• but content was important choice as well– important that content fitted the channel and

helped recreate the experience of the sharer

• other issues such as immediacy and privacy were important

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choice of channels• face-face was seen as preferred– to gain enhanced emotional experience (esp

reactions)– sharing more complex information– when information was seen as ‘big’ and ‘deserved’

to be shared in person

• online was preferred when– immediacy was important– information was seen as trivial– danger of forgetting it

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choice of channel• social norms were also observed– some saw phones (requiring an interruption) or

emails (more formal) as more purposeful whereas texting and Facebook were more playful and fitting ‘happy’ information

– some would not share information that was too trivial unless it came up in conversation

– some would chose to share some information in person because ‘that’s how my friends do it’

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act of sharing increasing happiness• reasons that sharing happy information can make you

happy included– pleasure in others’ reactions, making others happy

• gift-giving role• the need for a reaction to the shared information varied widely• ‘if you hadn’t reacted to my panda post I would have thought you

had died’– social element of sharing – act of sharing is a happy act– sharing allows enhanced personal enjoyment (retelling a

joke is funny)– serendipitous discovery of shared interests– but also strengthening relationships

• having ‘our thing’ was important– but several participants only shared within small groups to

retain ownership of their information

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responses• everyone felt a positive response enhanced the

‘happiness’ of the original post• for some sharing responses are more important– where more emotional investment is made in the post

• especially when less used to sharing– where response is expected

• and purpose of sharing is not content but sharing itself– where communication has been specific rather than

general (validation expectations)• but for general purpose sharing often doesn’t

matter is there is a response or not

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self-portrayal• most felt this kind of information sharing did

reflect on them personally so would censor– to avoid judgment – to avoid over-sharing (too much sharing)– to avoid in appropriateness to channel– for work reasons

• to avoid undermining professional standing• to portray idealised versions of themselves

• level of censoring relates to channel– more public, more censoring– less self-censoring offline than online

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summary of this part• lots of sharing of happy, trivial information• most decision-making is very quick with lots of

variety in how and what is shared• social relationships are critical and this kind of

trivial ‘happy’ information was important in their– development, maintenance and discovery

• a lot of this information was encountered information

• what people deliberately seek to make themselves happy is quite different

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information seeking• (briefly) a separate study looked at what

information objects sought to make themselves happy

• lots of visual material (photos, maps, clothes, videos)

• lots of personal information (photos, emails)• lots of material to stimulate imagination– ‘I wish I could buy/visit/live there/be close to…’

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information seeking• and many sites used– from general purpose

sites such as YouTube– to very personal sites

• used as entry points to get info

• or for the pleasure of ‘flow’

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information seeking• and various reasons for such information

interactions– relaxation– distraction– calibration against reality (things are not so bad)– nostalgia (remembering who I used to be)– balance (between life being lived and earlier

dreams and ambitions)– attitude (reinforcing the wish to be a more

positive person)

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summary• in these and other studies we have examined information

related to happiness• rich area of casual leisure research with lots of interesting

behaviours and uses of information for instrumental purposes

• very personal decisions – “materials perceived to be trivial or unimportant by some may

be extraordinarily important and meaningful for others” (Burnett, 2009)

• seen similar trends in other studies not directly related to happiness but where people are using information to change moods, create a sense of contentment or cope with life– coping theories themselves actually say very little about

information behaviours– perhaps a form of biblio self-therapy

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summary• lots of potentially interesting behaviours from

very ephemeral information sharing to more deliberate information seeking and ritualistic information use

• and potentially interesting solutions form information sciences to support behaviours that people are naturally engaging in

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