I Like What You Like: Social Norms and Media Enjoyment

People consume and enjoy similar media entertainment as their friends and close others do. Yet the underlying psychological processes driving selection and consumption of entertainment considered "mainstream" within a group are still unclear. Given that individuals' behaviors and attitudes are influenced by the perceived prevalence of others' behaviors (descriptive norms) and perceptions of what others approve (injunctive norms), we examined the role of descriptive and injunctive norms in media selection and enjoyment. In an online experiment, we tested whether norm messages affected perceptions of group norms, and whether these perceptions influenced the enjoyment of a movie trailer and intention to watch the full film. We also tested the moderating roles of group identity and proximity on perceived norms and subsequent effects. Results showed that norm messages predicted perceived descriptive norms, which in turn predicted enjoyment of the trailer and intention to watch the film. Norm messages also predicted perceived injunctive norms, and the effect of injunctive norms on outcome variables was strengthened by group proximity and identity. The discussion highlights ways that social norms can inform understandings of socially-influenced media enjoyment and selection in future work and unique opportunities to study normative influence in a media setting.