TY - JOUR
T1 - The impact of happiness in political ads on party evaluation
T2 - A data donation study with emotion recognition
AU - Chu, Xiaotong
AU - Van Remoortere, Annelien
AU - Vermeer, Susan
AU - Vliegenthart, Rens
AU - Kruikemeier, Sanne
PY - 2025/6
Y1 - 2025/6
N2 - Laughter is contagious. A happy stimulus could arouse positive affections and inhibit negative responses. This study investigates the impact of projected images of happiness in election campaigns on ad-evoked emotions and party evaluation. An elaborate data collection was conducted during the final weeks of the 2021 Dutch General Election campaign. An experience sampling method was applied where 126 participants donated a total of 2626 online political ads they encountered daily. The happy stimuli in the donated ads were recognized using Pykognition and manual content analysis. Hypotheses were tested using two multi-level models. The results indicated that happiness in online political ads directly affected voters’ evaluation of the promoted party. We also found that happiness had a positive effect on ad-evoked enthusiasm and a negative effect on ad-evoked anger, and these impacts subsequently affected party evaluation. Taken together, this study provides insights into the impacts of visualized positive emotions in political campaigns.
AB - Laughter is contagious. A happy stimulus could arouse positive affections and inhibit negative responses. This study investigates the impact of projected images of happiness in election campaigns on ad-evoked emotions and party evaluation. An elaborate data collection was conducted during the final weeks of the 2021 Dutch General Election campaign. An experience sampling method was applied where 126 participants donated a total of 2626 online political ads they encountered daily. The happy stimuli in the donated ads were recognized using Pykognition and manual content analysis. Hypotheses were tested using two multi-level models. The results indicated that happiness in online political ads directly affected voters’ evaluation of the promoted party. We also found that happiness had a positive effect on ad-evoked enthusiasm and a negative effect on ad-evoked anger, and these impacts subsequently affected party evaluation. Taken together, this study provides insights into the impacts of visualized positive emotions in political campaigns.
KW - Emotion recognition
KW - Happiness
KW - Mobile experience sampling method
KW - Online political ads
KW - Party evaluation
U2 - 10.1016/j.teler.2025.100196
DO - 10.1016/j.teler.2025.100196
M3 - Article
AN - SCOPUS:105002021114
SN - 2772-5030
VL - 18
JO - Telematics and Informatics Reports
JF - Telematics and Informatics Reports
M1 - 100196
ER -