Nudging News Readers: A Mixed-Methods Approach to Understanding When and How Interface Nudges Affect News Selection

Figures & data

Figure 1. The experimental news website (originally displayed as a vertical 1 × 4 grid).

Figure 2. Interface nudges.

Note. From left: Popularity Nudge, Model Citizen nudge, Self-actualisation Nudge. Translation from left to right: “Most read”, 85% of readers find this important to know about’, and “Reading this article makes you become a better-informed citizen”.

Figure 3. Percentage of topics selected per nudge condition - aggregated (upper) & individual (lower).

Table 1. Multilevel regression for H1a, H2a, and H3a with selection of current affairs news as binary dependent variable.

	Base model	Full model with all respondents	Full model with respondents that passed attention check
(Intercept)	0.45 (1.25)	0.10 (1.52)^∗∗∗	0.10 (2.05)^∗∗
Popularity Nudge	1.24 (1.14)	1.24 (1.15)	1.15 (1.20)
Model Citizen Nudge	1.21 (1.15)	1.21 (1.15)	1.47 (1.19)^∗
Self-actualization Nudge	1.27 (1.14)	1.27 (1.14)	1.35 (1.19)
Position	0.77 (1.04)^∗∗∗	0.76 (1.04)^∗∗∗	0.84 (1.06)^∗∗
Number of prior selections	1.03 (1.19)	1.02 (1.19)	1.07 (1.21)
Political interest		1.22 (1.06)^∗∗∗	1.28 (1.08)^∗∗
Need for cognition		1.18 (1.05)^∗∗	1.10 (1.07)
Diversity values		0.98 (1.08)	0.98 (1.12)
Overall selection time		1.09 (1.05)	1.08 (1.07)
Modality: Phone vs laptop		0.97 (1.13)	0.93 (1.18)
Modality: Tablet vs laptop		1.72 (1.27)^∗	1.79 (1.37)
Exposed to impression motivation		0.81 (1.10)^∗	0.83 (1.14)
AIC	2722.82	2689.39	1585.16
BIC	2768.82	2775.63	1662.58
Log Likelihood	−1353.41	−1329.70	−777.58
Num. obs.	2320	2320	1304
Num. groups: users	580	580	326
Num. groups: articles	4	4	4
Var: user id (Intercept)	0.14	0.05	0.05
Var: article id (Intercept)	0.14	0.14	0.16

*** p < 0.001.

** p < 0.01.

* p < 0.05.

Note. Given the binary dependent variable, we report odds ratios with exponentiated standard errors in brackets.

Table 2. Multilevel regression for H1b, H2b, and H3b with log-transformed reading time as continuous dependent variable.

	Base model	Full model with all respondents	Full model with respondents that passed attention check
(Intercept)	1.68 (0.05)	1.67 (0.06)^∗∗∗	1.68 (0.07)^∗∗∗
Popularity Nudge	−0.01 (0.04)	−0.00 (0.04)	−0.05 (0.05)
Model Citizen Nudge	−0.05 (0.04)	−0.05 (0.04)	−0.06 (0.05)
Self-actualization Nudge	−0.00 (0.04)	−0.00 (0.04)	−0.01 (0.05)
Position	0.03 (0.01)	0.02 (0.01)	0.03 (0.02)
Text length	0.00 (0.00)^∗∗∗	0.00 (0.00)^∗∗∗	0.00 (0.00)^∗∗∗
Number of prior selections	−0.03 (0.02)	−0.03 (0.02)	−0.01 (0.02)
Political interest		−0.01 (0.03)	−0.04 (0.03)
Need for cognition		0.07 (0.02)^∗∗	0.10 (0.03)^∗∗
Diversity values		0.05 (0.04)	0.01 (0.05)
Overall selection time		0.15 (0.02)^∗∗∗	0.15 (0.03)^∗∗∗
Modality: Phone vs laptop		−0.04 (0.06)	−0.01 (0.07)
Modality: Tablet vs laptop		−0.13 (0.10)^∗	−0.14 (0.13)
Exposed to impression motivation		0.04 (0.04)^∗	0.01 (0.05)
AIC	871.21	859.00	539.39
BIC	911.89	931.33	603.95
Log Likelihood	−426.60	−413.50	−253.69
Num. obs.	679	679	418
Num. groups: users	427	427	254
Var: user id (Intercept)	0.17	0.14	0.13
Var: Residual	0.08	0.08	0.08

*** p < 0.001.

** p < 0.01.

* p < 0.05.

Note. Here we report unstandardized coefficients and standard errors in brackets. All continuous predictors are centered around the mean.

Figure 4. Nudging mechanisms that emerged during the qualitative interviews.

Data Availability Statement

The data underlying this article are available at https://osf.io/audh3/.