Psychology of Popular Media

Papers
(The TQCC of Psychology of Popular Media is 3. The table below lists those papers that are above that threshold based on CrossRef citation counts [max. 250 papers]. The publications cover those that have been published in the past four years, i.e., from 2021-02-01 to 2025-02-01.)
ArticleCitations
Mimetic representations of the COVID-19 pandemic: An analysis of objectification, anchoring, and identification processes in coronavirus memes.36
What babies, infants, and toddlers hear on Fox/Disney BabyTV: An exploratory study.31
What does the Cat in the Hat know about that? An analysis of the educational and unrealistic content of children’s narrative science media.25
Supplemental Material for The Effects of Awe-Inspiring Nature Videos on Connectedness to Nature and Proenvironmental Intentions24
Supplemental Material for Strange New Worlds: Social Content in Popular Star Trek Fanfiction Versus Commercial Novels24
Supplemental Material for Who Finds Media Violence Funny? Testing the Effects of Media Violence Exposure and Dark Personality Traits23
Supplemental Material for Development and Validation of the Female Gamer Stereotypes Scale21
Select your character: Individual needs and avatar choice.17
Supplemental Material for Maternal Technology Distraction and Its Associations With Stress and Parenting During the COVID-19 Pandemic16
Supplemental Material for Crime in Your Area: Use of Neighborhood Apps Is Associated With Inaccurate Perceptions of Higher Local Crime Rates16
Deconstructing age-related messages in the Billboard Hot 100.16
Sexism and racism negatively predict preference for diverse characters in Star Wars fans.16
Supplemental Material for Sensing the Media Character: The Experience of Parasocial Interaction, But Not Identification, as a Real Physical Occurrence16
Psychology of Popular Media is, well, popular.15
Situational and personal determinants of adolescents’ attitudes toward online celebrity bashing.14
Binge-watching to feel better: Mental health gratifications sought and obtained through binge-watching.13
Narrative persuasion across the aisle: Mechanisms of engagement with discordant characters.13
Other-focus versus self-focus: The power of self-transcendent TV shows.12
The role of different screen media devices, child dysregulation, and parent screen media use in children’s self-regulation.12
Using comics and tweets to raise awareness about gender biases in STEM.12
Inspired to mask up: The effect of uplifting media messages on attitudes about wearing face masks among Democrats and Republicans.11
Pressure, preoccupation, and porn: The relationship between internet pornography, gendered attitudes, and sexual coercion in young adults.11
Following up on #fitspiration: A comparative content analysis and thematic analysis of social media content aiming to inspire fitness from 2014 and 2021.10
Qualitative and quantitative investigations of Office fans’ connections with fictional and celebrity couples: Identification, parasocial relationships, and beyond.10
Twitch in the time of quarantine: The role of engagement in needs fulfillment.9
Supplemental Material for The Effect of Short-Form Video Usage on Self-Expansion9
Strange new worlds: Social content in popular Star Trek fanfiction versus commercial novels.9
The psychology of likes: Relevance of feedback on Instagram and relationship to self-esteem and social status.8
Intergroup contact with a virtual refugee: Reducing prejudice through a cooperative game.8
The effect of TikTok body neutrality content on young women’s self-compassion.8
Alone and online: Understanding the relationships between social media, solitude, and psychological adjustment.7
Young love on the big screen: A content analysis of romantic ideals, challenges, hookups, and long-term relationships in teen romantic drama movies.7
“Ur a freakin goddess!”: Examining appearance commentary on Instagram.7
Self-simming while Black: Examining a petition to improve black representation in Sims 4.7
Predicting the use of YouTube and content exposure among 10–12-year-old children: Dispositional, developmental, and social factors.7
Rolling minds: A conversational media to promote intergroup contact by countering racial misinformation through socioanalytic processing in adolescence.7
South African university students’ use of mental health content on Instagram.7
Me, myself, and my avatar: Self-discrepancy, embodiment, and narrative involvement in gaming experiences.7
Disappearing in the age of hypervisibility: Definition, context, and perceived psychological consequences of social media ghosting.6
Random app of kindness: Evaluating the potential of a smartphone intervention to impact adolescents’ empathy, prosocial behavior, and aggression.6
Do social media experiments prove a link with mental health: A methodological and meta-analytic review.6
Activism through fandom for the Black Lives Matter movement.6
Cross-sectional and longitudinal relationships between young student women’s experiences of everyday sexual harassment on social media and self-objectification, body shame, and personal safety anxiety6
Reducing social media use improves appearance and weight esteem in youth with emotional distress.5
The role of different characters on story-consistent attitudes and self-reported mental health-related behavior change among viewers of 13 Reasons Why.5
From filters to body positivity: Opposing social media messages and adolescent body image.5
Online communities and identity: Experiences of LGBTQIA+ emerging adults engaging with LGBTQIA+ online content during the COVID-19 pandemic.5
A content analysis method for coding movie content using movie trailers.5
Recognizing the similarities and appreciating the differences? Content choices and perceived (dis)similarity with TV show characters among youth.5
Binging on the heartbreak: The effect of binge-watching on narrative engagement and parasocial breakups.5
Patterns of child and adolescent digital media use: Associations with school support, engagement, and cybervictimization.5
Time travels on Instagram: A longitudinal investigation of parasocial interaction with a historical person and the impact on followers’ morality.5
Ariel, Aurora, or Anna? Disney princess body size as a predictor of body esteem and gendered play in early childhood.5
Perceptions of health changes and support for self-limiting social media use among young adults in Finland—A qualitative study.5
Exploring the motives for watching horror movies: A replication and extension.5
Interactive decision-making in entertainment movies: A mixed-methods approach.5
From inglorious basterds, aliens, and hobbits: The structure of fictional film genre preferences and its relationship with time perspective and individual time span orientation.5
Personal comedy that resonates? Gun control, Uvalde, and identification with Jimmy Kimmel.5
Supplemental Material for “To Be Yourself or Your Selfies, That Is the Question”: The Moderation Role of Gender, Nationality, and Privacy Settings in the Relationship Between Selfie-Engagement and Bod4
Linking adolescents’ exposure to and identification with reality TV to materialism, narcissism, and entitlement.4
Supplemental Material for Qualitative and Quantitative Investigations of Office Fans’ Connections With Fictional and Celebrity Couples: Identification, Parasocial Relationships, and Beyond4
Supplemental Material for The Big Five and Beyond: Which Personality Traits Do Predict Movie and Reading Preferences?4
Supplemental Material for Other-Focus Versus Self-Focus: The Power of Self-Transcendent TV Shows4
Supplemental Material for Navigating a Muscular and Sexualized Instagram Feed: An Experimental Study Examining How Instagram Affects Both Heterosexual and Nonheterosexual Men’s Body Image4
Supplemental Material for The Role of Different Screen Media Devices, Child Dysregulation, and Parent Screen Media Use in Children’s Self-Regulation4
Supplemental Material for Parasocial Relationships as Functional Social Alternatives During Pandemic-Induced Social Distancing4
Supplemental Material for Postexposure Engagement With More and Less Eudaimonic Films: 10-Year Patterns of Response and the Role of Parasocial Relationship and Retrospective Imaginative Involvement4
Supplemental Material for Subtle Threat Cues in Marketing Horror and Children’s Entertainment4
Extensions of the proteus effect on intergroup aggression in the real world.4
Better than scrolling: Digital detox in the search for the ideal self.4
Supplemental Material for Problematic Video Gaming Is Associated With Poor Sleep Quality, Diet Quality, and Personal Hygiene4
Can the social network bridge social distancing? Social media use during the COVID-19 pandemic.3
Correction to “limiting social media use decreases depression, anxiety, and fear of missing out in youth with emotional distress: A randomized controlled trial” by Davis and Goldfield (2024).3
Social media usage is associated with lower knowledge about anxiety and indiscriminate use of anxiety coping strategies.3
Coping with COVID-19 stress: The role of media consumption in emotion- and problem-focused coping.3
Spoilers ahead, proceed with caution: How engagement, enjoyment, and FoMO predict avoidance of spoilers.3
Fear of missing out and compulsive social media use as mediators between OCD symptoms and social media fatigue.3
“You have to know how to live with it without getting to the addiction part”: British young adult experiences of smartphone overreliance and disconnectivity.3
Further tests of the media violence–aggression link: Replication and extension of the 7 Nations Project with multiple Latinx samples.3
The association between social media use and body dissatisfaction: Exploring a potential mechanism of action in an experimental design.3
That’s disgusting! Why disgust increases enjoyment of crime dramas.3
“Using Comics and tweets to raise awareness about gender biases in STEM.” Correction to Freedman, Green, Kaufman, and Flanagan (2022).3
The costs of sexualization: Examining viewers’ perceptions of sexualized profile owners in online dating.3
Perceptions of fake news, misinformation, and disinformation amid the COVID-19 pandemic: A qualitative exploration.3
The portrayal of mental illness in popular children's programs on Netflix: A content and thematic analysis.3
The impacts of cinematic portrayal of human virtues.3
Correction to “online communities and identity: Experiences of LGBTQIA+ emerging adults engaging with LGBTQIA+ online content during the COVID-19 pandemic” by Penfold et al. (2024).3
The role of envy in linking active and passive social media use to memory functioning.3
An unsafe space: Sexualization, dehumanization, and the harassment of women on social media.3
The effects of awe-inspiring nature videos on connectedness to nature and proenvironmental intentions.3
Self-compassion and women's experience of social media content portraying body positivity and appearance ideals.3
A moderated mediation model of the relationship between passive social network usages and life satisfaction.3
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