1. #Watercooler: An Examination of the Active Audience
And Television Program Viewing
Ingrid Napoletano
University of Hartford
Abstract
This literature review examines the ‘second screen’ phenomena and its impact on the active audience and television program content. This analysis includes
a review of international studies examining the use of personal computing devices to communicate via Twitter while viewing television programs. This
research examines the content of the Twitter conversations during the airing of television programs, the relationships developed among the conversation
participants, and the influence these conversations have on the participants and the television programs’ content.
The second screen phenomenon introduces a new platform for the social audience. This research is socially significant because the findings detail how the
interactions of the viewing audience, including the level and content of interactions online, may influence the television programs’ successes or failures. The
second screen offers a new manner in which to examine audience participation in television viewing. The results of the studies in this literature review
suggest that understanding the relationships developed by the members of the active audience and the topics of interest can help guide television program
producers to increase the odds of their programs’ success.
The research by Quintas-Froufe & Gonzalez-Neira (2014) found a positive relationship between the level of Twitter activity between the active audience and
talent show judges and host. Another study by Giglietto & Selva (2014) research found that Twitter was most often used to discuss personal opinions during
talk shows and political opinions during political talk shows. Cameron & Geidner (2014)’s research found a positive correlation between the Twitter feed
comments and audience members conforming to the majority opinion regarding singers in a talent contest and politicians during a political debate. The
research by Buschow, Schneider, and Ueberheide (2014) found that different television programs produce different types of activities and for creation of
specific online communities. One possible limitation of the research reviewed is that it limited its scope to discussions occurring during televisions that are
specific to the television program being viewed. The audience members could be multi-tasking and discussing the television program part of the time and
discussing other topics and performing other tasks during the viewing of the television program too. It might be interesting to understand what the
audiences are doing online during their television viewing.
Keywords: active audience, social audience, second screen

2. We do not interpret messages in a vacuum. Audience members
engage with media socially. The conversation avenue has expanded
beyond the office watercooler to whoever wants to participate in the
discussion with the introduction of social media tools like Facebook
and Twitter. Audience members may be physically alone while
viewing a television program but can participate in a real-time
discussion about the television program. This concept is referred as
the second screen phenomena or social TV (Croteau & Hoynes, 2014)

3. Nielson reports that in
2013 43% of smart device
owners reported second
screen use while viewing
tv

4. Quintas-Froufe & Gonzalez-Neira (2014) study
analyzed the Twitter comment feed during
episodes of different kinds of talent shows while
they aired in Spain in 2013. The results of this
study found no direct correlation between the
level of activity on Twitter and the television
program’s success.
34% of Tweets during Prime Time in Spain are about TV

5. Giglietto & Selva (2014) performed a content
analysis of peak Twitter activity between
August 2012 and June 2013 in Italy. They
used specific hashtags to perform searches
and to categorize the data. They attempted
to tie the data identified during the peak
Twitter use to the scene of the television
program that correlated to this peak.
The results showed there was a greater
peak of opinion comments regarding
politics during interviews and group
discussions scenes in these political
television programs but there was not
enough data to make a direct
correlation.
Giglietto & Selva (2014) believe that their
research data does support the presence of a
relationship between the content of Twitter
comments and the subgenre of the political
television program’s scene.

6. Buschow, Schneider, & Ueberheide (2014) performed
a quantitative content analysis of Twitter comments
that occurred during television programs aired
between January and April 2012 in Germany. They
categorized the content into four main categories .
They used hashtags to identify relevant data. They
were interested in understanding what
communication activities Twitter users engaged in
while watching TV, if the communication activities
were relevant, and if different television programs
influence the communication activities of Twitter
users.
24% of the Tweets were evaluating the show or the actors.
54% of the tweets were connecting with the community.
4% of the tweets explicitly referenced an emotion.
5% that contained personal or societal abstraction.
The results show that the communication activities performed by
Twitter users while watching television are most frequently unrelated to
the television content. When the content is related to the television
content, it tends to vary depending on the specific television program
with reality television programs generating the most content.

7. Cameron & Geidner (2014) performed quantitative experiments in the United states in 2013 to
examined if public opinion displayed on screen produced conformity during singing contents and
political speeches . They performed two experiments to evaluate if individuals exposed to a Twitter
feed will conform to the majority opinion when judging the quality and success of the singers or
politician.
Study participants were asked one
question on their opinion of the
singer and one question on the
likelihood of the singer winning
American Idol.
Study participants were asked their
opinion regarding the performance of
the speaker. Then, they were asked two
questions regarding the participant’s
perceived success of the speaker. One
question was to determine if they
believed the speaker could ‘convince
people to support their argument’ and
one question was to determine if the
speaker convinced them to support the
speaker’s argument (Cameron &
Giedner, 2014, p.410).
The results of the American Idol study
suggest that participants were
influenced by the twitter messages
and conformed to the majority
opinion.
The results of conformity study suggest that participants
were influenced by the twitter messages and conformed to
the majority opinion regarding the quality of the
politician’s speech and whether the participants believed
the politician’s speech could convince others to support
their argument.
The final question was split. The results showed that
positive condition associated with the Violence Against
Women Act did find a conformity effect whereas it was not
present with the topic opposing additional gun
regulations. The authors suggest that a topic like gun
control may be too engrained to be influenced by CRM.

8. The studies did not show any evidence of the third active audience activity
discussed by Croteau & Hoynes (2014), collective action. This is likely due to
the types of television programs selected for examination in these studies.
These studies can provide insight on how the second screen plays an
important role in bringing the social audience together while watching
television.
In addition to understanding this information from the television
producer’s perspective, it is also interesting insight as to what is important
to society. The three studies done in European countries suggest that
there is a lot of interest discussing politics.
The studies by Quantas-Froufe & Gonzalez-Neira (2014) and Cameron &
Geidner (2014) align with one of the activities of the active audiences
discussed by Croteau & Hoynes (2014), the individual’s interpretation of
media products.
Giglietto & Selva (2014) and Buschow, Schneider, & Ueberheide’s (2014)
research align with another audience activity of the active audience
discussed by Croteau and Hoynes (2014), the social context of
interpretation.
Although all of the studies in this literature review could be associated to a
third active audience activity discussed by Croteau & Hoynes (2014),
audiences as media producers, Cameron & Geidner’s (2014) research took it
a step further to show how much influence audience as media producers
can have over professionally produced media.
It appears the members of the audience are impacted by what their peers
are saying. It also appears that certain television programs, like talent
shows, illicit a flurry of activity about the show and its participants,
whereas with political talk shows, interviews and group discussions spur
the most conversations as people scramble to offer their opinions on the
guests and the subject matter.