Content and sharing · Six online studies, including a preregistered experiment
Message Self and Social Relevance Increases Intentions to Share Content: Correlational and Causal Evidence from Six Studies
Cosme, D., Scholz, C., Chan, H.-Y., et al. (2023). Journal of Experimental Psychology: General, 152(1), 253–267.
Plain-English take
Self-relevance and social relevance were each positively associated with intentions to share. For your marketing: This is a prompt for testing whether a technical article explains why it matters to the reader and to someone they work with.
How much weight to give this
4.5/5 Strong design for its specific question
The 1–5 evidence-check score is a practical reading aid, not a formal peer review or a probability that a conclusion is true. It combines design strength (2 points), sample reporting (1), comparison/control clarity (1), and how much of the paper could be checked (1). Access affects how confidently this directory can assess a study, not the study's underlying quality. Blinding is reported separately because it is not relevant to every design.
An experiment is useful for causal evidence, but the accessible profile does not establish random assignment.
Sample reported (3,727); size alone does not guarantee a representative sample.
Experimental comparison is described; randomization or control details need checking in the paper.
An accessible full paper or manuscript is linked, making methods easier to check.
Double-blind? Blinding is not reported in the source reviewed; that does not establish whether blinding was or was not used.
Research question
What the authors investigated
Are people more willing to share messages they see as relevant to themselves or to people they know, and does the audience context matter?
Design
Six online studies with adult U.S. participants. The studies included correlational and within-/between-person analyses across messages and sharing contexts; a preregistered framing experiment manipulated self and social relevance.
Sample and setting
3,727 adult participants in the United States rated 362 messages, producing 30,954 message ratings. Topics included COVID-19, voting, general health and climate change; formats included social posts and news articles.
Reported result
What the study found
Self-relevance and social relevance were each positively associated with intentions to share. A preregistered framing experiment found that making relevance salient causally increased sharing intentions; the relative pathways differed between broadcasting broadly and sending directly to someone.
This is a paraphrase of the source. Check the original paper for definitions, estimates, statistical uncertainty and analysis details.
Scope and transfer
Limitations to keep in view
Primary outcome is stated intention to share, not observed organic sharing, qualified visits or purchases. The message topics are public-interest content rather than commercial SaaS marketing; adult U.S. online participants do not represent every audience.
Possible founder application
A prompt for testing whether a technical article explains why it matters to the reader and to someone they work with. Measure actual forwarding or downstream behavior in your own context rather than assuming stated intention predicts reach.
Evidence access
Publisher record and accepted manuscript
APA publisher record and abstract plus an accessible accepted manuscript link. Profile claims follow the reported abstract; the paper should be consulted for measures and analysis details.
If only an abstract or metadata was available, the profile is limited to claims supported there. A paper's paywall does not change its evidentiary status, but it limits what we can substantiate from accessible text.