Evidence map›Paper›PMID 34525115›Full record

ArticlePloS one2021

Linguistic effects on news headline success: Evidence from thousands of online field experiments (Registered Report Protocol).

Kristina Gligorić, George Lifchits, Robert West, Ashton Anderson

Abstract read
In one paragraph

Article in PloS one, 2021. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 1 paper.

0numbers the graph read from it
0cells of the map it votes in
1citing papers in PubMed
–field-weighted citation impact
1 · What the graph read from it

What it found

Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.

The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.

2 · The registry

The trial behind it

Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.

Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.

3 · Its place in the literature

Who cites it

1 citing paper in PubMed.

  1. Article
4 · The record

Corrections and comments

5 · Who and what money

Authors and funding

4 authors.

Kristina GligorićSchool of Computer and Communication Sciences, Ecole polytechnique fédérale de Lausanne (EPFL), Lausanne, Switzerland.ORCID 0000-0001-8726-740X
George LifchitsDepartment of Computer Science, University of Toronto, Toronto, Canada.
Robert WestSchool of Computer and Communication Sciences, Ecole polytechnique fédérale de Lausanne (EPFL), Lausanne, Switzerland.
Ashton AndersonDepartment of Computer Science, University of Toronto, Toronto, Canada.

Funding

No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.

6 · The paper itself

Abstract

What makes written text appealing? In this registered report protocol, we propose to study the linguistic characteristics of news headline success using a large-scale dataset of field experiments (A/B tests) conducted on the popular website Upworthy comparing multiple headline variants for the same news articles. This unique setup allows us to control for factors that can have crucial confounding effects on headline success. Based on prior literature and a pilot partition of the data, we formulate hypotheses about the linguistic features that are associated with statistically superior headlines. We will test our hypotheses on a much larger partition of the data that will become available after the publication of this registered report protocol. Our results will contribute to resolving competing hypotheses about the linguistic features that affect the success of text and will provide avenues for research into the psychological mechanisms that are activated by those features.

Indexed as

Newspapers as TopicDatabases as TopicDictionaries as TopicInternetLinguisticsRegression Analysis

Identifiers

PMID34525115
PMCPMC8443035

What OpenQuestion holds

Textmetadata
LicenceCC BY
Read underepoch 390

Registered trials

None linked

Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.