The pandemic triggered lockdowns across the country and implemented social distancing measures into people’s lives, exacerbating the effects of loneliness. This research explores the effects of livestreams on the feeling of loneliness. It defines livestreams as ” synchronous or live video broadcast tools that users can use to engage with their online audiences in real-time,” where streamers broadcast themselves doing activities such as eating, studying, sleeping, and playing games.
Loneliness can trigger feelings of hostility, sadness, and fear, as well as cause negative emotions such as hostility and anxiety. This study examines the effect of loneliness on individuals’ psychological well-being, social well-being, and emotional well-being, as well as liverstreaming moderating these effects.
Social interactions around TV programs have grown among the population, and people now synchronously talk through messaging apps, or post on social media platforms or blogs. Livestreaming offers a sense of participation and interaction in a similar way, for streamers as well as for viewers.
In an era where individuals all over the world experience loneliness from separation from friends and family, watching a livestream can provide a way to fill that lack of social and physical interaction on top of creating a sense of community. Streamers tend to use a conversational style and address the camera directly (along with its viewers) giving the illusion of an intimate relationship, an increasing psychological sense of community and belongingness, and sometimes even a sense of relatedness.
The researcher gathered 1,606 responses collected from an online nationwide survey collected in Singapore in December 2020. Singapore is known for being a place of efficient information technology infrastructure, where residents have access to reliable internet and use social media platforms heavily. Participants were asked to rate questions on a scale of 1 to 5 (1 = “Strongly disagree” to 5 = “Strongly agree”) regarding their frequency of livestream watching, social media use, and the three dimensions of individual subjective well-being (i.e., psychological, social, and emotional),
Results showed that loneliness does have a direct negative effect on individuals’ well-being, be it psychological, social or emotional. It also showed that the frequency of livestream views has a positive effect on all three dimensions of well-being. This means that the more an individual views livestreams (heavy frequency, compared to light viewers) the less effects of loneliness will impact the individuals’ psychological, social and emotional well-being. Watching livestreams, therefore, does mitigate the negative effects of loneliness.
To read more: https://doi.org/10.1080/08838151.2021.1994970
