Gone with the flow: The cognitive, motivational, and affective cost of flow experiences in media use

This dissertation presents a novel theoretical framework that recognizes the potential downstream cost of flow experiences in media use. Flow (state of full immersion in an activity) has been considered an optimal experience, with considerable effort devoted to understanding how to increase flow. However, that may not always be the case. In the context of multiple goal pursuit, flow may facilitate one goal at the cost of the others given people’s limited capacity of time and cognitive resources for everyday activities. Three studies were conducted to examine the negative impact of flow in media use. The first study presents a concept explication of flow cost with preliminary evidence from a scenario-based study (N=245). The second study (N=55) conceptualizes and systematically investigates the cognitive, motivational, affective aspects of flow cost and the way people attribute the cause of the undesirable goal outcome caused by flow. The third study (N=114) further evidences costs of flow while examining the type of cognitive processes (controlled vs. automatic) required in the immediate subsequent tasks as a moderator of flow cost. Findings from this research promise to extend media and human-computer interaction research by highlighting flow as a double-edged sword for media users’ goal performance and gratification. They will also provide practical implications for designing tools that help reduce the cost of flow in everyday life media use and improve digital wellbeing.

Name thesis:degree_name

Ph.D.

Level thesis:degree_level

Dissertation

Discipline thesis:degree_discipline

Communications and Media

Grantor

University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign

Year dc:date

2022

Author dc:creator

• Pham, Giang Vu Hang

Contributors dc:contributor

• Duff, Brittany R. L.
• Wise, Kevin
• Fisher, Jacob
• Faber, Ron

• Flow
• Flow Cost
• Digital Wellbeing
• Cognitive Capacity
• Media Psychology
• Media Technology
• Entertainment Media

Statement dc:rights

• Copyright 2022 Giang Pham

Language dc:language

en, eng

Handle dc:identifier

https://hdl.handle.net/2142/117615

OAI record oai:identifier

https://www.ideals.illinois.edu/oai-pmh?verb=GetRecord&metadataPrefix=etdms&identifier=oai%3Awww.ideals.illinois.edu%3A2142%2F117615