The Power of Framing: How News Headlines Guide Search Behavior

We are conducting a user study to evaluate how different types of framing in news headlines influence user behavior. Participants will be asked to enter a search query and choose the search engine result they are most likely to visit. Each participant will complete this task five times, allowing us to examine how their previous selections influence their future search queries and choices. To ensure consistent exposure, only three or four search engine results will be displayed for each query. Participants will be randomly assigned to one of five groups: a control group and four treatment groups. The control group will view search results exactly as they are returned by Google News, without any modifications. The first treatment group will only see search results framed with a conflict perspective. The second treatment group will be presented with results framed using a game/strategy approach. The third treatment group will receive results emphasizing a human interest perspective, while the fourth treatment group will view results framed in an episodic manner. These frames will be determined by an automated text classifier at query-time. After completing the search tasks, all participants will be asked to fill out a short demographic survey. This survey will provide additional insights into their selection behaviors.