An Experimental Analysis of the effects of Memes and Emotion Regulation Processes
Anwen Thomas
Strategic Communication & Media 2022
Introduction

Results

Discussion

Emotion regulation is defined as the process by which people modify the duration,
intensity, or type of emotions they experience (Gross, 1998). Emotion regulation is
fundamental to human behavior; individuals commonly distract themselves, hide
behaviors related to emotion, and reassess situations to modify their emotional
experiences. The majority of research in this area focuses on the ways in which emotion
regulation processes are carried out on an intrapersonal level, while less research explores
how digital and social technologies may influence emotion regulation processes.
An internet meme is used to represent concepts or ideas that are spread virally on the
internet. These memes often couple still or video images with text in effort to convey a
complex idea (e.g., Diaz, 2013; Shifman, 2014). Memes are a popular form of
communication messages in online environments shape and reflect social and cultural
attitudes (Shifman, 2014).
Recent research indicates the profound effects that the internet and digital technologies
have on emotion regulation processes (e.g., Wadley et al., 2020). Within that line of
research, experimental evidence suggests that viewing internet memes can regulate
emotion in clinically depressed populations (Akram et al., 2020). However, it remains
unknown whether or not these effects extend to the general population, and whether or
not these effects extend to emotions other than depression. As such, the present study
employs an experimental design to understand if memes regulate emotion, specifically
anxiety. The following hypothesis guides this study.
H1: Anxious individuals will experience greater emotion regulation effects than nonanxious individuals when viewing memes related to anxiety, compared to other types of
memes (i.e., humorous, control).

To analyze the data specific to this study, we conducted a univariate ANOVA in which emotion and meme type were
added as fixed factors and anxiety was added as the dependent variable. Because the hypothesis predicted a specific
relationship, we ran a Bonferroni post-hoc test to assess where mean differences existed, if any were identified.
Results of this analysis revealed a non-additive effect that approached significance (F = 2.11, p = .13), while the
individual conditions alone did not demonstrate an effect with anxiety (emotion condition: F = 0.04, p = .85, meme
condition F = 0.26, p = .71). Figure X plots the means based on conditions. As evidenced in this chart, those who
responded to the anxiety prompt experienced the highest levels of anxiety when viewing humorous memes.
Furthermore, those who responded to the anxiety prompt experienced the lowest level of anxiety when responding to
a control prompt. H1 was not supported.

We did not find evidence to support H1, which stated that those who responded to an
anxious prompt would experience greater emotion regulation effects than non-anxious
individuals when viewing memes related to anxiety, compared to other types of memes
(i.e., humorous, control). Interestingly, those who responded to the control prompt who
viewed control memes experienced the lowest levels of anxiety compared to other groups.
Our results also indicate no differences in anxiety levels between anxiety and control
emotion conditions when viewing anxiety or humorous memes. Overall, it appears that
results of the present study suggest that when feeling anxious, distraction might be the
most effective at downregulating anxiety, as evidenced by our anxiety emotion condition
reporting the lowest levels of anxiety compared to other groups.
Gross (1998) argues that there exist five emotion strategies individuals employ to modify
their emotional experiences (i.e., situation selection, situation modification, attentional
deployment, cognitive reappraisal, response modulation). The results of the previous study
call attention to the attentional deployment strategy. Specifically, it may be the case that
when feeling anxious, it may be beneficial to view meme content that lacks in emotion.
Such a possibility is evidenced by our finding that those in the anxiety emotion condition
who viewed control memes experienced the least anxiety compared to other groups.
Of course, it is possible that our study design prevented us for detecting an effect
supporting H1. It is possible that we did not find support for H1 because our experimental
induction for emotion type (i.e., anxiety, control) was ineffective at producing the desired
emotion in participants. Previous research has suggested that the process of writing about
emotional experiences (as participants did in this study) may actually be a method of
emotion regulation (e.g., Pennebaker, Zach, & Rimé, 2001). Another possible explanation
may be the small sample size of this study.

Key Terms
Emotions: The reactions that we have to ongoing relationships with our environment
(Lazarus, 2000).
Emotion regulation: The process by which we change “the emotions we have, when we
have them, and how we experience and express them” (Gross, 1998).

Materials and Methods
This study employed a 2 (emotion type: anxiety, no emotion) x 3 (meme type: anxiety,
humor, control) between-groups experimental design. A sample of 108 people were
recruited from Amazon Mechanical Turk (M-Turk) to participate in this study in August
2021.
Upon agreeing to participate, participants were randomly assigned to emotion condition.
The anxiety condition had participants recall and write about a time in their lives in
which they felt particularly anxious. The no emotion condition has participants recall
and write about a time they did an everyday, mundane task. After this task, participants
were assigned to meme condition. Regardless of condition, all participants saw a total of
five memes. The nature of these memes depended on condition assignment.
Figure 1. Example of memes used in study (See second document for examples)
After viewing their condition memes, participants then went on to report their anxiety
levels using the State Trait Anxiety Inventory-T Form, which uses 20 items to capture
the construct of anxiety.

References
Akram, U., Drabble, J., Cau, G., Hershaw, F., Rajenthran, A., Lowe, M., ... & Ellis, J. G.
(2020). Exploratory study on the role of emotion regulation in perceived valence,
humour, and beneficial use of depressive internet memes in depression. Nature, 10(1), 18.
Díaz, C. M. (2013). Defining and characterizing the concept of Internet Meme. CES
Psicología, 6(2), 82-104.
Gross, J. J. (1998). The emerging field of emotion regulation: An integrative review.
Review of General Psychology, 2(3), 271-299.
Shifman, L. (2014). Memes in Digital Culture. Cambridge, MA: MIT press.
Wadley, G., Smith, W., Koval, P., & Gross, J. J. (2020). Digital Emotion Regulation.
Current Directions in Psychological Science, 29(4), 412-418.

Acknowledgments
I would like to thank Slippery Rock University and the office of Academic Affairs and Integrated Learning
for funding this project through a SCORE grant, and Dr. Emily Dolan for serving as my faculty advisor.