Document Type
Article
Journal/Book Title/Conference
Behaviour & Information Technology
Publisher
Taylor & Francis
Publication Date
5-25-2026
Journal Article Version
Accepted Manuscript
First Page
1
Last Page
45
Creative Commons License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 4.0 License.
Abstract
The rise of short-form content (SFC), such as reels and stories, has transformed social media use, encouraging urgency and overconsumption that can lead to harmful clickbait interactions. Despite this, few studies have examined how the unique features of SFC shape user behaviour or explored effective ways to protect users from clickbait in these formats. To address this gap, we began with an exploratory focus group study with five participants to identify properties of SFC that influence user behaviour; building on these insights, we conducted a co-design study with 20 participants, where they shared their experiences with clickbait reels through storyboards and developed contextual interventions. We then evaluated these interventions through an online survey with 164 participants. Our findings provide mixed results in evaluation of context-aware co-design and introduce context-specific strategies, such as curiosity diffusion and social credibility, for mitigating clickbait in SFC.
Recommended Citation
Shrestha, A., & Al-Ameen, M. N. (2026). A first look into contexts and risks associated with clickbait in short-form content and co-design of its countermeasures. Behaviour & Information Technology, 1–34. https://doi.org/10.1080/0144929X.2026.2675644