‘A Teaspoon of Authenticity’: Exploring How Young Adults BeReal on Social Media

Title of the Paper

‘A Teaspoon of Authenticity’: Exploring How Young Adults BeReal on Social Media

Bibliographic Information

• Research Domain: Authenticity design in social media and behavioral analysis of young users
• Keywords: Social media, feature design, young users, authenticity, self-presentation, BeReal

Research Background and Questions

• Problem or Challenge: Can social media platforms achieve authenticity through their feature design, and how should they be designed to support users in achieving authenticity?
• Significance: As young people increasingly rely on social media and demand authenticity, understanding how design influences authenticity is crucial for research on technology design and user behavior, offering insights for future platform development.
• Research Motivation and Related Work:
  • Western society encourages the pursuit of authenticity, and the concept of authenticity is often used as a marketing tool by major social media platforms.
  • Existing research primarily focuses on the relationship between authenticity and identity, mental health, and social support, with limited exploration of how feature design supports authenticity.
  • BeReal attempts to achieve authenticity through features like disabling photo editing and restricting posting times, but its actual effectiveness remains unclear.

Solution

• Proposed Method/Solution:
  • The authors analyze how BeReal’s features influence users’ perceptions of authenticity through a complete walkthrough of the platform’s operational process and semi-structured interviews with 31 young users.
• Innovative Aspects:
  • Refining the concept of authenticity into two definitions—extemporaneous interaction and comprehensive self-presentation—and analyzing whether BeReal’s feature design supports these perceptions.
  • Using Davis’s functionality framework to reveal how the platform achieves different forms of authenticity through conditions or constraints.
• Implementation Steps:
  1. Feature Analysis: Conduct an operational analysis of BeReal to clarify its feature design and intentions.
  2. User Behavior Analysis: Interview target users (college students and young adults) to explore their real-life experiences and perceptions of authenticity.
  3. Data Integration and Coding: Combine interview findings with feature analysis results, coding the data to uncover connections between design and user behavior.

Research Findings

• Specific Findings:
  • BeReal’s core features (e.g., daily push notifications, dual-camera collage photos, indicators for delays and retakes, and content visibility limited to users) provide a distinct interaction experience compared to traditional social media.
  • Users perceive authenticity in two main ways:
    1. Extemporaneous interaction: Emphasizing spontaneous displays of current states rather than deliberate design.
    2. Comprehensive self-presentation: Encompassing various aspects of daily life and both positive and negative emotions.
  • BeReal’s feature design primarily supports the former—spontaneous displays—rather than aiding users in comprehensive self-presentation.
• Advantages Over Existing Solutions:
  • Offers an image-sharing experience without filters or editing, making social interactions simpler and lighter.
  • Creates a posting design oriented toward "momentary" and "temporary" records, reducing the pressure of long-term image curation and editing seen on traditional social media.
• Experimental and Evaluation Results:
  • BeReal users reported feeling more relaxed when posting due to the platform’s ephemeral content and editing-free conditions.
  • However, users still faced pressure or actively avoided using the platform when sharing negative emotions or mundane moments.
• Limitations and Future Directions:
  • The study is limited to American college students, failing to reflect user behaviors across different cultural or racial backgrounds.
  • Specific interaction patterns among friends and their impact on authenticity were not deeply explored.
  • With BeReal’s user growth slowing, future research could examine how authenticity design influences long-term user retention.

Conclusion and Design Recommendations

1. Clearly Define Authenticity Goals and Meaning: Platform design should distinguish between different aspects of authenticity (e.g., extemporaneous vs. comprehensive presentation) and set clear design objectives.
2. Combine Content Ephemerality with Personal Persistence: Adopting the concept of "ephemerality for them, persistence for me" can help users relax in social interactions while preserving personal records.
3. Optimize Camera Interface Design: Make the front-facing camera view more intuitive, enabling users to make subtle adjustments during shooting.
4. Support User Choice Rather Than Coercion: Avoid making users feel judged when their behavior deviates from platform suggestions (e.g., delayed posts or not showing their face), while respecting their freedom in self-presentation.