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The dynamics of audience applause

Overview of attention for article published in Journal of The Royal Society Interface, August 2013
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About this Attention Score

  • In the top 5% of all research outputs scored by Altmetric
  • Among the highest-scoring outputs from this source (#29 of 3,314)
  • High Attention Score compared to outputs of the same age (99th percentile)
  • High Attention Score compared to outputs of the same age and source (98th percentile)

Mentioned by

news
15 news outlets
blogs
7 blogs
twitter
266 X users
facebook
17 Facebook pages
googleplus
8 Google+ users
reddit
1 Redditor
video
1 YouTube creator

Citations

dimensions_citation
62 Dimensions

Readers on

mendeley
118 Mendeley
citeulike
3 CiteULike
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Title
The dynamics of audience applause
Published in
Journal of The Royal Society Interface, August 2013
DOI 10.1098/rsif.2013.0466
Pubmed ID
Authors

Richard P. Mann, Jolyon Faria, David J. T. Sumpter, Jens Krause

Abstract

The study of social identity and crowd psychology looks at how and why individual people change their behaviour in response to others. Within a group, a new behaviour can emerge first in a few individuals before it spreads rapidly to all other members. A number of mathematical models have been hypothesized to describe these social contagion phenomena, but these models remain largely untested against empirical data. We used Bayesian model selection to test between various hypotheses about the spread of a simple social behaviour, applause after an academic presentation. Individuals' probability of starting clapping increased in proportion to the number of other audience members already 'infected' by this social contagion, regardless of their spatial proximity. The cessation of applause is similarly socially mediated, but is to a lesser degree controlled by the reluctance of individuals to clap too many times. We also found consistent differences between individuals in their willingness to start and stop clapping. The social contagion model arising from our analysis predicts that the time the audience spends clapping can vary considerably, even in the absence of any differences in the quality of the presentations they have heard.

X Demographics

X Demographics

The data shown below were collected from the profiles of 266 X users who shared this research output. Click here to find out more about how the information was compiled.
Mendeley readers

Mendeley readers

The data shown below were compiled from readership statistics for 118 Mendeley readers of this research output. Click here to see the associated Mendeley record.

Geographical breakdown

Country Count As %
United Kingdom 5 4%
United States 4 3%
Brazil 2 2%
Italy 1 <1%
Austria 1 <1%
France 1 <1%
Germany 1 <1%
Netherlands 1 <1%
Japan 1 <1%
Other 1 <1%
Unknown 100 85%

Demographic breakdown

Readers by professional status Count As %
Student > Ph. D. Student 31 26%
Researcher 27 23%
Student > Bachelor 12 10%
Student > Master 12 10%
Professor 6 5%
Other 15 13%
Unknown 15 13%
Readers by discipline Count As %
Psychology 25 21%
Agricultural and Biological Sciences 19 16%
Physics and Astronomy 10 8%
Engineering 9 8%
Computer Science 8 7%
Other 29 25%
Unknown 18 15%
Attention Score in Context

Attention Score in Context

This research output has an Altmetric Attention Score of 412. This is our high-level measure of the quality and quantity of online attention that it has received. This Attention Score, as well as the ranking and number of research outputs shown below, was calculated when the research output was last mentioned on 30 November 2023.
All research outputs
#71,881
of 25,571,620 outputs
Outputs from Journal of The Royal Society Interface
#29
of 3,314 outputs
Outputs of similar age
#412
of 209,292 outputs
Outputs of similar age from Journal of The Royal Society Interface
#1
of 56 outputs
Altmetric has tracked 25,571,620 research outputs across all sources so far. Compared to these this one has done particularly well and is in the 99th percentile: it's in the top 5% of all research outputs ever tracked by Altmetric.
So far Altmetric has tracked 3,314 research outputs from this source. They typically receive a lot more attention than average, with a mean Attention Score of 27.8. This one has done particularly well, scoring higher than 99% of its peers.
Older research outputs will score higher simply because they've had more time to accumulate mentions. To account for age we can compare this Altmetric Attention Score to the 209,292 tracked outputs that were published within six weeks on either side of this one in any source. This one has done particularly well, scoring higher than 99% of its contemporaries.
We're also able to compare this research output to 56 others from the same source and published within six weeks on either side of this one. This one has done particularly well, scoring higher than 98% of its contemporaries.