Hate Watching: Motives for Consumption of Celebrity Content by Anti-fans in the Social Media

This paper is devoted to the study of the phenomenon of hate watching, which is increasingly widespread nowadays, but is mainly studied in the context of watching television shows. The study aims at examining this phenomenon as consumption by anti-fans of celebrity content in the social media space. Hate watching as a phenomenon is considered relatively new in the academic field, due to which scholars have not reached a unified conclusion about the motivations behind this practice. Moreover, there is virtually no research devoted to this phenomenon in the context of social media. The aim of the study is to determine the motives of anti-fans' consumption of celebrity content in the social media space. The empirical part of the research is conducted using an exploratory design, which includes the sequential realisation of qualitative and quantitative stage. At the first stage, an in-depth interview is realised in order to obtain data on the personal experience of the individual. In the second stage, a survey is implemented to test the highlighted motives on a larger sample. The results of the work will be the motives of anti-fans' consumption of the content of celebrities in the social media space, as well as recommendations for their use.