A correlational study of animation narrative style preferences, viewing behavior, and audience experience

The association between animation narrative styles and the audience’s psychological experience is a critical question in media psychology. Grounded in Uses and Gratifications (U&G), this cross-sectional correlational study examines how narrative preferences are associated with viewing experience. Through a survey of 615 animation viewers, we evaluated how complex/non-linear, coherent/linear, and visual/expressive preferences correlate with cognitive engagement and flow experience. K-Means cluster analysis was utilized for audience segmentation. Two significant “preference-experience” pathways emerged: a positive correlation between a preference for complexity and cognitive engagement, and a strong correlation between a preference for coherence and flow experience. Furthermore, viewers were clustered into Analytical Viewers, Casual Plot-Followers, and Indifferent Viewers. Cognitive engagement exhibited a statistical indirect association between complexity preference and flow experience. These findings supply empirical evidence for understanding audience selection behaviors and offer evidence-bounded implications for content creation and platform recommendation strategies, highlighting an eudaimonic and a hedonic gratification path.