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Social TV provides a mediated TV viewing experience incorporating watching TV and staying connected with online friends at the same time, which is “a rewarding social experience” due to the enhanced social interaction (Cohen & Lancaster, 2014, p. 512). Prior studies mostly examined social TV by treating it as a co-viewing practice of TV programming and social media information, during which a second screen like a smartphone, a tablet or a laptop computer is involved (Cohen & Lancaster, 2014; Shin, 2009; Shin et al., 2013). In this scenario, viewers are multitasking on TV screen and ancillary devices. Few studies, however, had examined the phenomenon by studying how viewers interact with TV content and friends on the same TV screen.
To attract social media users, TV manufacturers work hard to make their products stay relevant in the living room as an entertainment and information center (Shin et al., 2013). This requires their TV sets to be growingly connected with the Internet and integrated with Web 2.0 features, such as sharing comments on the programming and shopping for products appearing in TV shows. Smart TV represents the trend of technological convergence that combines computers, set-top boxes and TV sets to bring an interactive viewing experience to viewers. Albeit researchers recorded a slight drop of TV watching among young people, the Internet has been found enhancing TV viewing due to the interactivity functions on smart TV (MarketingChart, 2014). Thus, this is a critical time to study viewers’ perception toward interactivity functions on smart TV.