VIEWING, EMOTION, AND NARRATIVE COMPREHENSION OF CHINESE FAMILY MICRO-DRAMAS IN A PLATFORMIZED MEDIA ENVIRONMENT
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.35631/IJLGC.1143039Keywords:
Emotion, Family, Microdramas, Platformization, ReceptionAbstract
In recent years, micro-dramas have become one of the fastest growing and most widely disseminated forms of online audiovisual content in China. Among them, family-themed micro-dramas have shown particular prominence. This study examines how audiences rapidly comprehend and emotionally engage with family micro-dramas. It focuses on their circulation in short-duration and rapid, platform-based media environments. Drawing on reception aesthetics, particularly the concept of the “horizon of expectation,” this study adopts qualitative textual analysis, integrating narrative and thematic approaches. Three highly popular Chinese family micro-dramas released between 2024 and 2025 are selected as case studies. These cases are chosen for their high viewership, strong audience engagement, and representation of contemporary family narratives. The analysis focuses on narrative structure, character relationships, emotional expression, and reception-oriented narrative strategies. The findings indicate that the effectiveness of family micro-dramas depends less on narrative complexity or formal innovation than on their alignment with audiences’ everyday family experiences. Familiar family relationships function as low-threshold narrative frameworks, enabling viewers to quickly identify character roles, conflict types, and emotional positions, thereby reducing cognitive effort. At the same time, these dramas employ emotional compression, concentrating conflicts so that narrative comprehension and emotional response occur simultaneously. This study argues that family micro-dramas represent a form of reception-driven narration adapted to platform-based viewing conditions. By combining accessible narrative structures with emotionally concentrated storytelling, they facilitate rapid meaning-making and audience engagement. These findings contribute to understanding narrative practices in platform-based media and extend the application of reception aesthetics to contemporary short-form audiovisual content.
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