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They kill time
Taking quizzes has been an online time-killer for years. When you are bored and have nothing to do but check your live feed from a social media website and find that your friend took a quiz, you get curious and click on it.
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They tell you about yourself
The idea behind the majority of the quizzes is to test yourself or to identify something you don’t know about yourself. Pottermore had great success because of the quizzes that help identify which Hogwarts house a person fits in.
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It helps you take pride
Some quizzes gain popularity because they help you take pride in something; or rather it gives you a reason to boast about how this quiz ended up giving you the result you predicted.
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They help people connect with one another
People who find that they have obtained similar results to their close friends feel better about their friendships in a way that makes them connect and bond even more. Those who find that they have obtained similar results to new friends tend to build a better friendship with each other.
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They give you a sense of hope
One quiz that has been particularly famous in the past couple of years is: ‘which country should you live in’. It has gained enough popularity that various websites and quiz-makers have it on their websites. It gives you a sense that you belong somewhere. (See Video Summary: Overcoming Hopelessness by Nick Vujicic l TEDx Novi Sad)
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Online quizzes are very easy
The ease of the online quizzes is one of the reasons why they are so famous. People like easy things, especially ones where they don’t have to read a lot and this is exactly what online quizzes have in common. Short choices and images are the foundations of online quizzes.
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People share them a lot
It’s the word-of-mouth kind of advertising when you see that one of your friends has taken a quiz and you immediately get the urge to do it out of curiosity. (See Why is classical advertising not effective online?)
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They help you know about others
Some people take quizzes to know more about other people around them. It’s a way of improving weak relationships through finding similarities. However, this is mostly done subconsciously.
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They appeal to most people
Whether it’s a topic that addresses your personality or picks a character of a movie that matches your personality or even a guessing game, quizzes tend to have a special effect that appeals to the curious eye.
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They help show off
Some people like to take quizzes to share their results in order to feel good about themselves through what others say. They share them mostly to see what other people have to say about the results that they received.