From Awkward to Viral: Why Consumers Can't Stop Sharing Cringe Content Online

Journal of Marketing Research Scholarly Insights are produced in partnership with the AMA Doctoral Students SIG – a shared interest network for Marketing PhD students across the world.

Few things on social media are as uncomfortable, as widely disliked, and yet as endlessly shareable as cringe content. Think about the last time you stumbled on a post so awkward that you scrolled past only to scroll back again. Slightly cringing, you open the comment section, where the comments read like “Why is common sense so uncommon?”, “My last two brain cells died watching this”, or “Can someone please sanitize my eyes?”

As you read through comments, you can’t help but wonder: How did this cringe post end up on my feed? Then your eyes land on metrics. Despite the collective discomfort, the post has been shared far more than it has been liked, making it massively viral. This is precisely is how cringeworthy content works: it can be hated and mocked, but it is rarely ignored, and almost never left unshared.

Why is Cringe Content so Shareable?

What makes cringeworthy content so hard to look away from and so hard not to share? In their Journal of Marketing Research article, “That’s So Cringeworthy! Understanding What Cringe Is and Why We Want to Share It,” researchers Brianna Escoe, Nathanael S. Martin, and Anthony Salerno take this everyday digital experience seriously by treating cringe as more than just a casual internet reaction. The authors conceptualize cringe as “a distinct form of vicarious embarrassment experienced by an observer when an actor makes an awkward attempt to create a positive impression in a way that the observer finds socially inexcusable.” One example discussed in the article is Peloton’s controversial “A Gift That Gives Back” campaign, in which a husband gifts his wife a Peloton bike for Christmas. Many consumers found the ad insensitive and sexist, triggering widespread reactions of cringe.

In essence, cringe is a subtle emotion marked by disbelief, the sense that “the actor should have known better.” It arises when a social transgression is perceived as inexcusable from the viewer’s perspective. Paradoxically, however, such content is often widely shared.

The authors show that people are motivated to share cringeworthy content because doing so offers a form of self-enhancement: sharing allows observers to engage in favorable downward social comparison, signaling their own social awareness and competence. While this dynamic can propel content to virality, it comes at a cost. The article ultimately serves as a cautionary note for marketers, reminding them that virality alone is not enough, and that what consumers say while sharing a brand’s content can matter just as much as how far it spreads.

Sharing allows observers to engage in favorable downward social comparison, signaling their own social awareness and competence…[But] virality alone is not enough: what consumers say while sharing a brand’s content can matter just as much as how far it spreads.

To explore these ideas further, I had the privilege to speak directly with the authors. Below, they share deeper insights into their research and the thinking behind their work.

Q: Cringe is widely used in popular culture but has received little formal academic attention. What motivated you to treat cringe as a distinct emotional construct worthy of systematic study? Were there particular real-world incidents that convinced you that cringe could not be fully reduced to existing constructs, such as vicarious or empathetic embarrassment?

A: Our interest in cringe stemmed from Pepsi’s viral 2017 Live for Now ad. At the time, Pepsi’s ad generated a ton of engagement on social media that was unequivocally negative, which we found particularly compelling. To determine what encapsulates the cringe experience, we first turned to related emotions. In an early exploratory study, we found that the emotions most commonly associated with cringe were embarrassment (with the vast majority of participants reporting it as the closest emotional experience to cringe), followed by anger and disgust. As a result, we considered each of these emotional experiences when deciding what exactly cringe is and whether it warrants its own study.

It quickly became clear that anger and disgust did not adequately capture the cringe experience. Consider a brand attempting to relate to younger consumers on social media by using slang and emojis in its advertising. This type of content often elicits a cringe, but it typically does not provoke anger or disgust. Thus, while some cringe experiences may involve secondary emotions like anger or disgust, these emotions could not explain all the instances of cringe we observed online, or why people were motivated to share them.

Next, we considered embarrassment, which fits much more closely with the experience of cringe—both emotions elicit a sense of social awkwardness or discomfort that is key for the experience of embarrassment. Despite the similarity, however, existing theories of embarrassment could not explain why people so readily share cringe experiences with others. Traditional embarrassment, for example, is elicited by one’s own actions and therefore cannot account for the virality of Pepsi’s Live for Now ad or similar online content. When we examined the literature on vicarious embarrassment, we found that most work in psychology and neuroscience characterizes it as an empathetic response in which observers feel embarrassment alongside the person who committed the social faux pas. This characterization differed from what we observed in cringe situations. In these cases, observers held a very negative view of the cringe-inducing actor (e.g., a person or a brand), which is inconsistent with the empathetic account found in the literature. Moreover, observers frequently shared the actor’s embarrassing behavior with others, which is not what one would expect if they were embarrassed by the actor and felt empathetic towards them.

Therefore, we found cringe to be a common emotional experience that had important downstream consequences (i.e., word-of-mouth) that could not be explained by our current understanding of embarrassment, anger, or disgust. So, we felt it warranted systematic study as a distinct emotion.

Q: In your paper, you introduce excusability as the key appraisal distinguishing cringe from empathetic embarrassment. How did you arrive at excusability as the central appraisal dimension?

A: Figuring out the right appraisal took a lot of thought and trial and error. Early on, we thought the key appraisal might be awareness or relatability. Our thinking was that when an observer believes the actor is aware they’ve made a social transgression—or when the situation feels relatable—the observer would feel empathetic embarrassment rather than cringe.

We still think these ideas play a role in excusability but on their own are insufficient to explain why people feel cringe versus empathetic embarrassment in every situation. This became clear as we tested each potential appraisal against examples of cringe we had seen online or experienced ourselves. Anytime we thought we might have a good idea of what the appraisal might be, we started running it through examples of cringe we had seen online or in our own experience to see if we could find instances where that appraisal dimension could not distinguish between the two related emotions. For example, there are situations in which the actor is completely unaware of the faux pas, yet the observer still feels empathetic embarrassment. Imagine watching a couple on a date and noticing that one person unknowingly has bits of food stuck in their teeth. This would likely elicit empathetic embarrassment even though the actor is unaware of the social faux pas. Relatability had similar issues. We didn’t want to argue that simply being similar to someone—same age, same life stage, similar experiences—automatically leads to empathetic embarrassment. Just because we can relate to someone doesn’t mean we won’t still cringe at their behavior.

After many iterations of this exercise, we landed on excusability. We determined that if an observer can excuse the actor’s behavior, they will experience empathetic embarrassment because they can understand how the inappropriate behavior occurred. If the observer cannot excuse the behavior, they cringe and are left wondering, “What in the world was that person thinking?”

Q: Given that excusability is inherently subjective and different observers may evaluate the same behavior differently, how can marketers account for such subjectivity in the interpretation of excusability?

A: The subjective nature of excusability is likely a prominent driver for when and why we see brands accidentally engaging in cringeworthy behavior. It is hard to predict what exactly consumers will find cringeworthy. To address this, brands can adopt several practices:

First, there needs to be a lot of different voices in the room when decisions are being made. What might seem like a funny joke or a clever way to connect with younger consumers to one person may feel completely inexcusable to someone else. This risk can be mitigated by incorporating people with diverse backgrounds and perspectives to catch these issues before a campaign goes live.

Also, marketers need to truly know their consumers inside and out. This means understanding their culture and which norms really matter to them. This is also where social listening becomes especially important. Younger generations often interact online in very different ways, and if marketers don’t understand these norms, the messaging they put out is likely to come across as cringeworthy. For example, imagine a brand trying to connect with teenagers by using slang like “6-7” in an ad. Without a deep understanding of how that language is actually used, teenagers may find this type of persuasive attempt awkward.

Lastly, brands must test their messaging and ads. Getting consumers’ opinions on an ad before an entire campaign launches can help avoid a cringeworthy disaster.

Q: Do people always recognize cringe in the moment, or can it also emerge retrospectively after observing how others discuss, mock, or share the same content? More broadly, do consumers sometimes rely on collective discourse to identify something as cringeworthy?

A: We have found that consumers often have immediate, strong reactions to cringeworthy content. That said, there are certainly instances where one may retrospectively find something cringeworthy. In some follow-up work, we look at personal cringe—cringe that stems from our own behavior. This type of cringe can be recognized immediately but is often recognized retrospectively. For example, consumers often talk about experiences from college or high school in which they did something they thought was cool at the time but now find cringeworthy.

Along similar lines, consumers may even be motivated to find the cringe in something that didn’t initially feel cringeworthy. Because cringe is shared as a form of social capital, it can be embarrassing not to see the cringe in something that everyone else is calling cringeworthy. In these cases, we would expect a consumer to respond with cringe retrospectively.

Finally, consumers sometimes rely on collective discourse, especially when unsure how to respond. There are plenty of situations where it’s unclear whether a behavior, ad, social media post, etc., is cringeworthy. When that happens, people often look to others to see how they’re reacting. This is especially likely when someone feels less confident in their own judgment, like when joining a new group or being around people they don’t know well. In those moments, looking to others helps people figure out what the social norms are and how they’re “supposed” to respond.

Q: As cringeworthy content becomes increasingly prevalent on social media, do you think repeated exposure weakens the motivational power to share cringe, or does it instead raise the threshold for what counts as cringeworthy? 

A: Yes and no. I do think that, more recently, consumers have become more aware of the culture of sharing cringe online, and as a result, they’re sometimes more hesitant to participate. In some situations, people may even be motivated to excuse cringeworthy behavior because they feel bad about how much backlash someone is receiving online. In other words, there may be a point where people feel like they are just “piling on” to the cringe-inducing party in a way that feels mean-spirited rather than signaling their own social savviness. There’s also a sense of fatigue—constantly pointing out how people or brands are messing up can get exhausting. That said, we still see a lot of sharing of politically driven cringe. People frequently share what they see as inappropriate behavior from the other side of the political spectrum. In fact, I’d argue that the bar for what counts as cringeworthy is much lower when the person or group belongs to the opposing political party.

There’s one more idea that really gets at the heart of your question: do we adapt to cringeworthy behavior? In other words, if cringeworthy behavior becomes constant, do we experience it less strongly—and do we share it less because it’s no longer such a powerful social signal? I think this does happen. Cringe is a social emotion that is triggered by a violation of social norms. As culture changes—and as the internet and social media continue to evolve—those norms change too. This is especially true at the individual level. Cringe, by definition, involves something unexpected. If the same norm is repeatedly violated, the norm itself may shift. Similarly, if a particular person repeatedly violates social norms, we start to expect that behavior from them, and it becomes less cringeworthy over time.

Q: Having studied and theorized the emotion of cringe in depth, how do you now view embarrassment and cringe differently? Has this research altered how you personally interpret or respond to awkward social situations or social media content?

A: I have found that I am more aware of cringeworthy content now. As an author team, we have all spent considerable amounts of time online and on social media looking for cringeworthy examples, and I honestly think my brain is now trained to spot it. I often catch myself thinking through how other observers might react to a brand’s ad or an influencer’s post, which has made me a harsh critic. 

I’ve also become more cognizant of the downstream consequences of both cringe and empathetic embarrassment. I can see in real time how people tend to forgive empathetic embarrassment but are much more likely to shame and share cringe. It really highlights how functional embarrassment can be. We all make social mistakes, but when we try to ignore them or play them off, people may end up cringing at us. On the other hand, when we acknowledge a mistake, laugh at ourselves, or openly show embarrassment, others are much more likely to excuse the faux pas. Because of this, I think I’ve changed how I respond to my own awkward moments. I’m now more likely to explain or laugh off my own social missteps rather than ignore them and hope no one notices.

Taken together, the research article and the author’s insights reveal that cringe is not just an uncomfortable online reaction but also a socially meaningful signal shaped by excusability, collective judgment, and social norms. It travels far because it invites judgment, comparison, and conversation. But as the research article illustrates, virality driven by discomfort is a double-edged sword. For brands and creators alike, the real question is not whether cringe content will be shared, but whether the story that sharing tells is one they can afford. For consumers, the urge to share cringe content presents an opportunity to reflect not just on why the post went viral but also on what sharing it reveals about their own social judgments and identities.

Source: Brianna Escoe, Nathanael S. Martin, and Anthony Salerno (2025), “That’s So Cringeworthy! Understanding What Cringe Is and Why We Want to Share It,” Journal of Marketing Research, 62 (4), 664–83. doi:10.1177/00222437241305104

Go to the Journal of Marketing Research