Case Study: This Is Us achieves 29% higher audience emotional engagement and deeper insights with Canvs

How to Determine a Show's Overall Success with Emotion Measurement

This Is Us, NBC’s hit primetime drama, needed to quantify the emotional reactions that were driving its Season 1 success. NBC turned to Canvs to quickly and accurately analyze audience emotions across social platforms (Twitter, Facebook, YouTube, Instagram) using Canvs’ emotion-measurement platform and Compare feature.

Canvs integrated social data, measured Reaction Volume, Reaction Rate and core emotions around episodes and the finale, and found nearly 5% of the audience said This Is Us made them “Cry” (6× the typical primetime series) and an overall Reaction Rate 29% above the primetime average. Canvs also identified Jack Pearson as the top driver (4.1% of season reactions, 14.4% in the finale) and showed the finale generated 105,000 Tweets—the most‑Tweeted non‑sports TV program that night—with over 35% of posts expressing emotion (Love was top), demonstrating clear, measurable audience impact.

This Is Us

Benoit Landry

Senior Director, Program Research