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Study: For Super Bowl 2025, Chiefs Fatigue - Not Taylor Swift - Dominates Social Media Chatter

The Joetta Di Bella and Fred C. Sautter III Center for Strategic Communication in the School of Communication and Media at Montclair State University collected social media data ahead of the big game

Montclair, NJ (02/06/2025) — Outside of loyal Kansas City Chiefs and Taylor Swift fans, a new study released by Montclair State University suggests football and pop music followers are growing tired of the team's run at a historic Super Bowl "three-peat" and the ubiquity of the world's biggest pop star on the NFL stage.

A team of faculty from the Joetta Di Bella and Fred C. Sautter III Center for Strategic Communication in the School of Communication and Media at Montclair State University collected data from 92,000 unique social media users starting the day after the Chiefs and Philadelphia Eagles advanced to Super Bowl LIX after winning their respective conference championship games. Using keyword combinations such as "Chiefs" AND "Super Bowl," "Taylor Swift" AND "Super Bowl" and "Swift" AND "Super Bowl," more than 821,000 posts from January 27 to February 2 were examined. The research team of Dr. Jin-A Choi, Dr. Bond Benton, Dr. Yi Luo and Ines Hwang found the following:

  • There was 45% more negative sentiment than positive sentiment about the Chiefs.
  • Nearly 80% of social media users expressed either frustration, anger or disgust in social media conversations around the Chiefs advancing to their third consecutive Super Bowl.
  • Posts about Taylor Swift's connection to the Super Bowl declined by 67% over last year's event.
  • A common conspiracy theme, mocked by NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell during Media Night on February 2, that referees continue to purposefully give Patrick Mahomes the benefit of the doubt on calls that benefit the star quarterback and his team. This opinion was reflected in the data, as a Google Trends Analysis revealed 147.8% more online activity about a "rigged game" than Swift. The NFL Referees Association even felt compelled to release a statement on Tuesday ridiculing the theory.
  • In contrast to the 2024 Super Bowl, team players generated 143% more online Super Bowl searches than Swift.

"This Super Bowl is met with fatigue as the public expressed a mixture of frustration, anger, disgust, and resentment at an astonishing 76% of all social media conversations surrounding Super Bowl LIX and the Chiefs" said Dr. Jin-A Choi, who is the Director of Data Analytics for the Joetta Di Bella and Fred C. Sautter III Center for Strategic Communication and an Assistant Professor of Advertising. "The ongoing debates and skepticism regarding officiating bias, perceived rigging, and the alleged controversial calls in favor of the Chiefs fuel fan discontent and conspiracy theories," she said.

Despite the decline in conversations about Swift, Dr. Yi Luo said the pop star is still driving positive conversation around the game. "Love for Taylor Swift tends to dominate among social discussions with an impressive 72% joyful emotions expressed by social media users," said. Dr. Luo who is an Associate Professor in the School of Communication and Media. "Such overwhelming positive emotion serves as a strong testament of Swift's enduring popularity and her dedicated fan base."

"This Super Bowl is a reminder that the event is equal parts celebration of the players and teams fans love, but also an opportunity to express animosity towards the teams and players fans do NOT love," said Dr. Bond Benton, a Professor of Communication. "The energy that a celebrity connection to the game like Swift brings is noteworthy, but it should also be recognized as potentially fleeting," he said.

The full study, which can be found here, is the 25th from Center of Strategic Communication, which provides social media analytics tools and training for faculty and students for classroom learning and research projects.

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Building on a distinguished history dating back to 1908, Montclair State University has evolved from an institution that was a recognized leader in teacher education to an R2 research institution ranked as one of the 100 best public doctoral universities in the nation. The University serves 22,000 undergraduate and graduate students with more than 300 doctoral, master's and baccalaureate programs provided by 13 colleges and schools.

Situated on a beautiful 252-acre campus just 12 miles from New York City, Montclair delivers the instructional and research resources of a large public university while retaining the supportive and personalized academic environment that provides a feeling of community more typical of smaller institutions.

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