Abstract
Online video media share a great part of similar attributes with traditional mass media. They also bear some fresh features of Web 2.0, such as integration, interactivity, both synchrony and asynchrony, which break the traditional pattern of media viewing and using. They allow for new forms of user activities and offer the user a participatory experience/role so as to facilitate the evolution and dynamic reintegration of the networked society as well as the whole social environment. Online video media have therefore been drawing lots of attention from both the industry and academic field since the emergence. The aims of this research are to: 1) investigate uses and gratifications theorizations in the era of Web 2.0, with online video media the typical target, by finding out the wide and coherent spectrum of online video media usage motivations and gratifications; 2) construct a comprehensive framework of online video media uses and gratifications from integrated and interdisciplinary perspectives; 3) verify the interactive relationships between or among the variables presented in the framework. Survey is adopted for data collection in this study. Convenient sampling and snowball sampling are used. A total of 470 respondents in mainland China complete the questionnaire online, in which 462 are online video media users and the rest 8 are non-users. The online video media uses and gratifications items are then subject to principal components factoring with varimax rotation. Seven factors are identified to explain 67.31% of the variance. Results indicate that the nature of device is a potential source of resulting in unique media outcomes, and habitual behavior of mobile video use has become a part of netizens’ life. More importantly, significant differences in both motivation and gratification between the two user identities are found. Besides, different genres of media contents are related to different motivations and gratifications, and may predict different degrees of interactivity. Moreover, results show that, people in different types of emotions (positive and non-positive) tend to arouse different motivations and attempt to seek different gratifications. Investigation also detect the relationships among dependency, activities after use and attitudes during the motivation and gratification process. It is concluded that, online video media usage is a spiral feedback process of dependency, activities after use and attitudes. During the process of motivation and gratification, people gain experience and derived perceptions, and the beliefs/loyalty gradually forms. Online video media usage is an interactive and dynamic process. During the process, user interacts with the media as well as with other users in the networked society. Though media culture, media literacy and social participation are still weak and limited in the domestic networked society, online video media user exhibits more active, intentional and conscious actions, which is distinguished from traditional mass media audience. In general, this study contributes to the understanding of user’s behaviors, needs and the effects of the new media.
Date of Award | 22 Sept 2015 |
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Original language | English |
Supervisor | Li Chuan Evelyn Mai (Supervisor) |
User-Defined Keywords
- Audiences
- Internet videos
- Mass media
- Psychological aspects
- Psychology.