The explosive proliferation of Internet usage has enabled a number of new online communities to be established. Among them, online games have been representing the leading technological edge of the entertainment sector and the trend is expected to continue. The nature of Internet has enabled its users easy to hop from one website to another only several clicks away with very little cost. While website stickiness is regarded as a significant factor to e-commerce success, how to attract the attention of gamers and make them stick around has become a big challenge for both online game developers and providers. Based on the uses and gratification theory, this study proposed a model which integrated use and gratification with service mechanism (i.e. fairness, security, and incentive) and media factor (i.e. spatial presence and social presence) to investigate what determines player¡¦s online game stickiness. The partial least squares method was applied to empirically evaluate the proposed model using survey data collected from 274 online gamers. Our findings indicate that all variables except presence have positive significant effects on continuance motivation (CM), and CM also significantly affects gamers¡¦ stickiness. The implications of this work to both researchers and practitioners are discussed.

This study investigates if different personality types are connected to different motives for Instagram use. 187 participants with 150 females and 44 men were part of this study and they were recruited through a Facebook group. The findings were that there was no gender differences in the use of Instagram and that the most frequent motive for Instagram use was “Surveillance/knowledge about others”. People who scored high on the neurotic personality trait tended to use Instagram with “surveillance” as their motive, while extraverted people tend to use Instagram with “documentation” as their motive. People who score high on  openness mostly used Instagram with “creativity” as their motive, and people spend mostly 5 to 1 hour a day on the application. The conclusion is that different personality traits are connected to different motives for Instagram use but not all of the five in the Big Five. The ones that were connected to different motives were extraversion, openness and neuroticism. Conscientiousness and agreeableness had no connection to any of the motives. / Denna studie undersöker skillnader i personlighetstyper kopplat till olika motiv för Instagram-användning. 194 personer har deltagit i studien varav 150 stycken kvinnor och 44 män och de blev rekryterade via en Facebook-grupp. Inga könsskillnader i användandet av Instagram hittades och det främsta motivet för användning var "övervakning/kunskap om andra". Personer som har mycket av personlighetsdraget neuroticism tenderar att använda Instagram med "dokumentation" som deras motiv, och personer som har mycket av openness tenderar att ha "kreativitet" som deras motiv för Instagram-användning. Personer spenderar generellt 5 minuter till en timme om dagen i appen. Slutsatser som dras är att personer med olika personlighetstyper har olika motiv för användandet av Instagram men inte alla personlighetstyper i Femfaktorteorin. Personer som hade mycket av personlighetsdraget conscientiousness eller agreeableness hade ingen koppling till något av motiven.

AbstractTitle: Onlinegaming – A qualitative study of young people's attitudes about online gaming(Onlinespel – En Kvalitativ undersökning av Ungdomars attityder om onlinespel)Number of pages: 34 (35 including enclosures)Author: Armin MoradiTutor: Else NygrenCourse: Media and Communication Studies CPeriod: Autumn 2009University: Division of Media and Communication, Department of Information Science,Uppsala UniversityPurpose/Aim: The purpose of my thesis is that from a social perspective to examine and discussyoung people aged 16-18 vision of online gaming. Why online games are so popular and to see ifthe stereotype is a reality among young people in their late teens ..I also have a secondary purpose where I want to explore the social function of online games have,and what or what needs it fills in young people's everyday lives.Material/Method: The main method used in this essay has been qualitative group interviewswith 17 high school students. The result from these interviews has then been analysed usingseveral theories, Uses and gratification theory, Socialinteraction theory, Interactivity theory andmedium theory.Main results: The compilation of collected my results have shown that young people makeextensive use of online gaming pastime and to socialize with each other both virtually andphysically. Online gambling has on young people an entirely different meaning than it does forolder generations.For young people online is as natural as watching TV is for the oldergenerations.There are gender differences in perception of online games but it is not at all in the same highdegree as can be expected, the differences were minimal. The participants in my interviews havealso made an association exercise in which I presented as the words of 15-20 seconds to describeother words. Most replied to the word "Homework" that it was "boring" and the word "computergames" was the most frequently used word "fun".Keywords: Uses and gratification theory, Socialinteraction theory, Interactivity theory , Mediumtheory, Online gaming,

Title: Users motivational drives to engage with athletes on social media Authors: Victor Videgren, Alexander Jost Auf Der Stroth, Jean-Paul Mathieu Supervisor: Viktor Magnusson Examiner: Åsa Devine Background: With social media becoming a more and more prominent tool of communication within sports marketing, athletes stand to gain much by implementing it in their branding and marketing efforts. However, existing literature on the matter inclined that further research in which the perspective of the user was taken, thus advancing the understanding of user engagement motivation toward these athletes on social media networks. This study adapted the Uses and Gratifications theory in which six motivational categories had been summarized, these being: Informational, Entertainment, Remunerative, Social, Communicative and Convenience. Purpose: The purpose of this study is to describe what motivates users to engage with athletes on social media. Methodology: This work has incorporated a qualitative approach sided with a descriptive purpose. The empirical findings were collected through semi- structured interviews. Furthermore, these findings are coded and analysed by taking inspiration from grounded theory. Analysis: The empirical data was discussed within six motivational categories and was used to describe existing theory. Through the process of analysis, patterns of motivational theories interrelating with each other emerged. These being, a common interest which led users to engage with athletes, honesty and transparency which is what users saw and appreciated in the athlete and finally, the building of relationship which was what created from the engagement with athletes on social media. Conclusion: Through the analysis of the motivational drives patterns were discovered regarding users’ motivations to engage with athletes. The three patterns discovered interrelate with each other and are interpreted to be the typical motivation of a user to engage with an athlete on social media. The motivational patterns are “common interests with athlete”, second being the “transparency of athletes” and third “building a relationship” Keywords: Athlete branding, Social media, Uses and Gratification theory, Motivation, Engagement, Marketing, Grounded theory

This paper aims to examine what kind of relation social actions have to the sharing behavior on social media. The technology is developing rapidly and contributes to an information-rich society, which has many positive aspects. In contrast, a lot of shared information is old, biased, incorrect, or come from extreme sources, because people do not take the time to investigate the origin of the information. These negative aspects and the sharing behavior it leads to are examined in this paper to find out if they are related to the simplicity of sharing. The procedure for investigating this has been through two different methods. The first is a survey that was shared on Facebook, to get an understanding of what is primarily given and why. Based on the results from the survey interview questions were developed to be addressed to a number of Facebook users, to understand how they act on social media. Analysis of the results was carried out with the help of Uses and Gratification Theory as it focuses on how people consciously choose the media that satisfies their needs. The study concluded that people's past experiences create expected feelings, which then form the basis for the decision to perform an action, for example, to share information.

Syfte och frågeställningar: Syftet med studien är att undersöka hur unga personer som lever med psykisk ohälsa uppfattar sin användning av Facebook och hur de resonerar kring betydelsen av Facebook i deras vardag. Vi vill även belysa hur de uppfattar att de påverkas av samhällets krav kring ideal, normer och känslan av tillhörighet genom Facebook. ● Hur beskriver unga människor som lever med psykisk ohälsa sin användning av Facebook? ● På vilka sätt uppfattar unga människor att Facebook kan utgöra ett verktyg för tillhörighet och delaktighet för personer som lever med psykisk ohälsa? ● På vilka sätt uppfattar unga människor att de normer och ideal som förmedlas via Facebook utgör ett hinder för tillhörighet och delaktighet för personer som lever med psykisk ohälsa? Metod och material: Studien utgår ifrån en kvalitativ metod där det empiriska materialet samlades in genom 6 semistrukturerade intervjuer med unga personer med psykisk ohälsa. Huvudresultat: Studiens resultat visar att Facebook känns som en trygghet där Facebookgrupper ökar tillhörighetskänslan och används för att få tips och hjälpa andra i svåra situationer. Kraven att behöva leva upp till samhällets ideal kan påverka känslan av utanförskap.

Background: With the emergence of new social platforms, nascent strategies of Viral Marketing utilizing User-generated Content has developed. TikTok is a new social media based on User-generated videos, where content is mainly expressed in the form of #challenges. Given its nascent nature, marketers lack clear directives of how to capitalize on #challenges by engaging the user base, in their pursuit of reaching virality. As the underlying motivations behind the participation of #challenges are unknown, further research is required. Purpose: The purpose of this study is therefore to explore what motivates Gen Z users to participate in #challenges on TikTok and how companies can utilize these motivations to structure their own #challenges’ in marketing campaigns.   Method: This is an exploratory qualitative study inspired by grounded theory where sixteen semi-structured, in-depth interviews were held with participants classified as Gen Z. Qualitative content analysis was used to develop a revised model of Uses and Gratification Theory.   Conclusion: The results suggests that the Uses and Gratification theory could be used in explaining the underlying motivation for participating in #challenges on TikTok. By drawing connections between Uses and Gratification Theory and empirical data, a revised model was found to include the six traditional forms of motivations with structure as an added seventh prevalent motivation on TikTok. The results propose the motivators factors to participate in a challenge to be intertwined but suggest Entertainment to be a superseding motivator. Suggestions of elements that marketers could implement in their campaigns were thereafter derived.

This study aims to investigate how parents are reasoning when it comes to sharing photos of their children on Instagram. The phenomenon, known as sharenting, has been questioned due to the morality problems that arise from the fact that children don't have the same opportunity to approve their exposure in social channels as an adult. The fact that parents make money off their Instagram account is another aspect that is included in the study, which is relevant because of a new law in France. This law regulates profitable content that includes children, in order to protect the children. The aim and purpose of the survey was therefore to gain a deeper understanding of what motivating factors that surround sharing pictures and information about your child on Instagram, and also investigate how parents are reasoning about moral issues. The theoretical framework for this study is uses and gratification theory and communication privacy management theory. Through interviews and a qualitative method of analysis, the results show that many motivating factors are affecting, but that the connection and communication created between parents online is one of the biggest driving forces. There is a significant variation in awareness of the moral issues, but it was possible to decipher a pattern regarding where the boundaries of integrity go. For example, naked content and conflicts are being held outside Instagram. Discussions are held about whether this could be linked to a media morality where societal norms control what is considered accepted to share or not.

With the rapid pace of technological development, the way we consume media has changed drastically. Not too long ago, the very idea of never watching TV in the sense of broadcasted TV channels was absurd. Nowadays more and more people spend most if not all their media consumption time on streaming services like Netflix and Viaplay. We conducted a study on the reasons behind this change in media consumption, to find out why more and more people choose to spend their days watching Netflix instead of TV6 like they used to. We chose to perform our study through the lens of two different consumer behavior models: The Technology Acceptance Model (TAM) and the Uses and Gratification Model (UGT). With the concepts of perceived usefulness and perceived ease of use from TAM, and information seeking, affinity and accessibility from UGT. A quantitative study was conducted with 72 respondents. Our choice of method was a questionnaire which we designed to gather data on the respondents’ thoughts towards streaming services and towards the different behavior models. The survey, which was web-based, was distributed on different Facebook groups to reach potential respondents. The data gathered was then analyzed using Cronbach’s alpha and linear regression. From the results, we could gather that perceived usefulness was the most important factor of TAM, and the largest explanation behind a consumer’s usage of streaming services. Information seeking, affinity and accessibility were the largest contributing factors in the UGT model, although our results showed that UGT was not as significant as TAM in usage of streaming services. We were able to conclude that streaming services are an innovation that offers usefulness to the respondents that broadcast TV cannot compete with. We also found that TV broadcasts have a potential niche audience which they can reach with the right priorities. There were some aspects of information seeking which our respondents felt streaming services lacked, meaning if broadcast TV capitalizes on this type of informative content that streaming services lack, they can hopefully maintain a significant enough audience.

Background: Throughout recent years, the amounts of competitions on Instagram have increased and is now a popular marketing tool for companies to use. The strong competition in digital marketing has led to the need for brands to effectively utilize this marketing strategy. However, what motivates users to participate is a subject that lacks previous research. Hence, the question of what motivates the users to participate remains. Purpose: The purpose of this study is, therefore, to explore the motivational factors for women in the ages between 16-25, which leads to participation in contests on Instagram. Further, this research additionally aims to proceed with the knowledge of UGC and partly investigate how companies can use the appeared motivational factors when designing and formulating contests.  Method: For this qualitative study, 15 interviews were conducted, using a phenomenological interview approach.  Conclusion: The main conclusion from the analysis was that several motivational factors were discovered that had not earlier been presented in previous research, the most significant one being the social aspects. Furthermore, the size of the prize and the non-motivational factors proved to be of importance for the users. Secondly, factors relating to entertainment, aesthetics and the desire to win were proved to be of high importance as well. Lastly, several managerial applications have also been discovered that could help businesses when forming contests on Instagram.