Master of Science / Department of Journalism and Mass Communications / Louise Benjamin / In 2013, creating a 57-second video can lead to more than $150,000 in profit for the creator and the creator can be anyone. This money-making opportunity comes from a recent popular trend known as a “viral video,” defined as a phenomenon of a video becoming highly popular through rapid, user-led distribution via the internet. However, research has not determined a clear model for creating a non-professional viral video. Interviews and YouTube analytics revealed how the video “I’m Farming and I Grow It,” a non-professional video created by three Kansas boys, was spread. Using the theories Uses and Gratifications and Two-Step Flow, this case study then analyzed the comments posted on the viral video and a content analysis of the comments identified the key factors mentioned by users, which contributed to the videos’ millions of views. The results conclude the key components for making a non-professional video go viral are “opinion leaders” spreading the message and video content that elicits positive feelings such as joy, humor, or praise. This study also provides a model to help a non-professional video go viral based on previous research and this case study.

Master of Science / Department of Journalism and Mass Communications / Nancy Muturi / This study was designed to explore how Alzheimer’s caregivers use Facebook support groups. Specifically it describes what kinds of activities caregivers engage in when in Facebook support groups, explores the motivation behind participation, and details perceived advantages and disadvantages of the groups. Whether Facebook support groups are considered a primary and accurate source of disease information was also explored. The study was qualitative in nature and consisted of 20 caregiver interviews, conducted via phone and Skype. Guided by uses and gratifications theory (Katz, Blumler & Gurevitch, 1974), the study employed six research questions to fully explore the experiences of caregivers in Facebook support groups. Generally speaking, the study identified the primary theme of community, and three subthemes including context, advice and emotional release/support. There were also significant findings on the primacy and accuracy of information. The ability to more fully understand these themes in the context of the caregiver experience will provide health care professionals with a foundation on which they can build effective ways to tap existing Facebook support groups and bolster support as the Alzheimer’s epidemic grows exponentially between now and 2050.

In a society where media use is increasingly fragmented, social media expand people’s media practices and satisfy peoples’ needs in new ways. Instagram is currently the social media platform with the highest growth of users around the world. The purpose of this study is to examine what needs of information, entertainment, self-confirmation and social connections are being fulfilled by Instagram-use. By applying Uses and Gratifications theory, the study analyzes the motivations behind Instagram use and how needs are fulfilled through user practices. The study builds on a quantitative survey (n=252) examining the Instagram use of students at Örebro University. The analysis assesses factors such as time, user practices and motivations as well as questions regarding interactivity and response. The study finds that students primarily use Instagram to fulfill needs of entertainment and social connection. The importance of response (interactive communication) is more important to those who spend more time on the platform. The study also concludes that younger students and women use the platform more extensively compared to older students and men.

Streamed media is becoming more and more a part of our daily lives and companies like Netflix is competing with linear television for consumers. It is hard to deny that there is a shift in the media industry and streamed media is progressing, within the last three years the number of subscribers has almost been doubled. With this in mind it is both interesting and necessary to study motives and content in users to gain a better understanding of this yet very little explored phenomenon that is streamed media. This report contains a qualitative study of motives behind the use of streamed media and how the content affects our choice of streaming service. We interviewed seven young adults between the ages of 21-26 at the Linneaus University in Kalmar. The result suggests that the user’s motives and the content depend on economy and generation factors, such as social situation and personal interests.

Organisationer använder sig ofta av flera olika sociala media för att nå ut till sina målgrupper, då en lyckad kommunikation har visat sig öka omsättningen (Okazaki,Katsukura och Nishiyama, 2007). Men det finns ännu ganska lite forskning om varför viss kommunikation lyckas nå ut med sitt budskap. Samtidigt söker allt fler organisationer svar på hur de ska göra för att kommunicera bättre och nå ut genom mediebruset. Annars riskerar de kommunikativa insatserna att falla platt, upplevas som intetsägande och sakna betydelse då de väcker minimalt med respons och engagemang hos målgruppen. Tidigare studier har funnit att Twitter och LinkedIn är två av de mest användbara sociala mediekanalerna för organisationer som vill kommunicera med sina målgrupper, mer specifikt potentiella samarbetspartners, potentiella anställda och konsumerande kunder. Därför menar vi att en studie av kommunikationen på LinkedIn via influencers är intressant ur ettMKV-perspektiv, då vi ämnar undersöka vilka kommunikationsfaktorer som påverkar engagemang i olika typer av inlägg på LinkedIn. Metod och material: För att besvara våra frågeställningar har vi använt oss av en kvantitativ innehållsanalys och en kvalitativ textanalys.Genom den kvantitativa metoden har vi analyserat 155 inlägg som publicerats av 16 influencers under en tvåveckors period. Vi har mätt engagemanget för alla inlägg genom att se till antalet kommentarer och reaktioner från andra användare på LinkedIn. I den kvalitativa metoden valde vi ut tre inlägg som vi utifrån resultatet i den kvantitativa delen såg hade högst genomsnitt kommentarer samt reaktioner. Vi valde att titta vidare på dessa tre inlägg för att identifiera det unika med kommunikationen i dem som gjorde att just dessa engagerade i högre utsträckning än andra inlägg. Huvudresultat: Utifrån vår studie har vi funnit att en kategori är vanligast förekommande som primär kommunikationskategori bland våra 16 influencers. Vi har även funnit att oavsett innehåll i inlägget finns det en primär kommunikationskategori som skapar mer engagemang i fråga om reaktioner samt att en annan kategori engagerar mer sett till viljan att kommentera. Att använda sig av visuellt intresseväckande innehåll ser vi också ökar engagemanget hos mottagarna jämfört med att inte använda sig av denna typ av innehåll. Vi finner också att för att bygga förtroende på LinkedIn kan det vara en god idé att använda sig av en kombination av flera av de marknadsföringsstrategier som vi presenterat i vår studie.

Master of Science / Department of Journalism and Mass Communications / Major Professor Not Listed / Based on the Uses and Gratifications (U&G) approach and Parasocial Interaction (PSI) theory, this study examined how people use live streaming platforms in China. Uniquely, it sought to understand the effect of romantic relationships on how and why people watch Host Live Shows (HLSs) and explored the relationships between Chinese audiences and live- streamers. Through an online survey, four viewing motivations were identified: Community Building, Ego-boost, Escape, and Bandwagon. Ego-boost is a relatively new motivation of media use, which means audiences watch and interact with HLSs to get compliments, self-confidence, self- validation, and ego-boosts. This study found audiences’ perceived realism and PSI were both very neutral. However, emotion projection of audiences onto streamers was observed – most viewers highly agree that streamers are their friends. Moreover, this study found the quality of interpersonal communication is affecting audiences’ HLS dependence and the degree of PSI, while the quantity of interpersonal communication might not be – the more satisfied a person is about his/her interpersonal communication, the heavier he/she depends on HLSs and the stronger his/her PSI is. As expected, the degrees of both romantic relationship status and romantic relationship satisfaction influence people’s HLS use. While compared with females, males are affected by romantic relationships more, both the status and satisfaction level. Lastly, when it comes to people’s romantic lives and social lives, HLSs are more likely to be used as alternatives to meet their unsatisfied needs from their “real partners.”

This research aims to fill a research gap by examining WeChat to explore whether changes of social context would exert any influence on the information disclosure of social networking site (SNS) users. Selective Exposure Theory and Uses and Gratification Theory were used as the theoretical foundation for this study. Four-hundred Chinese college students in China and the U.S. who have a WeChat App and have logged in to use it within the last 30 days from the day administered were asked to participate in a survey about their motivations and consequences when using WeChat. Results from MANOVA showed that the motivations and consequences of female participants’ self-disclosure were significantly higher than were male participants on WeChat. Moreover, the social context of Chinese students studying in the U.S. is perceived to be more individualized than the traditionally collective context that is perceived by Chinese students studying in China.

This study examined the context of browsing behaviors. According to uses-and gratifications approach, the motives of World Wilde Web (mentioned as WWW later) generate the expectations of the WWW and the other sources, which lead to differential patterns of browsing behaviors. On-line focus groups were performed three times in December 1999 and January 2000. The criterion used when we choose the respondents of the focus group is that they should have experienced in Internet at least one year. The purpose of the focus groups is to explore the context of browsing. In addition, an on-line survey was undertaken on and . The session of is from March 25, 2000 to April 20, 2000, and the session of is from April 11, 2000 to April 12, 2000. The primary purpose of the survey was to test hypotheses related to browsing motives, browsing strategy motives, and browsing activities. This study found that surfers were segmented into four groups according to the motives of WWW: ritualistic dominant motives, instrumental dominant motives, high motives, and low motives. Besides, the motives of browsing strategies ere probed in this study. Six factors of the motives of browsing strategies were extracted: to increase data completeness, to help awareness of site options, to avoid site redundancy or information duplicate, job factor, no scare at the loss in cyberspace, and to kill time in a high-speed or favorable site. These factors co-operated with browsing skills explaining medium to low variance of the browsing behaviors.

<p>Purpose/Aim: To investigate why people in the age group of 30-40 subscribe to the traditional morning newspaper even though they can get the same information at a much lower cost from for example TV, the internet or the free daily papers. The aim is to also look at possible future alternatives to the traditional morning newspaper.</p><p>Material/Method: Focus group interviews were used to gather the empirical material. These consisted of a total number of twelve people, divided into three groups. The results from the focus group interviews were analysed with help from established uses & gratifications theories and two diffusion theories.</p><p>Main results: This study shows that people read the traditional morning newspaper to get a good mixture of entertainment and local, national and global news. It is relaxing to read the newpaper on paper compared to reading it on the internet, mainly because you get a good overview which makes it a lot easier to find exactly want you want to read. The content of the newspaper is often discussed with family, friends and colleagues and can therefore be said to fill an important social function. Reading the newspaper is thought of to be intellectual and can help people form their identities. All respondents in this study grew up in homes which subscribed to a morning newspaper and thought this fact was a big reason for them finding it so important to have a subscription themselves. Even so, most of them were positively in favour of the so called e-paper, as a future alternative to the traditional newspaper, when discussed in the groups, mainly because of it being a more environmently friendly option, but also because of the ability to pick and choose your personal newspaper content and only pay for what you want to read.</p>

This study examined a specific and controversial issue in health communication: the complementary and alternative medicine (CAM). Recent studies have shown that both online newsgroups and traditional newspapers have involved in communicating CAM information, but research has not answered whether there are differences between the new and old media. From the perspective of uses and gratifications, this study first investigated that how people are using newsgroups to solve CAM-related problems. Then contents of newsgroup messages and newspaper stories were analyzed to do the comparison in topics, source types, efficacy claims, and CAM categories. The results showed that both similarities and differences existed between the two media.