University of Macau / Faculty of Social Sciences. / Department of Communication

University of Macau / Faculty of Social Sciences. / Department of Communication

In terms of Uses and gratification theory, this study examined the relationships between the usage of social networking sites and acculturation among Chinese students who are studying in U.S. colleges (N=246). By comparing two different SNSs, American SNS (Facebook) and ethnic SNS (WeChat), it was discovered that Chinese students exposed differential needs and gratification achievement in these two SNSs. This study applied a quantitative method, and data were collected with an online survey platform "Qualtrics," which was carried out on February 2018. The present study found that the degree of Facebook gratification can lead to the increasing of use intensity. In contrast, the degree of WeChat gratification cannot be reflected in use intensity. Intriguingly, Facebook and WeChat indeed act as important roles in adaptation to U.S. culture and maintenance to Chinese culture respectively.

Health misinformation is prevailing on Chinese social media like WeChat – a multi-functional social networking infrastructure in China – and it affects people’s choice and food and health care, which then influences people's health and sometimes cause panic. Many literatures have focused on health misinformation related to pandemic, vaccines or emergent diseases. However, few of them studies daily lifestyle related misinformation on social media. Also, many literatures suggest that aging plays a role in increased vulnerability to misinformation, but few discuss about it in the context of daily lifestyle related misinformation. In this study, an online survey (N=1,141) was conducted to study people’s susceptibility to daily lifestyle related health misinformation on WeChat, and the associated factors from the perspectives of misinformation topics, health belief, cultural belief, social networks and media. The results indicate that perceived severity and benefits increases people’s susceptibility to health misinformation. Alliance of people’s pre-existing belief with the underlying construct of the misinformation also increases their susceptibility to health misinformation. Additionally, lower rating of self-reported health status also plays a role in such susceptibility. Yet, in the contrast to existing literature, this study finds that self-efficacy has no effect on assisting people in identifying health misinformation. Regarding health information sharing, people tend to share what they consider credible but with different motivations to WeChat connections in different social settings. In a relatively more semi-public platform (WeChat Moments) with generalized social connections, they are motivated by the goal of sharing useful information and maintaining social relationships. Yet, in relatively more private settings like individual chat or group chat, they are motivated by altruism when sharing with strong ties while by maintaining social relationships when sharing with weak ties. The results also reveal that the increase in age increases the frequency of health information sharing behavior. In addition to the survey, I conducted a follow up interview with 30 participants of different age groups to explore how people access, process and share health information on WeChat. The interview contains a think-aloud protocol that can detect the criteria people employ to evaluate health mis/information on WeChat. Building on Elaborative Likelihood Model of Persuasion, the interview results reveal that in addition to relevance of topic and ability to process the mis/information, time constraints also contribute to which route people take on when processing information, especially with busy daily schedules and overwhelming amount of available health information on WeChat. When taking on the peripheral route, besides author credibility, older and younger generations use different peripheral cues to process health mis/information, and employ different criteria in evaluating the quality.

Multi-level marketing schemes (MLMs) is one of the fastest growing types of business in the world. Especially in China, with the development of e-commerce and social network application, increasingly people start doing business for MLM companies in social network platform. However, there are few academic articles have been written about the ethicality of MLMs on social media application in China. What surprising is, even in China, the ethical issue of MLMs on Wechat is controversial. Among the ordinary person, MLMs sometimes have been accused of being pyramid schemes, which is illegal in China. Besides, many people complain that some of their friends sell products on Wechat, which make them uncomfortable and sometimes be pressured to buy it. This research explores the nature of MLMs and the ethical issues of it. It argues that MLMs on Wechat in China posed some unique ethical issues and attempts to search for the solutions for them.

The purpose of the present study was to analyze whether self-esteem stability moderated the association between self-esteem level and the forms of self-enhancement strategies. Previous research has found that self-esteem level can predict the forms of self-enhancement, whereas the advances in the conceptualization of self-esteem recommend that the self-esteem stability is another essential variable in terms of analyzing the relationship between self-esteem and self-enhancement. Depending on the relevant researches on use and gratification theory, which indicate that people use social media for self-enhancement and fulfilling their inner needs. This research focused on examining the forms of individual’s self-enhance on WeChat Circle of Friends (COF) and how it influenced by the interaction between self-esteem level and self-esteem stability by analyzing 305 participants in China. The results of the study show that both self-esteem level and stability was positively correlated with direct self-enhancement, but negatively correlated with indirect self-enhancement. Furthermore, the findings also show that self-esteem stability moderated the association between self-esteem level and direct self-enhancement such that individuals with stable high self-esteem reported higher levels of frequency in direct self-enhancement. However, the findings also revealed the self-esteem stability failed to moderate the association between self-esteem level and indirect self-enhancement presentation. These results suggest that self-esteem level and self-esteem stability will interact to impact the forms of self-enhancement. The importance of considering both stability and level of self-esteem in analyses of self-enhancement presentation on social media is discussed.

<p>WeChat is one of the most popular applications in the world. By 2021, there were 1.24 billion users of WeChat. Many people call it the `super app` because it is an application for everything. Besides the basic messaging feature, it also supports online payment, video posts, news feeds, and more. Due to its wide usage, many criminals are using the platforms for illegal activities such as bank fraud, cyberbullying, and stalking. For these reasons, we need to understand WeChat forensically to assist investigators in cases involving WeChat.</p> <p>Previous research was mostly focused on the messaging of the WeChat application. However, artifacts of other features remain on the device undiscovered. These features can provide crucial evidence to a case such as geo-locations or monetary transactions. WeChat keeps updates monthly, and these updates may add new features or modify the data structure. The official website does not provide a detailed description of its features so it is hard for a non-WeChat user to understand the functionalities. Therefore, research is required to analyze the background, structure, and possible artifacts remaining of the WeChat app to assist practitioners who encounter WeChat in an investigation. This study included all platforms that WeChat provides, Windows, MacOS, Android, and iOS.</p>

As one of the most enduring theories in communication, gatekeeping suggests that stories have to move from one gate to another gate before being published. During this process, some stories are selected, while others are rejected. Previous studies heavily focus on traditional news media and explore the influence of internal and external forces on story selection. Very few studies, however, look at gatekeeping in new areas of technology. This case study extends this literature into social media. It looks at how editors at The Asian Magazine (TAM) select stories for its WeChat public account. Interviews with editors identify news values and news categories that these gatekeepers think are important. Results of the WeChat content analysis between May and August 2014 indicate that TAM editors do not strictly rely on established news values to select WeChat stories. News categories better predict story decisions. Examining which WeChat items generate the most reader engagement gives evidence of how well news content matches what attracts readers online. News category priorities closely match what readers want to read. / Master of Arts

The thesis examined the phenomenon of micro-entrepreneurship, social selling and relationship management on WeChat. I used autoethnography as my research methodology, and the findings contribute to academic area on social selling, micro-entrepreneurship, social marketing, relationship management, and strategic communication. This paper also explored how WeChat users conduct their management strategies and relationship marketing in the common Chinese culture background. Findings revealed that WeChat is an ideal social selling and marketing approach for Chinese individual sellers to accomplish their business goal.

In 21st century, social media has become one necessary part in people’s life, different kinds of social media emerge in endlessly. In younger generation, it is popular to use social media as a communication tool to get closer to each other. During using social media, it is important to have awareness to protect their personal information. Comparing with Western countries, the topic of privacy is not often discussed in China and some privacy issues might be ignored due to people have not enough knowledge in this area. In this study, the focus is to investigate Chinese university students’ perception of privacy risks and WeChat personal information exposure. Based on this, this study also explores the users’ attitudes toward WeChat and how it influences the future usage of it. The adopted research method is qualitative research method, by doing interviews with 15 students from different school, city and major. From the study, eight essential concepts are used to answer two research questions. Though analysis, the situation of the privacy perception can be found, the reasons and attitudes toward WeChat are also figured out. At the end of the thesis, the contribution of this study and suggestions to future research are shown.