Ma. Clariza Bernadette Ng MA Communication ID no.

035037 Review of Quan-Haase and Youngs Uses and Gratifications of Social Media: A Comparison of Facebook and Instant Messaging Bulletin of Science Technology & Society 2010 30:350 As social media are penetrating society more intensely each day, Quan-Haase and Young observed, Uses and Gratification scholars are adroitly turning away from the television and focusing on this phenomenon. While research on how the various computer-mediated communication tools are used and what gratifications they provide are abundant, however, scant comparative analysis have been conducted. Social media are rarely explored in relation to one another and so it remains unclear, for one, why users adopt multiple communication tools instead of substituting one for another. In the 2010 study Uses and Gratifications of Social Media: A Comparison of Facebook and Instant Messaging, Quan-Haase and Young attempted to elucidate why people integrate numerous digital technologies into their communication habits by comparing the gratifications university students obtain from the social networking site Facebook and instant messaging. The study attempted to illustrate that users employ multiple technologies concurrently because each medium fulfills a different social need, and claimed to provide insight into the question of why users switch from one medium to another and what motivates them to continue using an existing tool. Integral to the fulfillment of the authors goal was the acquisition of data about the gratifications obtained from Facebook and instant messaging. For the baseline data, they referred to a previous study conducted on the gratifications sought and obtained from chatting on ICQ, an instant messaging platform (Leung, 2001). The study adopted the Uses and Gratifications theory, which perceives the audience as actively selecting and utilizing media to address specific needs (Katz et al., 1974). Quan-Haase and Young used the same approach to explore the motivations of university students in joining Facebook and the gratifications obtained from continued use. The research process involved surveys and interviews among 77 undergraduate students, all Facebook users, and was facilitated between October 2007 and February 2008. The process first involved a questionnaire that measured the respondents Facebook usage, and examined the frequency of visits and updates done on the social networking site (SNS). It next measured the students motivation in joining Facebook from a retrospective perspective through an 11-item questionnaire, which covered a wide rage of possible motivations such as peer pressure, social connectivity, curiosity, and utilitarian need. In measuring the gratifications obtained from using Facebook, the authors adopted 25 items from Leungs list of gratifications. The survey asked the students about the different reasons why they use Facebook, and instructed them to rate each possible gratification on a 5-point Likert-type scale. Such a method allowed, from the authors perspective, direct comparisons between the gratifications attained in the use of Facebook and instant messaging. Valuable data about the motivations of Facebook users were acquired through the research process. Frequency analyses revealed that the primary motivation of the respondents in joining the social networking site is peer pressure (8 of 21 participants), followed by social connectivity (7 of 21 participants), curiosity and utilitarian need (4 of 21 participants). An examination of the gratifications obtained from using Facebook identified six key gratifications: pastime, affection, fashion, sharing problems, sociability, and social information. The primary

gratification was revealed to be pastimethat university students use Facebook as a form of escape from pressures and responsibilities and as a form of entertainment. The second key gratification, affection, asserts that it serves as a venue for expressing friendship and concern towards others (p.355). Fashion is the third key gratification, and shows that Facebook helps its users appear trendy to others. Sharing problems, the fourth key gratification, shows that the students also use the SNS as a venue to talk to others about their concerns. The fifth key gratification, sociability, shows that it is utilized to overcome social inhibitions and make new acquaintances. The final key gratification is social information, and suggests that students use Facebook to feel involved in what is going on with others (p.355). A principal components factor analysis with viramax rotation revealed a considerable overlap between the factors identified by Leung in his study of gratifications of IM use and the factors identified in [Quan-Haase and Youngs] study (p.355). The six key gratifications identified in the study conducted on Facebook users were also identified in Leungs research. This suggests that the two types of social media have a similar gratification structure. By closely inspecting the similarities and differences of the data gathered on Facebook and instant messaging, the authors attempted to explain why university students would concurrently utilize two social media, which have similar gratifications structures. While the two have similar gratifications, the study posited, some gratifications are more prominent in one than in the other. For one, while both types of social media serve as entertainment and escape, these gratifications are more prominent in Facebook. Likewise, while affection and sharing problems are key gratifications of Facebook, these are more prominent in instant messaging because it is usually dyadic and allows for interactive conversations in real time that are somewhat comparable to face-to-face interactions (p.356). On the other hand, social information is significantly more prominent in Facebook, which provides not only more extensive information about the users than IM but also qualitatively different information through the pictures section, the profile information, and the wall (p.357). While sociability is the primary gratification obtained from both media, the kinds of needs that each fulfills are different. Facebook is primarily about entertainment and social information, while instant messaging is primarily about nourishing and maintaining relationships. This, the authors concluded, is why the two social media have a place in the university students communication repertoire. They continue to hypothesize that perhaps users completely give up a medium and switch to another when one more effectively provides all gratifications, thus rendering the other obsolete. While the objectives the authors put forth at the beginning of the study are indeed pertinent and laudable, the execution of the project is problematic in several ways. The study supposedly attempted to illustrate, through the U&G comparative analysis of Facebook and instant messaging, that users employ multiple technologies concurrently because each medium fulfills a different social need. It also endeavored to provide insight into the question of why users switch from one medium to another and what motivates them to continue using an existing tool. In order to achieve these goals, the authors used as baseline data the study conducted by Leung in 2001 on the gratifications obtained from instant messaging and, using Leungs research method as framework, conducted a new study on Facebook users in 2007-2008. The authors, to be fair, ensured that standardized questionnaires are used in order to make direct comparisons between the two sets of data possible. It should be noted, however, that in order to facilitate a comparative analysis of the two social media that effectively addresses the goals of the study, it is not sufficient that the questionnaires are the same. The following conditions are necessary: (1) the respondents for the studies for both instant messaging and Facebook should be the same; (2)

the respondents should be concurrent users of instant messaging and Facebook. The goal of the study, after all, is to illustrate and explain why users adopt multiple forms of social media instead of substituting one for another, and why users switch from one medium to another. The study should ideally show, as the authors posited, that while both instant messaging and Facebook are social media and provide similar gratifications, they fulfill different social needs and can therefore co-exist in a users communication habits. Likewise, it is supposed to have shown, if the respondent switched from instant messaging to Facebook, the gratifications previously met by instant messaging and which have been displaced to the social networking site. As the baseline data used for the study was taken from a research on instant messaging conducted in 2001, three years before Facebook was born, and as the only necessary precondition given to the respondents in their 2007-2008 research on Facebook use is an account in the social networking site and not the subscription to both social media, Quan-Haase and Youngs study became not a comparative analysis of the gratifications of Facebook and instant messaging in concurrent users but a comparative analysis of the gratifications obtained by Facebook users against the gratifications obtained by instant messaging users. The method and sampling employed did not answer the question: Why do users adopt multiple forms of social media instead of substituting one for another? And, if they do switch from one social medium to another, what moves them to do so? Even if the study were to be taken as a comparative analysis of the gratifications obtained by Facebook users against the gratifications obtained by instant messaging users, it has not done its job well. The time gap between Leungs study and Quan-Haase and Youngs, it can be noticed, is so immense that the validity of the data collected for the earlier study becomes questionable. While it can be said that the primary features of instant messaging has remained remarkably unchanged through the years, and the uses it offers are more or less the same, the trends in society and the sensibilities and value-judgment of users may have evolved. What the respondents of Leungs study found satisfying in instant messaging in 2001 may no longer be satisfying in 2007. In their comparative analysis of the gratifications data about Facebook and instant messaging, Quan-Haase and Young expressed surprise over the discovery that instant messaging rated higher in fashion. Perhaps this incongruence in the analysis resulted from an anachronism in the instant messaging data. One cannot help but wonder if, had the instant messaging study been conducted in 2007, during a time when Facebook was already in existence and fast growing in popularity, would the respondents still have perceived instant messaging as trendier? For the comparative analysis to be veritable, the studies on the two types of media should have been simultaneously conducted. That the study in question is not without flaws cannot be denied. Aside from the problematics previously presented, it should also be noted that in light of recent developments on Facebook, including an instant messaging service called Facebook Chat, the study has become outdated and its relevance to new media studies has significantly decreased. This is not to say, however, that it is without merits. The major contribution of Quan-Haase and Youngs study is this: It has widened the field of new media studies by encouraging the analysis of media not as single entities but in relation to one another. It has opened the discussion to an undeniably pertinent questionwhy do people adopt a wide range of technologies with similar uses and gratifications? Drawing from the U&G approach and adopting Leungs survey method, the authors have developed a framework- albeit still raw and imperfect- for the comparative analysis of the different forms of social media. The task of the next scholar is to correctly execute it.

Uses and Gratifications of Social Media: A Comparison of Facebook and Instant Messaging may also prove useful for undergraduate and graduate communication theory courses, and other courses dedicated to the Uses and Gratifications Theory and new media. This study, in particular the gratifications and motivations data it has presented on Facebook users, may also prove useful for future studies. It may, for instance, serve as jumping board for Media Dependency studies on Facebook users. Likewise, if coupled with the Cultivation Theory in examining Facebook users and how the medium has shaped their worldview, this study may enrich the discourse as to why people use the social networking site and if a key gratification they receive from Facebook is the confirmation of their worldview. References: Katz, E., Blumer, J. G., & Gurevitch, M. (1974). Utilization of mass communication by the individual. In J. G. Blumler & E. Katz (Eds.), The uses of mass communications: Current perspectives on gratifications research (pp. 19-34). London, England: SAGE. Leung, L. (2001). College student motives for chatting on ICQ. New Media & Society, 3, 483500. Quan-Haase, A. & Young, A. (2010). Uses and Gratifications of Social Media: A Comparison of Facebook and Instant Messaging. Bulletin of Science Technology & Society, 30, 350-361.