Can microblogs motivate involvement in civic and political life? Examining uses, gratifications and social outcomes among Chinese youth

DOIhttps://doi.org/10.1108/OIR-04-2017-0136
Published date10 September 2018
Pages663-680
Date10 September 2018
AuthorHua Pang
Subject MatterLibrary & information science,Information behaviour & retrieval,Collection building & management,Bibliometrics,Databases,Information & knowledge management,Information & communications technology,Internet,Records management & preservation,Document management
Can microblogs motivate
involvement in civic and political
life? Examining uses,
gratifications and social outcomes
among Chinese youth
Hua Pang
Department of Media and Communication,
Technische Universitat Dresden Philosophische Fakultat, Dresden, Germany
Abstract
Purpose The purpose of this paper is to explore the Chinese microblog userspsychological motivations
and the association between usersmotivations and their offline civic and political engagement. Specifically,
this study examines what the psychological impetuses of Weibo use are and how they promote the young
citizenscivic and political involvement.
Design/methodology/approach The data were collected through the web-based survey with a total
sample of 426 people. Principal components factor analysis, correlation analysis, and hierarchical multiple
regressions were sequentially carried out to address the research questions.
Findings The findings reveal that there are four major motives for using Weibo: information, socializing,
recognition seeking and entertainment. Interestingly, seeking social needs is positively and significantly
related to increasing young peoples civic participation, but not political participation.
Research limitations/implications Theoretically, the research demonstrates that the uses and
gratifications is a suitable approach for analysis of psychological antecedents of Weibo use and subsequent
outcomes. Practically, it will help understand the dynamics of how the new media technology may engender
democratic development and change.
Originality/value Although the growing significance of social media has drawn considerable attention,
little research has been conducted to assess the political consequences of Weibo. The current study fills the
void by investigating whether Weibo functions as an effective tool to facilitate democratic engagement in
contemporary China. The obtained results may provide insight into the relationship between the gratification
structures and engagement in other social settings.
Keywords Uses and gratifications, Microblog, Politicalparticipation, Mainland China, Civicparticipation,
Weibo usage
Paper type Research paper
1. Introduction
In recent years, the arrival of online media and particularly social media platforms has
captured much attention for their potential in stimulating individuals civic and political
participation (Cheng et al., 2015). Among a multitude of social networking sites, Weibo
(Chinese microblog), one of the most popular websites, has provided alternative avenues for
the citizens to disseminate news and private information on political issues more widely and
quickly than traditional media (Liu, 2015; Sullivan, 2014). According to the China Internet
Network Information Centre (CNNIC) Statistical Report, Weibo has attracted approximately
242m of users at the end of June 2016 (CNNIC, 2016). The ever-increasing popularity of
microblog within the past decade has not only fundamentally transformed the Chinas
existing medialandscape (Mao, 2015; Yang and DeHart,2016), however, it has alsopotentially
altered daily political lifestyles of Chinese people (Chan et al., 2012; Hao et al., 2016).
The growing significance of social media technologies has already drawn considerable
attention from scholars worldwide, and a plenty of research appeared. For instance, a
number of previous studies have consistently illuminated the generally positive effects of
Online Information Review
Vol. 42 No. 5, 2018
pp. 663-680
© Emerald PublishingLimited
1468-4527
DOI 10.1108/OIR-04-2017-0136
Received 3 May 2017
Revised 25 July 2017
2 September 2017
12 December 2017
Accepted 12 December 2017
The current issue and full text archive of this journal is available on Emerald Insight at:
www.emeraldinsight.com/1468-4527.htm
663
Social
outcomes of
microblogs
social media on transmitting information and facilitating citizen engagement in both
democratic and non-democratic societies (Chan et al., 2012; Chen et al., 2014, 2016; Liu, 2015;
Loader et al., 2014; Skoric et al., 2016; Wang and Shi, 2017). Nevertheless, the majority of
empirical investigations exploring the association between social media use and democratic
engagement have been documented in the Western countries, particularly in America and
Europe (Kruikemeier et al., 2016; Loader et al., 2014; Saldaña et al., 2015; Yang and DeHart,
2016). Unfortunately, to date, research on the role played by the newly emerging media
technology in facilitating citizen participation in many authoritarian regimes remains
theoretically underdeveloped and empirically understudied (Hyun and Kim, 2015; Zhang
and Lin, 2014). Moreover, relatively little attention has been paid to unpacking what the
psychological impetuses of Weibo use are and how they link with citizenscivic and political
behaviors. Only recently have there been attempts to concentrate on the uses of the
microblogging service and citizen engagement in Chinese society (Wang and Shi, 2017).
To fill up these aforementioned research gaps, this empirical study will mainly focus on
the relationship between different types of motives for Weibo use, and political implications
for participatory behaviors of the younger population in Mainland China. First, as young
people constitute the majority of Weibo users, the work aims to probe their various
psychological factors for the popular technology adoption under the peculiar social and
political background of China (Chan et al., 2017; Zhong, 2014). Second, it attempts to
determine the connections between different dimensions of Weibo use and citizen
engagement. This objective is vital because several recent researchers have paid attentions
to the differentiate dimensions of social media usage predicted involvement in civic and
political life, such as use social media for sharing political information (Chen et al., 2016;
Chen and Chan, 2017; Gil de Zúñiga et al., 2017), discussing political issues with others
(Hsieh and Li, 2014; Wei, 2014; Gil de Zúñiga et al., 2016), and expressing political viewpoints
(Gainous et al., 2016; Hyun and Kim, 2015; Skoric et al., 2016). Third, this research also
intends to sort out and summarize these existing results and theoretical views so as to gain a
clearer understanding of the supportive role of the favorite social media tool in promoting
democratic engagement (Skoric et al., 2016; Zhong, 2014). Lastly, through survey-based
research method, the study systematically examines whether peoples demographics
directly contribute to their motivations of Weibo use and participatory behaviors. In doing
so, it is anticipated that the results may yield potential contributes to scholarly discussions
on psychological motives for young peoples engagement through microblog in a given
social setting, as well as other similar authoritarian states.
2. Literature review
2.1 Unraveling the characteristics and functionalities of Weibo
A number of researchers have recentlysuggested that Weibo as a virtualsite is different from
other social networking services in fostering civic and political engagement (Liu, 2015; Pang
and Goh, 2016; Wangand Shi, 2017). Similar to Twitter, the swiftemergence of Weibo enables
users to create andpost short messages of 140 characterson a variety of topics ranging from
individualpassions to political news in real time (Sullivan, 2014; Yu et al., 2016).Since Chinese
characters are on the basis of a logogram instead of an alphabet system, it is probably to
consist of comparatively more sophisticated information under the limit (Sullivan, 2014).
In addition to Twitter-like functionality, Weibo holds a distinct status by allowing users to
exchange videos, images, music and also give comments on another users posts directly
(Wang and Shi, 2017). More important, any users are able to take a screenshot of a lengthy
article and then insert it as an image into Weibo posts, thereby breaking the 140-character
restriction (Tong and Lei, 2013).
Moreover, the increasing popularization of Weibo has facilitated social interaction and online
participation on an unprecedented scale. Specifically, the comment function of Weibo makes it
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