Motivation and reward for media consumption

Uses and gratifications theory

Problems with traditional media effects research

• It takes the viewpoint of the communicator– The goal is to change attitudes, behavior, etc.– Research looks at the impact of a single

show, medium, political campaign, etc. without considering other choices the audience has

– Effects research usually looks at influence as a one-way process

– It sees audience members as targets rather than as ‘active’ seekers, interpreters, etc.

‘Active audience’ view

• People actively choose from among a large number of options– Choose among activities– Choose among media– Choose among content options

Uses and gratifications research

• “Uses and grats” asks why people attend to media content and what they get from it– The common-sense theory is that people

seek out media that satisfy their wants and/or needs.

– U&G research tries to build up a list of different types of gratifications that people turn to media content to provide. The goal is to match media and content to gratifications

Uses and gratifications

• If we can determine what people are looking for, we can better provide content that will satisfy their needs and interests– Very practical side to all this

• Personal social circumstances and psychological dispositions together influence both... general habits of media use and also... beliefs and expectations about the benefits offered by the media, which shape... specific acts of media choice and consumption, followed by.... assessments of the value of the experience (with consequences for further media use) and, possibly... applications of benefits acquired in other areas of experience and social activity. (Blumler and Katz, 1974).

People sometimes give reasons for consumption you would not predict

• Some gratifications may not be as obvious as others– Herzog’s (no relation—not even spelled the

same) study of daytime radio serial listeners– Radway’s Reading the Romance– Berelson’s study of what people missed

during a newspaper strike

Five basic assumptions (Katz, Blumler and Gurevitch, 1974)

• The audience is conceived as active, i.e., an important part of mass media use is assumed to be goal oriented … patterns of media use are shaped by more or less definite expectations of what certain kinds of content have to offer the audience member.

• In the mass communication process much initiative in liking need gratification and media choice lies with the audience member … individual and public opinions have power vis-à-vis the seemingly all-powerful media.

• The media compete with other sources of need satisfaction. The needs served by mass communication constitute but a segment of the wider range of human needs, and the degree to which they can be adequately met through mass media consumption certainly varies.

• Methodologically speaking, many of the goals of mass media use can be derived from data supplied by individual audience members themselves- i.e., people are sufficiently self-aware to be able to report their interests and motives in particular cases, or at least to recognize them when confronted with them in an intelligible and familiar verbal formulation.

• Value judgments about the cultural significance of mass communication should be suspended while audience orientations are explored on their own terms.

• McQuail, Blumler, and Brown (1972) proposed a model of “media-person interactions” to classify four important media gratifications: (1) Diversion: escape from routine or problems; emotional release; (2) Personal relationships: companionship; social utility; (3) Personal identity: self reference; reality exploration; value reinforces; and (4) Surveillance (forms of information seeking).

• Katz, Gurevitch and Haas (1973) developed 35 needs taken from the social and psychological functions of the mass media and put them into five categories:

• Cognitive needs, including acquiring information, knowledge and understanding;

• Affective needs, including emotion, pleasure, feelings;• Personal integrative needs, including credibility, stability,

status;• Social integrative needs, including interacting with family

and friends; and• Tension release needs, including escape and diversion.

• McQuail (1994) added another dimension to this definition. He states:

• Personal social circumstances and psychological dispositions together influence both … general habits of media use and also … beliefs and expectations about the benefits offered by the media, which shape ... specific acts of media choice and consumption, followed by ... assessments of the value of the experience (with consequences for further media use) and, possibly ... applications of benefits acquired in other areas of experience and social activity (p. 235).

Daytime serial listeners• Emotional release

– Enjoyed hearing of other people’s trouble• Provided some compensation for their own distress

• Wishful thinking– Characters led lives the listeners wanted to live

themselves

• Valuable advice– “serials provided many of their listeners with

explanations as to how to handle problems that they themselves might experience”

– (Lowery & DeFleur)

• Richard Kilborn (1992: 75-84) offers the following common reasons for watching soaps:

• regular part of domestic routine and entertaining reward for work

• launchpad for social and personal interaction• fulfilling individual needs: a way of choosing to

be alone or of enduring enforced loneliness

• identification and involvement with characters (perhaps cathartic)

• escapist fantasy (American supersoaps more fantastical)

• focus of debate on topical issues• a kind of critical game involving knowledge of

the rules and conventions of the genre

Reading the Romance

• Women used the romance novels as a form of escape from their rather humdrum lives, a means to connect with other housewives and as a way to accommodate themselves to the male-dominated world they live in

Gratifications

• One way to classify gratifications is based on whether exposure is sought for its own sake or whether it is pursued to support some other goal– Entertainment– Social interaction– Learning

Gratifications

• Another distinction is between gratifications that are biologically based and those that are learned– Nature v. nurture

• Excitation/sensation seeking• Mood management• Social reinforcement• Aesthetics• Economic profitability

Mood management

• People will choose content that best complements their current mood– Maintains an optimal state of excitation– Meadowcroft and Zillmann

Excitation

• Theorists have argued that excitation itself generates pleasure. Simply getting the blood pumping watching an action show or playing a video game generates endorphins

Social reinforcement

• Group discussion of content—being ‘in the know’

• Parasocial interaction with characters

• Compensation for lost partners, lack of social circle

• Occasion for getting together with friends, family

Aesthetics

• Appreciation for beauty, form, etc.

• Some innate preferences (balance, color) but mostly learned– Develop an appreciation for art, music, etc.

Economic value

• Can learn valuable skills

• Information value in competitive settings

• Money-saving tips

Critique

• McQuail (1994) commented that the approach has not provided much successful prediction or casual explanation of media choice and use. . . . much media use is circumstantial and weakly motivated, the approach seems to work best in examining specific types of media where motivation might be presented (McQuail, 1994).

• Ien Ang also criticized uses and gratifications approach:

• It is highly individualistic, taking into account only the individual psychological gratification derived from individual media use. – Social context tends to be ignored

• Some use may be forced on us

• There is relatively little attention paid to media content– researchers study why people use the media, but

less what meanings they actually get out of their media use.

• The approach starts from the view that the media are always functional to people and may thus implicitly offer a justification for the way the media are currently organized

• (cited by CCMS-Infobase, 2003).

• uses and gratifications research relies heavily on self-reports (Katz, 1987). – Personal memory can be problematic

• The stance can also lead to the exaggeration of openness of interpretation, implying that audiences may obtain almost any kind of gratification regardless of content or of 'preferred readings'. Its functionalist emphasis is politically conservative: if we insist that people will always find some gratifications from any use of media, we may adopt a complacently uncritical stance towards what the mass media currently offer.– Chandler

Internet use motivations

• Although motivations for Internet use may vary among individuals, situations, and media vehicles, most uses and gratifications studies explore them based on some or all of the following dimensions: relaxation, companionship, habit, passing time, entertainment, social interaction, information/surveillance, arousal, and escape (Lin, 1999).– Wikipedia

Video game uses and gratifications

Types of video game players

• “Play theorists have identified a number of types of players, each with a different need that gets met by the type of game they play.”– Klug & Schell

Types

• The Competitor plays to be better than other players.

• The Explorer plays to experience the boundaries of the play world. He plays to discover first what others do not know yet.

• The Collector plays to acquire the most stuff through the game.

• The Achiever plays to not only be better now, but also be better in the rankings over time. He plays to achieve the most championships over time.

• The Joker plays for the fun alone and enjoys the social aspects.

• The Director plays for the thrill of being in charge. He wants to orchestrate the event.

• The Storyteller plays to create or live in an alternate world and build narrative out of that world.

• The Performer plays for the show he can put on.

• The Craftsman plays to build, solve puzzles, and engineer constructs.

Controlling their environment

• Games not only allow players to escape their environment, but to actively become involved in a new environment– Only escape available in most entertainment media

• Gamers make up little stories about game characters, increasing the realistic feeling of the game

• Control sought is mainly predictability of actions within the game so that the player can anticipate actions of opponents and be assured that random happenings do not undo his own actions

• MMORPG game players tend to be Achiever/Collectors

• “These people tend to view MMORPG games as a way to gain control in an alternative universe that is “sort of” like the one they actually live in, but is much more predictable. This forms an alternative to the world they live in, which feels (to them) random, heartless, and insensitive to their needs.”

• Control players want order so much that they are willing to give up narrative logic for predictability

Vicarious experience

• Participants are attracted to the ability to “experience a universe they may have only imagined”– Fantasy games– History games

• Storytellers are attracted by this possibility• Storytellers often want to see “what would

have happened if—”– “What if Stonewall Jackson had not been killed 2

months earlier and Lee had him at his side in [the battle of Gettysburg]?

Vicarious experience

• Sports games are also popular for this gratification—especially those that allow for team management and strategy

Other lives

• “Similar to Storytellers, these players have a lot in common with those who enjoy traditional media such (as) books and movies. They often play games to escape into an alternate reality, to see and explore and interact with every nook and cranny of that reality.”– Having control over the environment is not as important

has having the environment seem real and fleshed out– They expect random events, even want them (so long as

they fit with the scenario)• Volcanoes

– Scenarios can be designed to allow for role playing, collection of artifacts, rebuilding after disasters, etc.

– Explorers, Collectors, Performers, and Craftsmen

People play to compete

• “The stereotype is hardcore, frag-minded, trash-talking, head-to-head gamers playing Doom or Quake on the Internet and bragging about their conquests afterwards.”– “Competitive games give people a way to

express their combative, aggressive tendencies in a safe, socially acceptable way.”

– The player wants to establish a pecking order– This group may be maladjusted socially

• Engineers

• “Their success in games many times is a substitute for social acceptance and success in the real world. Let us be clear that we are talking about the extremes in these cases.”

• Similar to those who play competitive real-life sports for “the adrenaline rush of competition and the need to establish dominance in some arena.”– The environment must be organized

• Standings, ladders, rankings

Exploring fantasy relationships

• Explorer, Joker, Director, Storyteller, Performer• Much as the appeal of romance novels (women) or pornography

(men)• Not really well developed in gaming field yet• RPGs closest• Women are attracted by the possibilities of romantic relationships• “Even if the game designer does not explicitly deal with romance in

the story, the female gamers will invent it in their own head.”• Chat rooms, etc. have been much more involved in ‘cyber-sex’

– Note: Japanese development of sex games has been significant