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The purpose of this study is to compare the gratification sought and gratification obtained for cognitive needs from social media among information professionals in the limelight of uses and gratification theory. Cognitive needs are related to knowledge, acquiring information, comprehension etc., and gratification sought and gratification obtained are two distinct components of the uses and gratification theory.

For this quantitative research study, a self-administered survey questionnaire was used to collect data from the participants of the study. Sample of this study was 700 information professionals who are necessarily users of social media.

Finding of this study depicted that gratification obtained and gratification sought from social media for cognitive needs are different from each other, and information professionals need to revisit their social media use for cognitive needs.

The present study is limited to gratification sought and gratification obtained for cognitive needs among information professionals.

This study has determined that information professionals need to revisit their social media use for cognitive needs, as the obtained gratifications are different from gratification sought from social media.

Social media provides versatility of information in different forms and large numbers of information professionals are the users of social media around globe. Perceived use of social media for cognitive needs has been resulted into destructed gratifications. This study has brought the actual outcome of the use of social media to the audience so that they may rectify their social media use.

This study is a significant contribution for information professionals to review the gratifications sought and obtained from social media for cognitive needs. It has been established in this study that gratifications sought are significantly different from gratifications obtained from social media among information professionals.

The purpose of this research is twofold: (1) to identify and understand consumer motivations to use interactive technologies in stores through the lens of the uses and gratifications (UGT) approach and (2) to understand how these gratifications differ between different interactive technologies (interactive kiosks and self-checkouts).

This research presents a dual qualitative study based on 32 in-depth interviews with 20 consumers, eight salespersons and four phygital experts.

The data analysis identified three specific gratifications sought in using interactive kiosks (information-seeking, hedonic and social interaction) and two gratifications common to both interactive kiosks and self-checkouts (control and time-saving).

From a media perspective (UGT), this research provides a deeper understanding of gratifications sought in using interactive technologies in a phygital store. It also contributes significantly to previous research by highlighting that gratifications differ between different technology types.

The purpose of this paper is to explore the social media marketing activities of luxury brands, guided by uses and gratifications theory (UGT). It examines the gratifications sought by millennials, a new core luxury consumer group, and the gratifications obtained when following and connecting with luxury brands.

Online data are gathered from Facebook, Instagram and Twitter accounts of five top luxury brands. In addition, 30 in-depth interviews with millennials, the new generation of luxury consumers, were conducted. Thematic analysis strategy was followed to analyze the data and present the findings.

Luxury brands remain distant and aloof, which helps them to maintain a sense of exclusivity. User activity, ranging from observations to commenting on and liking luxury brand content, leads to the gratification of two types of need: affective and cognitive. Two affective needs that are satisfied by luxury brands’ social media marketing activities are aesthetic appreciation and entertainment. Cognitive needs are satisfied through the functional use of social media as an information source.

Several studies have investigated social media from the perspective of UGT, but this study is the first to investigate the implications of luxury brands’ social media usage with the lenses of UGT.

The purpose of this study is to describe university students’ motivations for using Facebook as an informal learning tool and explore the key barriers that may inhibit learning on the social media platform.

A case study approach was adopted in this study. Participants were 82 university students who participated in “e-Tutor” – an informal learning activity, conducted through Facebook. Focus group interviews were conducted, and students’ interactions on Facebook were also analysed to understand their motives for using the social media platform for learning. The uses and gratifications theory was used to explore student motivations for participating in the learning activity.

Results suggest that students perceived Facebook as a potential tool for learning and identified multiple motivating factors for their participation that included information seeking, convenience, connectedness, entertainment and reward seeking. Results also show that time constraints, social anxiety and cultural issues may inhibit learners’ active participation on social media platforms such as Facebook.

This study outlines an approach to use readily available and low-cost technological tools in learning design and provides some insights for teachers to design ubiquitous and personalised learning environments for students using such technologies, particularly social media. Specifically, Facebook offered a way to engage students in informal learning which can supplement students’ formal learning trajectories at university. While the uses and gratifications students sought through Facebook had an overall positive effect on their participation in e-Tutor activity, certain barriers can impede student active participation in learning environments on social media sites such as Facebook.

Enterprises build online product community to expect users to contribute: opinion sharing (content contribution) and product consumption (product contribution). Previous literature rarely focused on both. The purpose of this paper is to explain user contribution mechanism by identifying content contribution and product contribution.

This research chose Xiaomi-hosted online product community (bbs.xiaomi.cn) and Huawei-hosted online product community (club.huawei.com) where users can freely share ideas and buy products at the same time. Data were crawled from 109,665 community users to construct dependent variable measurement, and 611 questionnaires were used to verify research hypotheses.

The results indicate that both cognitive needs and personal integration needs have a significant positive impact on browse behavior; social integration needs and hedonic needs have a significant positive impact on content contribution behavior. Browse behavior not only directly affects but also indirectly influences product contribution through content contribution behavior.

Findings of this research provide community managers with useful insights into the relationship between content contribution and product contribution.

This study explains the formation mechanism of user product contribution and reveals the relationship between user content contribution and product contribution in online product community. This paper provides a different way of theorizing user contributions by incorporating uses and gratifications theory into the “Motivation-Behavior-Result” framework.

This study aims to examine how information and social gratifications sought by Internet users affect their affinity for the Internet or for particular types of online content.

A survey was administered in Singapore to collect data. A correlation analysis, a paired‐sample t test, and hierarchical regression analyses are conducted to address the research questions and hypotheses.

Affinity for the Internet and affinity for particular types of online content are correlated and distinct. Both relate positively to social gratifications. The passive social gratification of Internet access and the active pursuit of interactions exert similar impact on both types of affinity. Information affects neither after social gratifications are controlled.

Constant access to online contacts or quality online interaction may facilitate social gratifications, thereby boosting user affinity for the Internet or for particular types of online content. Online information should be presented interactively to attract and retain users. The selection of online content and applications should also be made easier to cultivate a loyal user market.

This study contributes to U&G theory by adapting a television‐based proposition to cyberspace, and examining the attitudinal effect of online social gratifications involving different levels of user activity.

The purpose of this paper is to propose a robust framework for assessing motivations to use Twitter. Drawing on previous studies, diffusion of innovations, unified theory of acceptance and use of technology, and uses and gratifications frameworks were incorporated to capture the variety in Twitter gratifications.

This study explored the motivations to use Twitter through data mining and content analysis of #IUseTwitterBecause trending topic in Turkey. The sample was consisted of 4,465 tweets posted by 3,794 unique Twitter persona.

Findings revealed 13 distinct Twitter gratifications which were grouped under four main categories: content, process, social and technology. Process gratifications were found to be the strongest motives for using Twitter whereas content gratifications were the weakest. The current findings indicated that Turkish users engage with Twitter mostly for self-expression, escapism, and social interaction. Moreover, the study found a novel campaign gratification for using Twitter solely to make political or social agenda visible in the society.

The current study extends the previous literature on motivations in using social networking services from both analytical and methodological perspectives. The naturally occurring data and relatively large sample size in this study provides a deeper look into social media gratifications and yields more generalizable findings. Besides, this study contributes to the alleviation of conceptual confusions among the past social media gratification studies.

The aim of this paper is to assess the use of social media by Gen Z consumers and the ways they impact on and re-shape their fashion consumption journey. This generational approach uses the lens of uses and gratifications theory (UGT) to explore the customer fashion retail journey from the perspective of the Gen Z consumer.

The research uses an exploratory approach in response to the relative lack of research in to GenZ consumers combined with a need to understand shopping journeys. Mixed methods were used with a first phase of interviews followed by a survey of 102 Gen Z students recruited online in the UK during the COVID-19 pandemic.

The study found that GenZ users of social media for shopping sought gratification from experiences derived from social relationships, entertainment and information. The need for immediate gratification was found in new information and meeting new people to maintain social relationships, learn about products and inform the shopping journey. Further, the research supported the importance of visual images in the affective gratification of shopping needs. Resale sites on social media were favoured for their low prices, information about previously owned fashion items and the opportunity to exercise sustainable fashion choices.

The research advances understanding of fashion shopping journeys through social media and online resale sites. It demonstrates that younger consumers, GenZ, shop through the gratification of experiences informed by their social networks and wider contacts. The linear stages of pre to post–purchase shopping are merged and looped as they exchange information about their shopping journey, from information gathering to post–purchase comments. The role of the brand to these knowledgeable consumers conducting their own resale trade is to facilitate access to and information about their products.

Usage patterns of mobile phones in Israel position them as instruments of great importance and as everyday, multipurpose, and interpersonal devices. This study utilizes a critical perspective of the “uses and gratifications” approach to explore the usage of and gratification sought from smartphone usage of millennials. Sixty personal in-depth interviews were conducted during 2013 with millennials (undergraduate students) with the primary goal of exploring millennials’ perceptions of smartphone usages, as well as their personal experiences with smartphones and the role of smartphones in their lives. A grounded theory approach was used to analyze students’ reflections on the roles of smartphones in their lives. Participants have expressed a great bonding with their smartphone and relationships that can be described in term of "love and hate.” The thematic analysis highlighted the addictive elements of using their smartphone, that is, using it more frequently and under undesired circumstances than one would like to, and even becoming anxious about losing the device or even getting too far away from it. Other leading themes included the influence of external pressures to use smartphones, the varied usefulness that smartphones serve in participants’ lives, and a strong sense of "Fear of missing out" as an explanation for their extensive use of their smartphones. The findings of this chapter indicate that smartphones have become an indispensable medium among young adults, used due to practical, as well as to emotional reasons; inner, as well as external impulses.

The number of children using and owning mobile devices has grown significantly in the last decade. By applying a uses and gratifications approach, this paper aims to explore what customers of a tablet computer for children report about the use and expectations of these devices from an information behavior perspective.

For this study, 1,185 online customer reviews published for two different versions of the Amazon Fire Tablet Kids Edition on the German Amazon website between June 16, 2019, and June 15, 2020, were analyzed. A content analysis of the reviews was conducted using different inductive coding methods.

Findings indicate that customers describe different aspects of children's use and families' expectations of tablets within their reviews. The expressed gratifications mostly relate to the aim of entertainment. Intentional information seeking activities were hardly mentioned within the reviews, but many customers emphasize learning as an important activity with the devices. Overall, the customer reviews reveal a mix of gratifications that differ from reported motivations for adults' tablet use.

The possibility of manipulated online customer reviews must be considered. It should also be viewed critically that the children's perspectives are only indirectly included in the data.

Families' expectations of tablets as a device for children have not been a focus of research to date. This study uses an innovative research design by applying a uses and gratifications approach to online customer reviews for children's tablets. The findings add to previous research on children's use and families' expectations of tablets and contribute to our understanding of children's information behavior in connection with mobile devices.