Uses and Gratification paradigm

A Uses and Gratification approach will be used to develop and answer
research questions. The current status of the uses and gratifications
theory is still based on Katz's first analysis, people use media for
many different purposes, but the uses and gratification approach is
still extremely valid as technology moves the universe into an
electronic information age. Advances in media technology have allowed
consumers to be in more control of the media, and because
uses-and-gratification perspective is based on the concept of an active
audience, it is especially appropriate for studying new communication
technologies (Rubin, 1989). The individual communicator is considered
central to the study of media effects in uses and gratifications theory.
In contrast to more direct effects explanations of new and traditional
media, it is thought that a person must typically have some use for a
medium or message in order for that medium or message to have potential
influence (Katz, 1959).
Concisely speaking, there are two main reasons why the uses and
gratifications approach is used for this study.

1. New media have been studied repeatedly using a uses and gratification
approach. A new medium may generate new motivations and gratifications
obtained by its users. Over the past twenty years there have been studies
of VCR by Levy (1980), videotex by Atwater et al. (1985), cable television
by Heeter and Greenberg (1985), political computer bulletin boards by
Garramone et al. (1986), another extensive look on video recorders by Rubin
and Bantz (1989), and remote control devices by Perse and Ferguson (1993).

It is within this line of research that this study examines Internet
broadcasting. An analysis of users should take place as the Korean
television and radio industries move onto the World Wide Web. As Severin
and Tankard point out, media planners in many areas should be conducting
more research on their potential audiences, and the gratifications those
audiences are trying to obtain (1997, p.340). Pitkow and Recker add that
the universal accessibility of information technologies means that the
user population will be extremely diverse in terms of skills, experience,
abilities, and backgrounds. A crucial ingredient to the success of such
endeavors is an understanding of its user population
(Pitkow & Recker, 1994, p.1).

2. Another tenet of uses and gratification approach is that the audience
is active, and the audience member's uses of the mass media is goal
directed (Katz et al., 1974, p.21). Such is the case with Internet
broadcasting. The web is highly interactive. Users of Internet broadcasting
are in control of the flow and content of information they view or listen to.
Its basic design requires the user to select or bypass "pages" of text or
graphics. Unlike traditional media such as television and radio, web pages
require continuous interaction from users. The users can select one web site
or move through a series of web sites, which usually have several layers of
screens of information to access. It is the users to make about how much
information they want or need. The users can and have to seek sites which
will best fit the motives they log on for, and then they determine if the
sites are fulfilling their sought gratifications. These various levels of
audience activity suggest that the uses and gratifications theory is an
appropriate strategy to explore Internet broadcasting.

Significance

Finding patterns for this new media consumption among Korean international
students will give the Korean media industry a better understanding of
communication behavior of new media users. Also, it is crucial for media
planners to monitor the position and direction of the audience to provide
useful data for future business strategies and media studies.