Exploring the Typology and Impacts of Audience Gratifications Gained from TV–Smartphone Multitasking

ABSTRACT

Using an additional device (i.e., smartphone) while viewing TV is becoming one of the most popular forms of media multitasking, and the motivations of the TV–smartphone multitasking are worthwhile to investigate. Extant studies on gratifications derived from media consumption mainly examined the consumption of a single medium and few studies evaluated gratifications from concurrent media combinations. But the gratifications of media multitasking vary greatly among different forms of multitasking. This study addresses the typology and impacts of gratifications in simultaneous TV–smartphone use through an online national survey in China in 2016 (N = 682), based on the affordance-based framework. The study identifies four kinds of gratifications in TV–smartphone multitasking: emotional, social, habitual, and contextual interaction gratifications. It also finds positive impacts of fear of missing out and social media use on all gratifications. The results finally show that habitual gratifications negatively predict the propensity that the audience select TV as the primary screen.

Acknowledgments

The authors thank Prof. Sylvia M. Chan-Olmsted, from University of Florida, for her assistance and contribution about the research design and data collection.

Notes

1. The demographics of the internet users are provided by the China Internet Network Information Centre (CNNIC) on the half-a-year base, and the updated demographics during the survey conducted is the 38^th Report on China Internet Network Development of China (http://www.cnnic.net.cn/hlwfzyj/hlwxzbg/hlwtjbg/201608/t20160803_54392.htm).

Additional information

Funding

This Research is sponsored by Beijing Social Science Foundation [Grant No: 18XCA003]

Notes on contributors

Linsen Su

Linsen Su is a Professor of Department of Communications of Beijing Jiaotong University of China. Dr. Su’s research interest lies in new media and society, public opinion, and media management & economics.

Shih-Chih Chen

Shih-Chih Chen presently serves as an Associate Professor of Department of Information Management at National Kaohsiung University of Science and Technology, Taiwan. His research interests include electronic commerce, marketing, social media applications and managerial issues of emerging technologies.