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SundarLimperos2013-UsesandGrats2.0-1.pdf
Uses and Grats 2.0: New Gratifications
for New Media
S. Shyam Sundar and Anthony M. Limperos
This article responds to recent calls for conceptual and methodological re-
finement, issued by uses-and-gratifications scholars (Rubin, 2009; Ruggiero,
2000), for studying emergent media. Noting that studies on the uses of the
Internet have generated a list of gratifications that are remarkably similar to
those obtained from older media, it identifies two measurement artifacts—
(1) measures designed for older media are used to capture gratifications from
newer media; and (2) gratifications are conceptualized and operationalized
too broadly (e.g., information-seeking), thus missing the nuanced gratifications
obtained from newer media. It challenges the notion that all gratifications are
borne out of innate needs, and proposes that affordances of media technology
can shape user needs, giving rise to new and distinctive gratifications. A
sample of new gratifications and potential measures for those are provided.
‘‘It’s really the messaging service we didn’t know we needed until we had it’’
Biz Stone, co-founder, twitter.com
Thanks to the Internet, the concept of ‘‘active audience’’ has now reached a
pinnacle. Proposed by early uses-and-gratifications (U&G) researchers (e.g., Rubin,
1993) to capture the purposiveness and attentiveness in media consumption and
contrast it with the general assumption of a ‘‘passive audience’’ among media-
effects scholars (Rubin, 2009), the notion of an active audience has steadily moved
from an assumption to obvious reality. Internet audiences are so active now that
S. Shyam Sundar (Ph.D., Stanford University) is a distinguished professor of communication and co-director of the Media Effects Research Laboratory at Penn State University.His researchexamines social psychological aspects of technological affordances in digital media.
Anthony M. Limperos (Ph.D., Pennsylvania State University) is an assistant professor in the Division of Instructional Communication & Research at the University of Kentucky. His research focuses on the uses and effects of video games and new communication technologies in health, entertainment, and instructional contexts.
The first author was supported in this research by the U. S. National Science Foundation (NSF) via Standard Grant No. IIS-0916944 and by the Korea Science and Engineering Foundation under the WCU (World Class University) program funded through the Ministry of Education, Science and Technology, S. Korea (Grant No. R31-2008-000-10062-0) and awarded to the Department of Interaction Science, Sungkyunkwan University, Korea (where he served as visiting professor).
© 2013 Broadcast Education Association Journal of Broadcasting & Electronic Media 57(4), 2013, pp. 504–525 DOI: 10.1080/08838151.2013.845827 ISSN: 0883-8151 print/1550-6878 online
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we seldom refer to them as ‘‘audiences.’’ Instead, we call them ‘‘users,’’ in keeping
with the letter and spirit of the U&G paradigm.
Usage implies volitional action, not simply passive reception. What explains this
transformation in our media consumption? The answer may lie in the nature of the
media themselves. The tools offered by modern media have expanded the range and
scope of our interactions with media content. While a simple dial characterized the
sum total of user interactions with a traditional radio receiver and a remote-control
device channeled our interactions with a television set, current-day media technolo-
gies (e.g., the computer) offer a wide variety of action possibilities for the user—the
keyboard invites us to type, the mouse to point, the hyperlink to click, the joystick
to navigate, the haptic sensors to scroll, and so on. Human-computer interaction
researchers (Norman, 1999) have conceptualized these ‘‘actionable properties’’ as
‘‘affordances’’ (Gibson, 1977) that are visually suggestive of the nature of user
interaction with the medium. Increasingly, these affordances are allowing Internet
users to not only experience media in newer ways, but also actively contribute
their own content, given the rise in interfaces and applications that are premised
on user-generated content (UGC).
While previously the notion of ‘‘media’’ referred to a handful of mass communi-
cation tools such as newspapers, radio, television, and film, the current academic
conception of media is broader, reflecting the proliferation of new communication
technologies in recent times. Media today range from a plethora of devices (smart
phones, robots) to channels (Internet, cable) to venues on those channels (social net-
working sites, home shopping network) and/or devices (smartphone apps), affording
users the ability to not only interact with these ‘‘media’’ (human-computer interac-
tion) but also interact through them to communicate with other users (computer-
mediated communication). As Sundar and Bellur (2011) note, it is problematic to
conceptualize convergent media like the Internet as a single monolithic source.
Instead, it is more useful to disaggregate such media into their constituent affor-
dances (e.g., interactivity) and study the uses and gratifications obtained from each
of those affordances. For example, we would make discoveries about the psychology
of interactivity per se, in a way that is independent of the medium offering that
interactivity so that we can generalize this knowledge to future technologies (Nass
& Mason, 1990). Some affordances are present to a greater degree in certain media,
with interactivity, for example, being lower in newspapers (given the structure of
letters to the editor and other feedback mechanisms) than in computer-based media
(Rafaeli, 1988). Sundar (2008) argues that the affordances of digital technologies
transform our media experience by inviting us to engage with content in such a
personal way that we not only act, but actively construct meaning.
Does this expanded scope of user interactions lead to a net increase in the grati-
fications obtained from modern media? If so, is this increase simply one of volume?
Or do we seek and obtain new gratifications from new technologies? Perhaps more
fundamentally, do new media create new needs, which they then proceed to gratify,
as suggested by the co-founder of Twitter? Historically, U&G research has been
criticized on the grounds that it is too audience-centered and does not consider
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how the technology itself can influence the selection of—and gratifications obtained
from using—media (Lichenstein & Rosenfeld, 1983; Ruggiero, 2000). Considering
that the focus of uses and gratifications studies is often not the technology of the
medium per se and considering that much of the research is governed by the tenets
and methods of traditional U&G research, it is likely that our understanding of new
media use is dominated by social psychological factors rather than medium-related
aspects. With this in mind, we elaborate upon the possibility that the technology
itself could be responsible for creating new gratifications, so that we can increase the
scope, relevance, and robustness of U&G research for explaining new media use in
initial stages and beyond. To do this, we review past U&G studies on different media
technologies and then discuss potential gratifications suggested by four classes of
affordances—modality, agency, interactivity, and navigability—in modern digital
media, proposing specific new gratifications that can be measured in future U&G
studies that focus on such media.
U&G Research in Mass Communication
According to Katz, Blumler, and Gurevitch (1974), U&G research is concerned
with ‘‘(1) the social and psychological origins of (2) needs, which generate (3) ex-
pectations from (4) the mass media or other sources, which lead to (5) differential
patterns of media exposure (or engagement in other activities), resulting in (6) need
gratifications and (7) other consequences, perhaps mostly unintended ones’’ (p. 20).
This approach assumes that people have innate needs that can be satisfied by media.
Gratifications are conceptualized as ‘‘need satisfactions,’’ which are obtained when
a person’s needs are met by certain types of media sources that match their ex-
pectations (Katz et al., 1974). This original outline of U&G from the 1970s governs
scholarly research on media gratifications to this day.
Broadly, U&G is an audience-centered approach, which posits that individuals
have particular needs that drive selection of certain types of media (Rubin, 2009).
The overarching goal of U&G research is to understand the interaction between the
origins of media user needs and context (Palmgreen, Wenner, & Rosengren, 1985).
Regardless of medium or context, the emphasis of traditional U&G research is on
individual differences and active audience members (Haridakis, 2002), meaning that
gratifications obtained from media are largely based on a given user’s pre-existing
needs, rather than on specific technological features of media.
In keeping with this assumption, U&G researchers have often focused on social
and psychological variables as determinants of motivation to use certain types
of media (e.g., Conway & Rubin, 1991; Rubin, 2009). Others have focused on
the difference between gratifications that are ‘‘sought’’ and ‘‘obtained’’ through
media use (e.g., Palmgreen & Rayburn, 1979; Palmgreen, Wenner, & Rayburn,
1980), further underscoring user determinism in the media-use equation. In essence,
the dominant belief appears to be that motives or needs drive the actual use or
gratification obtained from different types of media. Accordingly, in U&G research,
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Sundar and Limperos/NEW GRATIFICATIONS FOR NEW MEDIA 507
motives (often modeled as latent constructs) reflect the gratifications that people
seek and potentially receive from media use (Rubin, 2009). In contemporary ap-
proaches to U&G, social and psychological factors guide behaviors which then
mold expectations about perceived or actual media use (Palmgreen et al., 1985;
Rubin, 2009).
Media Gratification Typologies
Although the U&G perspective has been applied in a variety of ways to understand
media, the bulk of the work in this area has focused on understanding gratifications
of media use (So, 2012). U&G researchers have identified many ‘‘gratifications’’
over the past 60 years by using the classic two-step methodological approach of
focus groups followed by surveys (Greenberg, 1974; Lucas & Sherry, 2004; Rubin,
2009; Rubin & Bantz, 1987).
However, in recent years, U&G researchers have tended to dispense with the
first step of the two-step process and administered survey instruments from studies
of older media, modified slightly to suit the particular medium under investigation.
For example, Papacharissi and Rubin (2000) combined pre-existing measures of
interpersonal, traditional media, and new media motives/gratifications measures in
order to shed light on why people use the Internet. After assessing the responses
to their survey, the researchers found that people use the Internet for interpersonal
reasons, to pass time, information-seeking, convenience, and entertainment pur-
poses. Similarly, Haridakis, & Hansen (2009) used the pre-existing measures of
Internet gratifications (identified by Papacharissi, & Rubin, 2000) and television
viewing (Rubin, 1983) and found that people view and share YouTube videos
for convenient entertainment, interpersonal connection, convenient information-
seeking, escape, co-viewing, and social interaction. While these two examples are
revealing with regard to the general reasons that people use the Internet and specific
Web sites like YouTube, the reflected gratifications are almost identical to those
that have historically been identified as salient for traditional media like radio and
television.
Video games, the Internet, social networking sites, and devices such as MP3
players and tablets are considered to be relatively new types of media in popular
culture as well as in research. If these media are new, do they provide new types
of gratifications, leading to new felt needs among users? To further investigate this
claim, we identified and reviewed 20 U&G studies (see Figure 1) that contained
gratification typologies for major media from the 1940s to the present day. This
review of the literature revealed considerable overlap between gratifications for
both old and new media, suggesting that there are some core reasons for media
use that cut across specific media vehicles of the time. For example, many studies
have shown that arousal, escape, learning, habit, social interaction, companion-
ship, information-seeking, passing time, relaxation, and entertainment to be the
salient gratifications derived from watching television (Greenberg, 1974; Rubin,
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Figure 1
Gratifications Obtained from New Media (1940–2011)
Each color represents a specific type of gratification identified in the U&G literature and shared by two or more media. Gratifications that are unique to a given medium are not colored. Across the landscape of U&G studies from 1940 to 2011, two trends are noteworthy: (1) As we move from old to newer media, it appears that new gratifications do emerge with new technology; (2) Some broad gratifications, especially those related to social and information functions, tend to get more nuanced and specific with newer media.
1981, 1983). The entertainment gratification has been associated with television
(Greenberg, 1974; Rubin, 1983), the Internet (Papacharissi & Rubin, 2000), video
games (Lucas & Sherry, 2004), YouTube (Haridakis & Hansen, 2009), Facebook
(Joinson, 2008; Raacke & Bonds-Raacke, 2008), MP3 players (Zeng, 2011), and
Twitter (Liu, Cheung, & Lee, 2010). This should not come as a surprise because
researchers tend to borrow measures used with analogous older-media contexts,
but it does give rise to a larger question concerning the nature and specificity of
media-related gratifications. When comparing the gratifications from early television
studies to the Internet and new communication technologies, one is left with the
impression that newer media do not really afford any new gratifications that cannot
be found in traditional media. This could be due to the fact that there are fairly
consistent and overlapping gratifications that people have for using various media,
or could be a result of the measures that are often employed to understand new
media.
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Could the overlap in gratifications be a result of using gratifications measures de- signed for older media and therefore not reflective of the new gratifications poten- tially obtained from newer media?
Overlap in gratification typologies is very common across the communication
literature. For example, the research on the uses and gratifications of video games
identified such gratifications as competition and challenge (Lucas & Sherry, 2004),
which were noted 60 years earlier as gratifications derived from listening to radio
talk shows (Herzog, 1944). In the earliest studies involving U&G of television,
Greenberg (1974) and Rubin (1981, 1983) identified gratifications like entertain-
ment, social interaction, and information-seeking. Roughly 35 years later, the same
gratifications have been identified for a variety of new media like blogging (Kaye
& Johnson, 2002), interactive news (Yoo, 2011), YouTube (Hardakis & Hansen,
2009), and social-networking Web sites ( Joinson, 2008; Raacke & Bonds-Raacke,
2008). Even when other researchers have identified seemingly unique gratifications
obtained from different types of new media, these too have been associated with
more traditional media, sometimes under different labels (see Figure 1). Although
it is entirely possible that we seek out new media for reasons that are similar to
those for selecting and using older media, we must also consider the possibility that
nuanced (and perhaps ‘‘new’’) gratifications obtained from using the Internet and
other new communication technologies have not been fully specified, even though
they may be captured by gross measures of larger categories of gratifications.
Could the overlap in gratifications be a result of using overly broad categories of gratifications (e.g., information-seeking, entertainment) and therefore not sensitive enough to identify the specific gratifications obtained from newer media?
Rubin (2009) recently pointed out that U&G would greatly benefit from ‘‘in-
creased specificity, especially as attention is turned to new media’’ (p. 176). In
the few instances where researchers have emphasized specific, rather than general,
gratifications, we have seen new gratifications emerge. These tend to be specific
to a given medium at the time it is introduced, but become a routinely sought
gratification from later media. For example, mobility was identified for the first time
as a gratification obtained from using cell phones (Wei & Lo, 2006), but is now
an integral gratification obtained from all mobile devices, including ‘‘tablets’’ such
as iPad (Kim, Sundar, & Park, 2011). Personal identity enhancement and photo
sharing were recognized as new gratifications from using Facebook, the popular
social networking site ( Joinson, 2008), but are now obtained routinely from a whole
suite of Web 2.0 applications, including mobile photo-sharing applications such as
Instagram (Wortham, 2011).
Even though unique medium-specific gratifications have been identified in some
studies, a few broad categories of gratifications dominate the U&G literature on
most media technologies (see Figure 1). According to the original tenets of U&G,
gratifications are rooted entirely in social and psychological origins of needs (Katz
et al., 1974). U&G researchers would argue that some media meet certain needs
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while others fulfill a slightly different configuration of needs. If this is the case,
every emergent gratification that is obtained from each new medium is merely a
reflection of needs that already existed, signaling that gratifications from new media
are reflections of primary needs rather than manifestations of new needs.
However, this focus on a finite set of human needs is somewhat limiting, par-
ticularly when it comes to articulating newer gratifications derived from emergent
media. An exclusive focus on users’ needs would mean, as Elliot (1974) argued, that
U&G cannot predict anything useful past an elaborate construction of media use
based on individual differences. But, perhaps more important, it hinders the concept
of gratifications by surrogating it to needs (Becker, 1979). Conceptually, the gratifi-
cations that we derive from media need not necessarily be driven by innate needs,
but could be triggered by features we experience while using particular media.
The interactivity of most modern media makes possible such a conceptualization
whereby users are not always goal-directed at the beginning of their engagement of
media, but tend to develop needs during the course of their media interaction. U&G
scholars have historically distinguished between ‘‘content gratifications’’ (obtained
from media content) and ‘‘process gratifications’’ (from using the media) (Rubin,
2009). But, neither the content nor the process is fixed or finite when users browse
through different Web sites or navigate their way through video game worlds.
Stafford, Stafford, and Schkade (2004) claim that this gives rise to a third kind of
gratification, relating to the use of media as a social environment.
Beyond these three broad classifications of process, content, and social gratifica-
tions, the literature on U&G studies does not offer specific insight into the changing
nature of media-related gratifications. In order to capture the increasing volume and
diversity of gratifications being obtained by such heavily used media products as
Twitter, Facebook, and mobile games, it is time that we broaden our focus beyond
social and psychological origins of needs, and also consider potential influences of
the perceived capabilities of the media technology upon our gratifications.
Technology as a Source of Gratifications
Lichtenstein and Rosenfeld (1983) first proposed that medium-specific gratifi-
cations are predicted by characteristics of media themselves rather than innate
needs or perceptions of use. This essentially means that certain gratifications are
predicted by using different types of technologies, rather than felt needs. The idea
that gratifications obtained are not necessarily predicated on strong pre-existing
needs was evident even in non-interactive media, with researchers noticing that the
gratifications sought from the media do not always predict gratifications obtained
from them (Palmgreen et al., 1985). Recently, Rubin (2009) offered a nuanced
definition of gratifications (as ‘‘expectations and desires that emanate from, and are
constrained by, personal traits, social context, and interaction’’ p. 167), noting that
the media user’s ‘‘degree of initiative or activity : : : has been seen as more variable
than absolute’’ (p. 168) in recent times. With the explosive growth of interactive
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Sundar and Limperos/NEW GRATIFICATIONS FOR NEW MEDIA 511
media in the last 2 decades, the time has come to take seriously the changing
nature of user interactions with media, and the newer, more specific gratifications
that they engender instead of simply relying on gratifications used in research with
older media.
A fundamental source of the changing nature of user gratifications is the tech-
nology of the medium itself. Ruggiero (2000) suggested that aspects of technol-
ogy (e.g., interactivity, demassification, and asynchronicity) would be important
for future U&G research, in that they will provide researchers an array of new
behaviors to examine. Newer media are characterized by newer functionalities,
thereby altering ‘‘process gratifications.’’ At the same time, they also determine
‘‘content gratifications’’ by influencing the nature of content accessed, discussed,
and created when users interact with such media. For example, historically, U&G
researchers have treated the pursuit of these gratifications as being motivationally
driven (e.g., Hearn, 1989), with media users orienting either to the medium in
a ‘‘ritualized’’ way for diversion or to its content in an ‘‘instrumental’’ way for
achieving a particular utilitarian goal (Rubin, 1984). It is clear that newer media
have ushered in new rituals (e.g., game-playing, checking Facebook news feed)
and new instrumental activities (e.g., using a search engine, pulling up smartphone
apps for tracking one’s health behaviors). Furthermore, new features (e.g., mobility,
augmented reality) offered by each new medium can themselves provide process
gratifications. For example, the affordance of mobility has quickly resulted in a
number of new rituals, such as flipping out a phone when the plane lands and
watching a movie on one’s tablet during one’s subway commute. Such gratifications
may reflect latent needs that were hitherto unfulfilled, but their realization is clearly
driven by the new possibilities offered by the technology of the medium. Content
gratifications, especially when construed broadly as the pursuit of information and
entertainment, may not be altered by the technology, but the process gratifications
relating to the context and method of consuming information and entertainment are
likely to be influenced by the interaction opportunities offered by the medium.
How users interact with a given medium is dictated at least in part by the affor-
dances in the technology of the medium (Norman, 2002). The notion of affordances
is rooted in perceptual and evolutionary psychology and is based on the argument
that visual stimuli in our environment suggest how we are supposed to interact with
them (Gibson 1977, 1986). For example, a computer invites a person to type and
the shape of a shoe implies that it is to be worn on your foot. Gibson (1986) also
viewed affordances in a constructivist way, consisting of the interaction between
the world and an actor. For instance, a news Web site affords users the possibility of
browsing current news items much like in a newspaper. Additionally, some of these
Web sites now allow users to post news and submit stories that end up being part
of actual news feeds. In sum, affordances visually suggest not only how users can
interact with the interface, but also how they can contribute and construct content
by using that interface.
That said, there are numerous affordances offered by modern media, raising the
need for a systematic approach to categorizing them and studying their contribution
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to specific gratifications. The variable-centered approach (Nass & Mason, 1990)
offers a solution by disaggregating technologies into their constituent variables.
One such class of variables, called task variables, relates closely to the notion
of affordances. The MAIN Model (Sundar, 2008) identifies four classes of tech-
nological affordances in digital media—modality, agency, interactivity, and navi-
gability—that have been shown over the years to have significant psychological
consequences. The model posits that these affordances provide cues to media
users, which then trigger cognitive heuristics (mental shortcuts) about character-
istics of the content that they consume. These heuristics, or snap judgments, can
lead to either quick or ‘‘heuristic processing’’ (Chaiken, 1980) of content or guide
more effortful ‘‘systematic processing’’ of content. The cues could come in the
form of the mere existence of an affordance on an interface (e.g., presence of
chat function) and/or metrics (e.g., # of Facebook friends) assembled by an af-
fordance.
Given this, a distinct possibility is that the affordances of modern media will
lead users to expect certain gratifications and thereby shape the fulfillment that
they receive by using these media. We illustrate this with a few examples of new-
media gratifications derived by users when they engage with the four technological
affordances identified by the MAIN Model.
Modality-based Gratifications
Modality refers to the different methods of presentation (e.g., audio or pictures) of
media content, appealing to different aspects of the human perceptual system (e.g.,
hearing, seeing). The Internet’s ability to provide content in multiple modalities (text,
pictures, audio, video) is the reason why we sometimes refer to it as ‘‘multimedia.’’
Research indicates that presenting information in multiple modalities is not simply
convenient, but also perceptually and cognitively significant. As it turns out, we
process information from one modality quite differently than another, expending far
more cognitive effort with textual information and experiencing greater distraction
with audiovisual representation of information (e.g., Sundar, 2000). Moreover, some
modalities unique to the Internet, such as animation and pop-ups, are shown by
research to evoke visceral responses in users, commanding our attention while
simultaneously inviting our wrath (Diao & Sundar, 2004). In addition to dictating
how we perceive and process content, modality enhancements in digital media
serve to cue cognitive heuristics about the quality of underlying content. The MAIN
Model argues that the visual modality is more trusted than text, i.e., pictures cue
the ‘‘realism heuristic’’ leading us to quickly conclude that if something is pho-
tographed, then it must be more real than if it is simply written about in textual
form. We feel that a meeting via videoconferencing is more real than one via
audioconferencing because of the additional affordance of video. More advanced
modalities like virtual reality can cue the ‘‘being-there heuristic,’’ leading us to factor
in the authenticity and intensity of our experience when making judgments about
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Table 1
Possible New Gratifications from Media Technology
Modality Agency Interactivity Navigability
Realism Agency-Enhancement Interaction Browsing/Variety-Seeking
Coolness Community building Activity Scaffolds/Navigation aids
Novelty Bandwagon Responsiveness Play/Fun
Being There Filtering/Tailoring Dynamic control
Ownness
Note. This list is not exhaustive. Each new proposed gratification is theorized to originate from one or more of the 4 broad classes of technological affordances.
the content delivered through that experience. Newer stylish modalities like the
cover-flow feature on an iPod could cue the ‘‘coolness heuristic’’ on the one hand,
leading to a generally positive consideration of message content, but also cue the
‘‘novelty heuristic’’ on the other hand, leading to uncertainty during the interaction.
In this way, the modality of presentation can be quite influential in dictating our
stance toward content delivered by Internet-based media.
As media users become saturated with devices and interfaces that offer such
modality affordances, their expectations from media are likely to be dictated by
these heuristics. For example, ‘‘coolness’’ is a gratification that we have now come
to seek with new interfaces released by Apple, and ‘‘novelty’’ is a gratification that
we seek in new video game consoles that include gestural modality in addition
to more traditional modalities of interaction. We anticipate greater ‘‘realism’’ from
news Web sites that have live video feeds in addition to text, and fully expect
to enter a new world when browsing a virtual environment such as Second Life.
The realism with which we can experience mediated portrayals of reality and the
feeling of ‘‘being there’’ in a mediated environment are examples of gratifications
made possible by innovations in the modality affordance of technologies underlying
modern-day media. (See Table 1 for a list of modality-based gratifications). When
mapped onto traditional U&G communication orientations, realism and being-there
gratifications would likely serve an instrumental purpose whereas coolness and
novelty would apply more to ritualized use of the medium.
Agency-Based Gratifications
Under the MAIN Model, the agency affordance of the Internet allows us all to be
agents or sources of information. While the role of gatekeeping has historically been
the domain of a privileged few, now anybody can serve as a gatekeeper of content
on the Internet. Blogs allow us to broadcast our own content or filter other content
on the Web. The rise of user-generated content, in the form of such platforms and
sites as YouTube and Facebook, has profoundly altered the sender-receiver equation
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of communication, but more importantly given rise to new gratifications (Shao,
2009). Studies show that digital media users are more agentic and like to assume
the role of sender or source of information, thanks to widespread proliferation of
customization technologies (Sundar, Oh, Bellur, Jia, & Kim, 2012). They are also
motivated to build community, as manifested in their efforts to participate in online
forums in large numbers, post comments on others’ blogs and contribute willingly
to collaborative filtering applications that dominate so many Web sites. In fact, they
rate content chosen or favored by other users as being more worthy than that offered
by professional journalists (Sundar & Nass, 2001). Therefore, agency-enhancement
and community-building are gratifications driven by affordances that (a) let users
to serve as sources of content, both individually and collectively, and (b) convey
others’ reception of their postings (Stavrositu & Sundar, 2012).
In terms of transmitting meaning, self-agency can connote own-ness whereas
other-agency may lead to the application of either the expertise heuristic, machine
heuristic, or bandwagon heuristic, depending on whether the other is a professional
gatekeeper, a bot, or the collective user base respectively. Again, these heuristics
serve as repositories of meaning for users, especially in terms of deriving gratifica-
tions from the media being used. The fact that other-agency leads to the application
of bandwagon heuristic is quite well established (e.g., Sundar, Oeldorf-Hirsch &
Xu, 2008). When we are given information about what other customers bought on
Amazon.com or what the most forwarded news stories of the day are, we tend to
be swayed by the choices of our unknown peers. But, this heuristic becomes a
gratification when we begin to expect them on interfaces and feel disadvantaged
when they are unavailable. Consider this example: Before the diffusion of travel
Web sites, most of us booked hotel rooms in remote locations, often over the phone,
without ever knowing the experiences of previous hotel guests. Today, the hotel-
booking routine for most of us is quite different. We have come to expect guest
ratings and comments about the hotels under consideration before we book them
online. Even if one other user has left a comment saying that they found a cockroach
in the bathroom of the hotel suite in which they stayed, that will likely give us pause.
More generally, we have begun to expect some general consensus information about
the value of a product or service when we go to e-commerce Web sites, in the form
of numeric cues (e.g., star ratings) and/or user comments. This need for assessing
the bandwagon around a service, commodity, or an issue is a classic example of a
need facilitated by user interactions with affordances offered by new media. Clearly,
advances in collaborative filtering technology have made us seek this gratification
(of viewing collective opinions of others) when using modern-day media, be it other
customers’ experiences on an e-commerce site or other readers’ views on a news
site.
In general, agency-based gratifications such as agency-enhancement, community-
building, bandwagon, filtering/tailoring, and ownness (Table 1) are made possible
by a suite of new interface tools relating to customization and crowd-sourcing,
serving mostly instrumental goals of highly motivated and involved users.
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Interactivity-Based Gratifications
Interactivity is defined as the affordance that allows the user to make real-time
changes to the content in the medium. The interactivity affordance goes to the heart
of audience activity by allowing users to interact with and through the medium.
News presentation is no longer static; the consumer dynamically manages it. Re-
search has shown that some interactive features such as drags (as on a map) are
physiologically significant, commanding heightened attention, while also tending to
impede the processing of content (Sundar & Constantin, 2004). Nevertheless, they
have become the norm on news Web sites, so much so that the presence of a map
on any media interface triggers the interaction heuristic (Sundar, 2008). If, upon
seeing a map on a non-interactive Web site, users drag their mouse on it unsuc-
cessfully and are disappointed as a result, then this signals a need for interaction.
Likewise, several new gratifications are likely to be triggered by the proliferation
of interactive media—users are likely to expect greater levels of activity from their
media experiences, they would want their media interfaces to be responsive to
their actions, they will expect to be given more choice and greater control, they
will expect more embedded hyperlinks to click through, more flow in their media
experiences, and so on. As a result, activity, responsiveness, choice, control, and
flow may well be the next generation of gratifications that we seek from interactive
media (Table 1).
In general, interactivity has proven to be a double-edged sword, with users
desiring more of it, but responding negatively to content delivered via high lev-
els of interactivity. For example, studies with political-candidate Web sites have
demonstrated that interactivity has a positive effect on user impressions of the
candidate up to a point, but too much interactivity is as bad as no interactivity,
partly because it entails more effort on the part of the user and partly because it
results in a rigorous scrutiny of content (Sundar, 2007). Interactivity assures intense
engagement with content—good content will appear much better, but most content
on most Internet sites is mediocre, so interactivity is likely to highlight flaws in
content that might have otherwise been ignored. These characteristics can, over
time, drive a general preference toward interactive interfaces, making the need for
interactivity as common a gratification as information-seeking.
The very presence of interactivity on a Web site or any other digital application is
likely to convey meaning to users (Sundar, 2008). For example, it signifies openness
of information access and the participatory nature of a forum, which can directly
lead to positive perceptions of the content even without an effortful consideration
of the nature of the content. The usefulness of such mental shortcuts (or heuristics)
might indeed motivate a greater need for interactivity in media interfaces. It is akin
to accountability that we automatically expect from those in whom we entrust
responsibility. Just like we expect our bank accounts to be insured by FDIC, we
expect our media to be equipped with the ability to provide an open forum for user
feedback and participation.
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In sum, the proliferation of interactive features has expanded our expectations as
well as bandwidth for the degree of interaction and activity that we prefer to have
with modern media interfaces. Moreover, we expect our media to be responsive to
our actions in real-time and provide us dynamic control over the interface. Together,
the various gratifications related to interactivity (Table 1) suggest that this affordance
serves a highly utilitarian orientation toward the medium and its operation.
Navigability-Based Gratifications
Navigability is the affordance that allows user movement through the medium.
The fact that the Internet is a space rather than simply a window means that archi-
tectural and interior design considerations enter into the communication equation,
making navigation a key aspect of the online user experience. Gratifications like
play and the quality of ‘‘information scent’’ (to follow, for example, in a search
engine; see Pirolli, 2007) are likely to predominate, indicating the broader range and
scope of information obtained and entertainment derived from Internet-based media.
Affordances designed to aid user navigation can convey rich meanings pertaining to
the presence of variety and the benevolence of the designer implied by the scaffolds
that are made available to the user.
The common activity of freely navigating from one site to another on the Internet
and ‘‘checking out’’ various links is said to trigger the ‘‘browsing heuristic’’ (Sundar,
2008). This has become an essential process gratification, which, when taken away,
leads to complaints. If a media interface limits user navigability, this is likely to lead
to dissatisfaction, meaning that browsing is a gratification that we have come to
expect. Likewise, we have come to expect that we will be scaffolded through every
step of the checkout process on an e-commerce Website. We expect error messages
and warnings before any drastic commitment is made on our behalf (e.g., ‘‘Are you
sure you want to proceed?,’’ ‘‘Clicking the Submit button will charge your credit
card,’’ and so on). The scaffolding gratification is a powerful one and probably drives
the bulk of our commercial transactions on Internet-enabled media devices. When
an e-commerce site charges our account without proper scaffolds, we complain
and demand our money back even though we pressed the ‘‘purchase’’ button. This
is because we expect sites to step us through the process, making it an important
gratification. So much so that we expect to be given the option to opt-in rather than
opt-out of default settings in social networking sites and other venues where privacy
is a major concern.
The play gratification, arising from the fun element of moving through spaces or
levels, is best realized in game interfaces that have superior navigability affordances
than less dynamic interfaces. The escapism and immersion that are induced by the
affective state of play are best realized when the navigational structure of the inter-
face affords a continuous sense of exploration and smooth transitions. In general, as
evident from the variety of spatial metaphors that we use to describe Internet-based
media (e.g., cyberspace, information superhighway, iway), it is clear that navigation
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is an essential gratification that we seek from these media. While browsing and
play gratifications signal a ritualistic orientation toward the medium, the scaffolding
gratification arises from a utilitarian orientation toward the transactions performed
via the medium.
To sum up, each technological affordance stimulates a unique set of gratifica-
tions. While the modality affordance is primarily associated with perceptual grat-
ifications, the agency affordance serves gratifications related to gatekeeping and
UGC, the interactivity affordance triggers gratifications related to user activity and
system responsiveness, and the navigability affordance caters to user movement
in the space created by the medium. Clearly, these gratifications are quite differ-
ent from the bulk of the gratifications identified in the U&G literature over the
decades. Table 1 provides a list of new gratifications emerging from expectations
associated with new media and Table 2 lists potential measures to capture those
gratifications.
New Technology, New Gratifications?
In a recent review of U&G research, Krcmar and Strizhakova (2009) stated,
‘‘while it is certainly true that different media have different motivations for use,
generating typologies with little attempt to integrate them at a broader level may
do little to forward uses and gratifications as a meaningful approach’’ (p. 56).
When one examines the larger body of gratification typologies and how scattered
it is, the suggestion of condensing the multitude of gratifications into three or four
broad typologies is certainly a sensible one. In fact, integrating typologies seems
to be emerging as the primary and most parsimonious way to apply U&G to new
communication technologies. Much of the current literature in this area (Chen,
2011; Haridakis & Hansen, 2009; Papacharissi & Mendelson, 2007; Yoo, 2011)
shows a great deal of conceptual overlap from previous studies, but also clearly
indicates that more nuanced gratifications are emerging. For example, Papacharissi
and Mendelson (2011) found in their study of Facebook gratifications that question-
naire items relating to historically distinct gratifications (‘‘habit’’ and ‘‘pass time’’;
‘‘relaxation’’ and ‘‘entertainment’’) loaded together, suggesting that the configuration
of gratifications is changing for newer media. It is clear that relying simply on broad
categories of gratifications and existing measures may indeed be obfuscating our
ability to understand potentially new gratifications. One of the strengths of the U&G
approach is that it is flexible and allows us to understand what people are doing
with the media, in an inductive manner. In this article, we have argued that many
gratifications that emanate from technological affordances have remained untapped
across the broader U&G literature.
Research has shown that technological affordances are indeed perceptually and
psychologically significant (Reeves & Nass, 2000; Sundar, 2008). If U&G researchers
continue to view media gratifications as solely governed by innate human states or
psyche (e.g., cognitive, motivational, or emotional factors), then our descriptions of
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Table 2
Potential Measures of New Gratifications
I use communication technology (e.g., Second Life, iPod, Blackboard) because : : :
Modality
Realism
1. I know the content is real and not made up
2. It is like communicating face-to-face
3. The experience is very much like real life
4. It lets me to see it for myself.
Coolness
5. It is unique
6. It is distinctive
7. It is stylish.
Novelty
8. It is new
9. The technology is innovative
10. The interface is different
11. The experience is unusual.
Being There
12. It helps me immerse myself in places that I cannot physically experience
13. It creates the experience of being present in distant environments
14. I feel like I am able to experience things without actually being there.
Agency
Agency-Enhancement
15. It allows me to have my say
16. It allows me to assert my identity
17. It allows me to send my thoughts to many
18. It gives me the power to broadcast to my followers.
Community-Building
19. I can connect with others
20. It allows me to expand my social network
21. It makes me realize that I am part of a community
22. It allows me to build social capital.
(continued )
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Table 2
(Continued )
Bandwagon
23. It allows me to review opinions of others before I make decisions
24. It comforts me to know the thoughts and opinions of others
25. It allows me to compare my opinions with those of others.
Filtering/Tailoring
26. It allows me to set my preferences
27. I can avoid viewing things that I do not want to see
28. It allows me to sort through information and share it with others.
Ownness
29. Once I use it, I feel like it is mine
30. It features content that is a true reflection of myself
31. It allows me to customize so that I can make it my own.
Interactivity
Interaction
32. I expect to interact with the system
33. I can perform a number of tasks
34. I can specify my needs and preferences on an ongoing basis.
Activity
35. I feel active when I use it
36. It is not a passive interaction
37. I get to do a lot of things on it.
Responsiveness
38. It is responsive to my commands
39. It responds well to my requests
40. It can anticipate my needs.
Dynamic Control
41. It gives me control
42. It allows me to be in charge
43. I am able to control my interaction with the interface
44. I am able to influence how it looks
45. I am able to influence how it works.
(continued )
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Table 2
(Continued )
Navigability
Browsing/Variety-Seeking
46. It allows me to obtain a wide variety of information
47. It helps me to skim and check out various links
48. It allows me to surf for things that I am interested in
49. It allows me to browse freely.
Scaffolding/Navigation Aids
50. The interface helps me every step of the way
51. The device is easy to use and explore
52. It allows me to link to other pieces of information
53. It offers a number of visual aids for more effective use
54. It will double-check with me before performing a risky transaction.
Play/Fun
55. It is fun to explore
56. It lets me play
57. I enjoy escaping into a different world.
the uses and gratifications of emerging communication technologies will be very
similar to what we already know about traditional media. This will not only limit
our understanding of the appeal of new media, but also curtail our efforts to connect
media uses and gratifications to specific behavioral and cognitive effects.
In our earlier review of gratification typologies, each specific medium was dis-
cussed in terms of the gratifications that it could provide. Some of these typologies
are broad and encompassing (e.g., gratifications of television) while others are
more nuanced and diverse. After studying a variety of different traditional media,
McQuail, Blumler, and Brown (1972) concluded that diversion, personal relation-
ships, personal identity, and surveillance were the broad motives and gratifications
for using traditional media. Of these gratification concepts, surveillance and its
related concepts (e.g., information-seeking) remain constant across most gratification
studies. Now, consider the following example, which illustrates how current U&G
approaches capture what people are doing with new media: Surveillance is an
identified and inherent need that has strong social and psychological origins. This
much is beyond dispute. However, the broad notion of a surveillance gratification
may be understood in a completely different way when one considers technological
affordances. It has become common practice for Internet users to seek opinions
when they watch entertainment online, make purchases or plan events. In the past,
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Sundar and Limperos/NEW GRATIFICATIONS FOR NEW MEDIA 521
if one were to visit a virtual museum or plan a trip to Paris, chances are media
would not be able to provide information that would be helpful in planning the
trip. These days, Web sites offer an array of modality and interactivity affordances
that elicit heuristics such as being there and responsiveness. These heuristics are
likely to dictate the gratifications that one obtains from these media. A 360-degree
interactive panoramic view of the convention floor when visiting the Democratic
party’s Web site might elicit the feeling of ‘‘being there.’’ This is made possible by
a modality affordance. With such affordances becoming commonplace, we have
come to expect virtual tours. It is now quite common for us to check out a place
online before visiting it physically, be it a park, restaurant, or neighborhood. We
have also become used to seeing user reviews of the place that we are planning to
visit (agency affordance) and pictures of the surrounding area (modality affordance).
These elicit the bandwagon heuristic and realism heuristic respectively, each im-
pacting a different gratification.
One could make the argument that all of these affordances merely aid in fulfilling
the need of information-seeking. However, information-seeking encompasses almost
everything we do online. Although this broad category does provide insight into
general gratifications of Internet use, it is likely that information-seeking itself is a
very general term encompassing a collection of more nuanced gratifications. For
instance, information-seeking gratifications might be driven by a need for authen-
ticity (interactivity of hotel view) or consistency (user reviews matching your own
perceptions) or both. Identification of nuanced gratifications that map onto these
specific needs underlying the larger gratification of information-seeking addresses
Rubin’s (2009) call for greater specificity in U&G research with newer media (see
Table 1).
The needs fulfilled by various affordances of modern media can be disaggregated,
as we have suggested, in order to propose specific gratifications that meet those
specific needs rather than some generalized category of needs. The bulk of U&G
research has treated gratifications as somewhat static and arising from pre-existing
needs, but our approach motivates a focus on the process behind the formation of
gratifications. We suggest that technological innovations have given rise to new af-
fordances, which in turn have cultivated in users new needs that they seek to gratify
from their media experiences. The runaway success of social networking sites (e.g.,
Facebook) and microblogging services (e.g., Twitter) speak to technology’s potential
to create and satisfy new gratifications. How these newly developed gratifications
impact user reception of traditional media as well as forthcoming media is an area
of future research with rich theoretical potential.
In conclusion, we recommend that U&G researchers adopt an affordance-based
framework for identifying gratifications sought and obtained from media. This means
triangulating the traditional emphasis on purely social and psychological needs
with technology-driven needs. The latter is best understood by investigating the
various affordances offered by newer media, such as the four classes identified
by the MAIN Model and discussed in this article. An understanding of how users
engage the affordances of newer media will help researchers devise more specific
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measures for capturing the nuanced and specific gratifications obtained from newer
media. The next step is to devise survey measures that will not only tap into
emergent uses and gratifications, but also deconstruct and specify them in ways
that help us distinguish the gratifications derived from different media, both old and
new. We have provided a list of measures in Table 2 as a starting point. A focus
on key technological affordances will help us situate the source of gratifications
in specific functionalities of media interfaces that may be offered to a different
degree by different media. This will not only head off the criticism that we are
proliferating a whole new set of gratifications for each new medium, but also help
build theories that relate technological affordances with human needs, in the context
of understanding the uses and gratifications sought and obtained from emergent
media.
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