EXAMINING NEW OPPORTUNITIES IN CHICAGO’S RESTAURANT INDUSTRY: THE CORRELATION BETWEEN SOCIAL MEDIA AND CHINESE EATING HABITS IN CHICAGO

Abstract

Purpose -   This study was designed to investigate the relationship between social media usage and the eating habits of the Chinese population in the Chicago area.  To be more precise, this study provides insight into what kinds of social media affect the Chinese diet in Chicago.  The social media sites included Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, Myspace, LinkedIn, and Chinese social media such as WeChat.   

Methodology -   A self-administered online questionnaire survey was designed and used to examine the relationship between the eating habits and social media usage of the Chinese population in the Chicago area.  This study involved the use of a survey that contained three sections.  The first section was a demographic questionnaire.  The second section was a food-related behavior questionnaire based on eating habits studies.  The third section was a social media usage questionnaire constructed from consumer behavior research.  The participants were Chinese individuals who were 18 years or older and living in the Chicago area.  The data were collected through an online self-administered survey www.surveymonkey.com. Statistical Package for the Social Sciences (SPSS) software was used to analyze the data, and an alpha significance level of 0.05 was used.   

Findings- Based on the data from the current study, the Chinese population in Chicago is strongly affected by Chinese culture, as 90% speak Chinese and 53.7% eat Chinese food every day.  The researcher found that Chinese diet change in Chicago is significantly influenced by the number of reviews from non-Chinese friends on social media, and diet change has a significant positive correlation with the number of non-Chinese friends.  This confirms that the constructs of interaction and electric word-of-mouth (eWOM) of social media marketing have a significantly positive effect on purchase intentions (Chen, Leu, & Su, 2016).  In this research, the number of food reviews and non-Chinese friends represented social interaction and eWOM level on social media. The results from this research indicate that the market opportunity among the Chinese population in the Chicago area is promising.  Therefore, it is worthwhile for non-Chinese restaurant owners in Chicago to invest in and develop specialized marketing strategies to attract Chinese customers.  

Conclusion- Based on a quantitative analysis, this research showed that for the Chinese population in the Chicago area, the more nonChinese friends they had, the more likely it was that their eating habits would change.  This supports that interactions with friends on social media is a contributing factor to differences in eating habits.   

Keywords

• Eating habits,social media,restaurants,Chinese food,and electric word-of mouth

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