The Investigation of Social Communication Apprehension and Motives for Social Network Sites Usage

Yıl 2015, Sayı: 23, 115 - 134, 15.06.2015

Serra İnci Çelebi

https://doi.org/10.31123/akil.436880

Öz

The main purpose of this study is to investigate the possible connection between social network

sites (SNSs) usage and communication apprehensiveness or communication easiness. Survey

was conducted (N=229) to find a possible connection between communication apprehension

or easiness and the use of SNSs in addition to the motives for the use of some popular SNSs.

The survey was conducted at a private university in Turkey and probability sampling was used

to select the sample from the population. It was found that socially communicative individuals

connected to SNSs for long hours. Facebook users were drawn by two leading motives to use

Facebook: relaxing entertainment and professional advancement. Expressive information sharing

was the main reason why users connected to Twitter. The motives for using Google+ were

meeting with new people, and habitual pass time-companionship. Escapism and habitual pass

time-companionship motivate individuals to use SNSs more frequently and for long hours. On the

other hand, individuals who have a need for ‘meeting new people’ had more number of SNSs.

The findings were discussed by using several theoretical perspectives (e.g., the rich get richer,

and U&G) in the results section and included practical recommendations and further suggestions.

Anahtar Kelimeler

Communication apprehension, social network sites (SNSs), motives, uses and gratifications (U&G), and social media behaviours

Kaynakça

• Akdenizli, B. (2015). Introduction. In B. Akdenizli (Ed.). Digital transformations in Turkey: Current perspectives in communication studies. (pp. ix-xv). London: Lexington Books.
• Alloway, T. P. and Alloway, R. G. (2012). The impact of engagement with social networking sites (SNSs) on cognitive skills. Computers in Human Behavior, 28, 1748-1754.
• Armstrong, C. B. and Rubin, A. M. (1989). Talk radio as interpersonal communication.Journal of Communication,39 (2), 84-94.
• Baek, K., Holton, A., Harp, D. and Yaschur, C. (2011). The links that bind: Uncovering novel motivations for linking on Facebook. Computers in Human Behavior, 27, 2243-2248.
• Berger, B. A., Richmond, V., McCroskey, J. C. and Baldwin, H. J. (1984). Reducing communication apprehension: Is there a better way?.American Journal of Pharmaceutical Education, 48: 46-50.
• Berry, S. (2007). Situational Communication Apprehension Measure. In R. Reynolds, R. Woods, & J. Baker (Eds.) Handbook of Research on Electronic Surveys and Measurements(pp. 376-378). Hershey, PA: . doi:10.4018/978-1-59140-792-8.ch056
• Boyd, d. m. and Ellison, N. B. (2007). Social network sites: Definition, history, and scholarship. Journal of Computer-Mediated Communication, 13(1), article 11. http://jcmc.indiana.edu/vol13/issue1/boyd.ellison. html19.11.2012
• Burke, M., Marlow, C. and Lento, T. (2010). Social network activity and social well-being. The proceedings of the SIGCHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems, ACM: New York. 1909-1912. doi>10.1145/1753326.1753613
• Campbell, J. (2006). Media Richness, Communication Apprehension and Participation in Group Videoconferencing. Journal of Information, Information Technology, and Organizations, 1, 87-96.
• Clark, D. (2013). Why You Should Be On Google Plus (Even Though No One Else Is). http://www.forbes.com/ sites/dorieclark/2013/01/04/why-you-should-be-on-google-plus-even-though-no-one-else-is/ 10.4.2014
• Correa, T., Hinsley, A. W. and de Zúñiga, H. G. (2010). Who interacts on the Web?: The intersection of users’ personality and social media use. Computers in Human Behavior, 26, 247-253.
• Drost, E. A. (2011). Validity and reliability in social science research. Education Research and Perspectives 38 (1), 105-123.
• Duggan, M.,Ellison, N. B., Lampe, C., Lenhart, A. and Madden, M. (2015). Social media update 2014. http:// www.pewinternet.org/2015/01/09/social-media-update-2014/ 21.4.2015
• Erdoğan, Y. (2008). Exploring the relationships among Internet usage, Internet attitudes and loneliness of Turkish adolescents. Cyberpsychology: Journal of Psychosocial Research on Cyberspace,2(2). http://www. cyberpsychology.eu/view.php?cisloclanku=2008111802&article=118.11.2012
• Gosling, S. D., Augustine, A. A., Vazire, S., Holtzman, N. and Gaddis, S. (2011). Manifestations of personality in online social networks: Self-reported Facebook-related behaviors and observable profile information. CyberPsychology, 14 (9), 483-488. “Gratification” (n.d.). http://oxforddictionaries.com/definition/english/gratification?q=gratification8.1.2013
• Hess, S. (2012). New Facebook study reveals motivation behind Facebook visits. http://www.webpronews.com/ new-facebook-study-reveals-motivation-behind-facebook-visits-2012-06 10.4.2014
• Ho, S. S. and McLeod, D. M. (2008). Social-psychological influences on opinion expression in faceto- face and computer-mediated communication. Communication Research, 35 (2), 190-207. DOI: 10.1177/0093650207313159
• Holton, A. E., Baek, K. H., Coddington, M. and Yaschur, C. (2013). Soliciting reciprocity socializing, communality, and other motivations for linking on Twitter. The proceedings of the 2013 International Symposium on Online Journalism, Austin, Texas: University of Texas atAustin. http://www.academia.edu/3624260/Soliciting_Reciprocity_Socializing_communality_and_other_motivations_for_linking_on_Twitter10.4.2014
• Hughes, D. J., Rowe, M., Batey, M. and Lee, A. (2012). A tale of two sites: Twitter vs. Facebook and the personality predictors of social media usage. Computers in Human Behavior, 28, 561-569.
• Hunt, D., Atkin, D. and Krishnan, A. (2012). The influence of computer-mediated communication apprehension on motives for Facebook use. Journal of Broadcasting &Electronic Media, 56 (2), 187-202. DOI: 10.1080/08838151.2012.678717
• “Internet stats and Facebook usage in Europe 2014 mid-year statistics” (2014).http://www.internetworldstats. com/stats4.htm#europe 1.5.2015
• “Internet top 10 countries in Europe” (2014). http://www.internetworldstats.com/stats4.htm#europe 1.5.2015
• Kaplan, A. M. and Haenlein, M. (2010). Users of the world, unite! The challenges and opportunities of social media. Business Horizons, 53, 59-68.
• Katz, E., Blumer, J. G. and Gurevitch, M. (1973). Uses and gratifications research. Public Opinion Quarterly, 37 (4), 509-523.
• Kaye, B. K. and Johnson, T. J. (2002). Online and in the know: Uses and gratifications of the web for political information. Journal of Broadcasting & Electronic Media, 46 (1), 54-71.
• Kaye, B. K. and Johnson, T. J. (2004). A Web for all reasons: Uses and gratifications of Internet components for political information. Telematics and Informatics, 21, 197-223.
• Kim, Y., Sohn, D. and Choi, S. M. (2011). Cultural difference in motivations for using social network sites: A comparative study of American and Korean college students. Computers in Human Behavior, 27, 365-372.
• “Leading social networks worldwide as of March 2015, ranked by number of active users (in millions)” (n.d.). http://www.statista.com/statistics/272014/global-social-networks-ranked-by-number-of-users/ 1.5.2015
• Lee, C. S. and Ma, L. (2012). News sharing in social media: The effect of gratifications and prior experience. Computers in Human Behavior 28, 331-339.
• “Longitudinal study, wave 2: Facebook users read more and post less; motivations for twitter usage change” (2014). http://www.redeftie.eu/?p=20610.4.2014
• Maxwell, E. M. (2012). Motivations to tweet: A uses and gratifications perspective of twitter use during natural disaster. Unpublished Master thesis. Tuscaloosa, Alabama: The University of Alabama.
• McCord, B., Rodebaugh, T.L., & Levinson, C.A. (2014). Facebook: Social uses and anxiety. Computers in Human Behavior, 34, 23-27.
• McCroskey, J.C. (1984). The communication apprehension perspective. In J.A. Daly and J. C. McCroskey (Eds.), Avoiding communication: Sheyness, reticence, and communication, (pp. 13-38). Beverly Hills, CA: SAGE Publications.
• McCroskey, J. C., Booth-Butterfield, S. and Payne, S. K. (1989). The Impact of communication apprehension on college student retention and success. Communication Quarterly, 37 (2), 100-107.
• McCroskey, J. C. and Sheahan, M. E. (1978). Communication apprehension, social preference, and social behavior in a college environment. Communication Quarterly, 26 (2), 41-45.
• Miller, C. C. (2014). The Loyal Users of Google Plus Say It Is No Ghost Town. http://bits.blogs.nytimes. com/2014/02/19/the-loyal-users-of-google plus-say-it-is-no-ghost-town/ 10.4.2014
• Miyata, K. and Kobayashi, T. (2008). Causal relationship between Internet use and social capital in Japan. Asian Journal of Social Psychology, 11, 42-52. DOI: 10.1111/j.1467-839X.2007.00242.x
• Mustafa, N., Ibrahim, F., Mahmud, W. A. W., Ahmad, F., Kee, C. P. and Mahbob, M. H. (2011). Diffusion of innovations: The adoption of Facebook among youth in Malaysia. The Innovation Journal: The Public Sector Innovation Journal, 16(3), article 8, 1-15.
• Nadkarni, A. and Hofmann, S. G. (2012). Why Do People Use Facebook? Personality and Individual Differences, 52 (3), 243–249. doi:10.1016/j.paid.2011.11.007
• Papacharissi, Z. and Rubin, A. M. (2000). Predictors of Internet use. Journal of Broadcasting & Electronic Media, 44 (2), 175-196.
• Perse, E. M. and Courtright, J. A. (1993). Normative images of communication media: Mass and interpersonal channels in the new media environment. Human Communication Research, 19 (4), 485-503. Pitt, L. F. and Ramaseshan, B. (1990). Apprehension about communication and salespersons’ performace. Psychological Reports, 67, 1355-1362.
• Raacke, J. and Bonds-Raacke, J. (2008). MySpace and Facebook: Applying the uses and gratifications theory to exploring friend-networking sites. CyberPsychology & Behavior, 11 (2), 169-174.
• Rohani, V. A. and Hock, O. S. (2010). On social network Web sites: Definition, features, architectures and analysis tools. Journal of Advances in Computer Research, 2, 41-53.
• Ross, C., Orr, E. S., Sisic, M., Arseneault, J. M., Simmering, M. G. and Orr, R. R. (2009). Personality and motivations associated with Facebook use. Computers in Human Behavior, 25, 578-586.
• Scott, C. R. and Rockwell, S. C. (1997). The effect of communication, writing, and technology apprehension on likelihood to use new communication technologies. Communication Education, 46, 44-62. Sheldon, P. (2008). The relationship between unwillingness-to-communicate and students’Facebook use. Journal of Media Psychology, 20 (2), 67.75.
• Smock, A. D., Ellison, N. B., Lampe, C. and Wohn, D. Y. (2011). Facebook as a toolkit: A uses and gratification approach to unbundling feature use. Computers in Human Behavior, 27, 2322–2329.
• “Social” (n.d.). http://www.macmillanddictionary.com/dictionary/british/social8.1.2013
• “Social media” (n.d.). http://oxforddictionaires.com/definition/english/social%2Bmedia8.1.2013
• Stefanone, M. A., Hurley, C. M. and Yang, Z. J. (2013). Antecedents of online information seeking. Information, Communication & Society, 16 (1), 61-81, DOI: 10.1080/1369118X.2012.656137
• “Top 10 countries with most Facebook users 2014” (2014). http://addictivelists.com/top-10-countries-with-mostfacebook- users-2014/1.5.2015
• Tufekci, Z. (2010). Who acquires friends through social media and why? “Rich get richer” versus “seek and ye shall find”. Proceedings of the Fourth International AAAI Conference on Weblogs and Social Media, 170-177.
• Wang, Q., Fink, E. L., and Cai, D. A. (2008). Loneliness, gender, and parasocial interaction: A uses and gratifications approach. Communication Quarterly, 56 (1), 87-109.
• Wang, Z., Tchernev, J. M. and Solloway, T. (2012). A dynamic longitudinal examination of social media use, needs, and gratifications among college students. Computers in Human Behavior, 28, 1829-1839.
• Watson, B. R. (2007). Speaking up in the 21st century: The effects of communication apprehension and Internet self-efficacy on use of social networking websites. Unpublished master thesis, Columbia: University of Missouri.
• Woods, R. (2007). Personal Report of Communication Apprhension. In R. Reynolds, R. Woods and J. Baker (Eds.) Handbook of Research on Electronic Surveys and Measurements (pp. 320-322). Hershey, PA: IGI Global. doi:10.4018/978-1-59140-792-8.ch042
• Wrench, J. S., Brogan, S. M., McCroskey, J. C. and Jowi, D. (2008). Social communication apprehension: The intersection of communication apprehension and social phobia. Human Communication: A Publication of the Pacific and Asian Communication Association, 11 (4), 409-430.
• Wrench, J. S. and Punyanunt-Carter, N. M. (2007). The relationship between computer-mediated communication competence, apprehension, self-efficacy, perceived confidence, and social presence. Southern Communication Journal, 72 (4), 355-378.
• Zhang, Y., Tang, L. S-T. and Leung, L. (2011). Gratifications, collective self-esteem, online emotional openness, and trait-like communication apprehension as predictors of Facebook uses. Cyberpsychology, Behavior, and Social Networking, 14 (12), 733-739. DOI: 10.1089/cyber.2010.0042
• Zhou, Z. and Bao, Y. (2002). Users’ attitudes toward Web advertising: Effects of Internet motivation and Internet ability. Advances in Consumer Research. 29, 71-78.
• Zywica, J. and Danowski, J. (2008). The faces of Facebookers: Investigating social enhancement and social compensation hypotheses; predicting FacebookTM and offline popularity from sociability and self-esteem, and mapping the meanings of popularity with semantic networks. Journal of Computer-Mediated Communication, 14, 1–34.