Uses and Gratifications Post

Explaining Why Young Adults Use MySpace and Facebook Through Uses and Gratifications Theory was a very helpful article in explaining why young adults use social networking sites such as Facebook and MySpace.  Early in the article, the text stated that "in her study, Ray demonstrated that SNS satisfy a variety of needs in one central location, thus making it a popular destination for many Internet users" (p. 219).  Before even reading the article, I tried to answer the question myself of why I use social networking sites and pretty much came to the same conclusion.  Convenience is a big reason why I tend to use SNS.  This is also supported in the article after 50 undergraduates participated in a focus group and it was reported that the main results showed that these young adults use SNS because of "1. efficient communication, 2. convenient communication, 3. curiosity about others, 4. popularity, and 5. relationship formation and reinforcement" (p. 221).  SNS are used to satisfy young adults wants and needs.  For me personally, Facebook has become a part of my life.  I care about updating my profile and use it to communicate with a lot of my friends.  Thinking back to my early high school years, most of the communication I do now through Facebook was done face to face or over the telephone.  It's pretty amazing to read about the statistics that show how fast sites like MySpace and Facebook have grown and how popular they have become in such a short time.

Although SNS are fast growing and make life easier in a lot of different ways, I still think conventional face to face communication is necessary.  It's easy to find the information that you're looking for on these sites but at times, I feel people are taking the easy and lazy way out.  I feel like a lot of today's young adults would be lost if these popular sites shut down.  This is why I tend to not rely on SNS as much as some people do.  This article was very interesting and confirmed a lot of my beliefs as to why people use SNS.