Uses and gratifications

Abstract

This article gives an overview of the origin and assumptions of uses and gratifications (U&G) theory, highlighting past and present U&G research. U&G research seeks to understand why people use media, rather than what media do to people, and the general theoretical conclusion from past U&G studies is that the gratifications sought motivated the use of a particular medium in an audience to satisfy certain social and psychological needs. This article also emphasizes how the U&G framework has been employed in political communication research and, more recently, how new media, especially the Internet, have become a focus in explaining a host of political effects variables.