Study On Factors Influencing Social Media Users' Behavior

With the rapid development and wide application of the wireless network and intelligent terminal, social media pushes the Internet into the social media age from the portal age by everywhere. Since social media gives everyone the ability to create and spread the information, the user is the absolute protagonist. The core value of "socialization" of social media lies in users' behavior. In this paper, we take users' intention and behaviorof social media as the research object, analysis the influence factors on social media users'behavior, construct the model of influence factorson social media users' behavior, verify the relationship and influence degree among variables in our model through empirical analysis, and make a comparative study on different users groups.This paper introduces the research background and significance, reviews the existing research at home and abroad, states the research goal and method, summarizes the research content and framework. In the part of basic theory, we summarizes the definition, development, application of Media Richness Theory, Uses and Gratifications theory, Technology Acceptance Theory, Perceived Risk Theory and Life Style Theory. Based on the five theories,We divide the media richness of social media into three aspects including content, expression and quality, divide the users' needs into four aspects including information search, social contact, entertainment and leisure and self identity demand, divide the technology acceptance into four aspects including performance expectancy, effort expectancy, social influence and convenient conditions, divide the perceived risk into four dimensions of user privacy risk, social risk, economic and time risk and risk bearing, and adopt the user lifestyle as the adjusting variable.In the model construction part, the paper analyzes the meaning of social media users' behavior from three aspects including content, process and patterns, summarize the influence factors of social media users' behavior into five aspects including content resource factor, demand factor, user perceived risk factor, technology acceptance factor and life style factor, make definition for all the variables, and put forward the hypothesis about the relationship among variables.In the questionnaire design and data collection part, this paper selected We-Chat as a research platform. Through the questionnaire survey to We-Chat users, we collect social media user behavior information. Through the literature research, interview, initial questionnaire and exploratory factor analysis, we make project analysis, reliability analysis and validity analysis and create the formal questionnaire. After determine the sample object and scale and questionnaire pattern, we make descriptive statistical analysis on the recovery data, which confirm the sample data suitable for model validationin subsequent research.In the model evaluation and validation part, we analysis the influence factors on social media users' behavior. The result shows that, usage intention is a necessary condition for the users' behaviors, which directly predict and interpret users' behavior. The content of resource factor, demand factor, user technology acceptance factor and perceived risk factor are the directly influence factors, in which the usage intention has largest effect and the risk factor make negative impact. Information content richness, information expression abundance and information quality richness positively reflect the content of resource factor, in which the information content richness shares a large proportion. Information searching need, social contact need, entertainment and leisure need and self identity need positively reflect the usage needs factor, in which the social contact need shares a large proportion. Performance expectancy, effort expectancy, social influenceand convenient conditions positively reflect the technology acceptance factor, in which performance expectancy shares a large proportion. The privacy risk, social risk, economic and time risk and risk bearing positively reflect the perceived risk factor, in which the economic and time risk shares a larger proportion.In the user group comparison part, social media users are classified into mature and gentle type, fashion and enjoyment type, practical and prudent type. The comparative analysis on the adoption of different social media users group shows that, all assumptions conclusion on users' group model and overall model are exactly the same, but some factors reflect differences on the usermodel with different groups. It means that different types of social media users are differently affected by the influence factors.The contribution of this paper in theory includes:(1) extending the theoretical basis on traditional user behavior, developing the new theory support, exploring the theory application of Media Richness Theory, Uses and Gratifications theory, Technology Acceptance Theory, Perceived Risk Theory and Life Style Theory in social media environment;(2) considering the'social','media'and'user'of social media, constructing the social media influencing factors model, which develops the existing theory perspective and enrich the connotation of social media users' behavior theory. The contribution of this paper in the practice activities includes:(1) make a prediction of the development trend of the future social media;(2) provide the suggestion for the social media operator.