What drives me to use TikTok: A latent profile analysis of users’ motives

Abstract

With TikTok rising in social media, the heterogeneity of users creates diversity in motives for using it. The issue of which profiles of TikTok use motives can be identified warrants greater understanding. Conducting latent profile analyses for a sample of 384 TikTok users, we identified four profiles, namely overall low motives, overall medium motives, overall high motives, and escapist addiction and novelty motives profiles. The former three profiles reflect different levels of motivations across four motives (socially rewarding self-presentation, trendiness, escapist addiction, and novelty). It is worth noting that TikTok users in the escapist addiction and novelty motives profile are mainly motivated by escapist addiction and novelty, but not socially rewarding self-presentation or trendiness motives. Through multivariate analysis of variance (MANOVA) and multinomial logistic regression, we further explore the differences in TikTok use between the profiles and the extent to which users’ background characteristics and TikTok use predict their profile membership. The four profiles differ significantly in terms of the scores of almost all TikTok use motives. The frequency of TikTok use and video posting are the most notable predictors of profile membership. These results make theoretical contributions to the extant literature on social media use profiles by exploring the number and types of latent profiles of TikTok use motives, which also inform opportunities for enhancing user experience and imply tailored content recommendations to both achieve maximized gratifications and maintain mental wellbeing based on user profiles.

Validity of Material Related to the Anterior Cruciate Ligament on TikTok

“…13,17 A 2022 study explored whether users' background traits and TikTok use can predict their profile memberships. 12 The results offered strong evidence of the differences in TikTok use motives by revealing 4 profiles, namely, overall low, medium, high, and escapist addiction and novelty motives profiles. In addition, these findings of differences across profiles, particularly socially rewarding selfpresentation and escapist addiction motives, are novel and notable.…”

“…In addition, these findings of differences across profiles, particularly socially rewarding selfpresentation and escapist addiction motives, are novel and notable. 12 Furthermore, the present study generated information regarding the predictive effect of TikTok use…”

“…In addition, these findings of differences across profiles, particularly socially rewarding self-presentation and escapist addiction motives, are novel and notable. 12 Furthermore, the present study generated information regarding the predictive effect of TikTok use frequency and active use (ie, video posting). Reels is one of the fastest-growing short video-sharing apps globally, yet no academic research has examined this app except for a few anecdotal studies.…”

Procrastination Mediates the Relationship between Problematic TikTok Use and Depression among Young Adults

“…The main motives for TikTok use are social interaction, self-expression (especially socially rewarding self-presentation), needs affordance, trendiness, escapist addiction, novelty, and archiving [ 70 , 97 , 98 ]. Cao et al [ 99 ] proposed that the extent of social media addiction is influenced by individuals’ emotional and functional attachment to the platform.…”

Motivaciones y contradicciones en el uso de las redes sociales en estudiantes universitarios

“…En muchas ocasiones, esta es la razón por la que se utilizan estos canales, la necesidad de evadirse de su propia realidad y sentirse valorados(Santamaría & Meana, 2017). Además, como sugieren estos autores, el hecho de poder ocultar los aspectos más vulnerables de la persona, superar miedos e inseguridades, así como poder transcender la realidad son otros atractivos que las redes sociales ofrecen a los usuarios.En esta línea,Gu et al (2022) señalan que la utilización de TikTok está muy relacionada con el escapismo, ya que esta red se utiliza para escapar de la realidad cotidiana y olvidarse de los problemas. Todo esto tiene un efecto de satisfacción a nivel psicológico, otro de los motivos que llevan a utilizar las redes sociales.…”