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Political Use of Instagram: The Relationships Between Political Use of Instagram: The Relationships Between
Motivations, Frequent Use, Incidental News Exposure and Online Motivations, Frequent Use, Incidental News Exposure and Online
Political Participation Political Participation
Hyerin Kwon
University of New Mexico - Main Campus
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i
Hyerin Kwon
Candidate
Communication & Journalism
Department
This thesis is approved, and it is acceptable in quality and form for publication:
Approved by the Thesis Committee:
Dr. Yangsun Hong, Chairperson
Dr. David Weiss
Dr. Jessica Feezell
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POLITICAL USE OF INSTAGRAM: THE RELATIONSHIPS
BETWEEN MOTIVATIONS, FREQUENT USE, INCIDENTAL
NEWS EXPOSURE AND ONLINE POLITICAL
PARTICIPATION
by
HYERIN KWON
B.A., MEDIA COMMUNICATION, SUNGSHIN WOMEN’S
UNIVERSITY, SEOUL, SOUTH KOREA, 2018
THESIS
Submitted in Partial Fulfillment of the
Requirements for the Degree of
Master of Arts
Communication
The University of New Mexico
Albuquerque, New Mexico
July, 2020
iii
DEDICATION
This thesis is wholeheartedly dedicated to my parents, who have been emotionally and
financially supported me since I started master’s program in the United States. I would not have
accomplished it all without my mom and dad. I love you, Miyoung Jang, Youngho Kwon,
Takyoung Kwon, Dalbong, and Julie.
iv
Political Use of Instagram: The Relationships Between Motivations, Frequent Use,
Incidental News Exposure and Online Political Participation
By
Hyerin Kwon
B.A., Media Communication, Sungshin Women’s University, Seoul, South Korea, 2018
M.A., Communication and Journalism, University of New Mexico, 2020
ABSTRACT
As Instagram is widely popular with young people, politicians and news media turn to Instagram
and spread an array of political information. Despite the growing popularity, few studies have
explored political use of Instagram. The purpose of this thesis is to investigate why and how
college students use Instagram for politics. Based on the Uses and Gratifications (U&G) theory,
this study examines students’ motivations and political uses of Instagram, such as getting
political information, expressing political opinions, and following political accounts. Lastly, this
thesis explores how young people unintentionally get political information on Instagram. This
thesis found that motivation for information seeking is positively associated with political
information consumption and following news media accounts on Instagram. Motivation for self-
expression is positively associated with political information consumption, political opinion
expression and following politicians’ accounts on Instagram. In addition to the motivations,
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frequent use of Instagram use is positively associated with incidental news exposure on
Instagram.
Key words: Instagram, uses and gratifications theory, political information consumption,
political opinion expression, following politicians, following news media, incidental exposure
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TABLE OF CONTENTS
CHAPTER 1 INTRODUCTION ···································································· 1
CHAPTER 2 LITERATURE REVIEW ··························································· 5
Uses and Gratifications: A Theoretical Framework ············································ 5
Uses and Motivations of Instagram in 2020 ····················································· 9
Understanding Instagram Use for Politics ····················································· 11
Online Political Participation: Political Information Consumption and Political Opinion
Expression on Instagram ·········································································· 12
Political Instagram Uses and Motivations ······················································ 14
Following Accounts on Instagram ······························································ 16
Incidental News Exposure on Instagram ······················································· 19
CHAPTER 3 METHODS ··········································································· 23
Data collection ····················································································· 23
Measurement ······················································································· 25
Analytical Framework ············································································ 30
CHAPTER 4 RESULTS ············································································· 31
CHPATER 5 DISCUSSION ········································································ 36
Conclusion ·························································································· 40
REFERENCES ························································································ 42
APPENDIX: Survey ·················································································· 63
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Chapter 1
Introduction
People use digital and social media for various activities from shopping, searching,
reading articles, watching videos and joining online networks to posting, expressing opinions and
engaging in social events. In particular, many studies reveal that people utilize social media to
consume political news, express their perspectives on social issues, participate in petitions and
organize offline protests (Conroy et al., 2012; Gil de Zúñiga et al., 2012; Journell et al, 2013;
Rojas & Puig-i-Abril, 2009; Vitak et al., 2011).
Young people are inclined to utilize social media for political communication. Previous
studies have investigated the relationship between social media use, particularly Facebook and
Twitter, and political engagement among young adults (Journell et al., 2013; Loader et al., 2014;
Park, 2015; Yang & DeHart, 2016). For example, Vitak et al. (2013) found college students,
during presidential elections, use Facebook to join political groups, gain information about
candidates, share their opinions, and engage in online political participation such as volunteering
and signing petitions. Journell et al. (2013) found that Twitter is more likely to serve as a
political conversation sphere in which students can easily follow candidates, retweet the
candidates’ posts, and share commentary about election issues. Therefore, Facebook and Twitter
have attracted scholarly attention as places for political communication.
In recent years, Instagram has become one of the most appealing social media platforms
for young adults (Alhabash & Ma, 2017). In fact, user rates of Instagram have already overtaken
those of Twitter. Instagram is dominated specifically by relatively younger age groups (18 and
24 years), compared to Facebook, in which people of all ages (18 to 65+ years) utilize
proportionately (Pew Research Center, 2019).
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Given the popularity of Instagram among young adults, politicians are creating and
operating Instagram accounts to attract Instagram users for the benefits of their political
campaigns. For example, Alexander Van der Bellen was elected the Austrian President in 2017
by successfully utilizing Instagram as an election campaign channel (Liebhart & Bernhardt,
2017). The key strategy of his team was to make all stories, from those about his political
competence to those about his personal background, visualized on his Instagram account. His
visual political communication made a strong impression on Instagram users, and ultimately
helped to mobilize them. Also, during the 2016 U.S. primaries and general election, a number of
major party candidates utilized Instagram to convey their election messages (Duffy, 2016;
Parmelee & Roman, 2019).
Despite the trend, there are few studies examining the way young people use Instagram
for political information and political communication (Muñoz & Towner, 2017; Russmann &
Svensson, 2016). Although existing literature on political use of social media abounds, it mostly
reports on Facebook and Twitter (e.g., Journell et al., 2013; Vitak et al., 2013). Furthermore,
some people even underrate the possibility of using Instagram to gain real-time political
information and trending news (Forsey, 2020). As mentioned above, the majority of Instagram
users are young people, between 18 and 24 years, compared to those using Facebook, which is
used evenly by members of all age groups. Previous studies suggest that young people are less
politically interested and engaged than older citizens (Cassel & Luskin, 1988; Henn et al., 2002).
Therefore, it is possible that Instagram, a platform that attracts young people, is yet to be
considered as a political venue in the same way as Facebook and Twitter. Given the growing
trend in politicians’ turning to Instagram ahead of the 2020 election as well as lack of evidence
on young people’s use of Instagram for politics, this thesis posits a two-pronged question:
3
whether young people use Instagram to gain political information and to express their own
political opinions.
Young people’s political use of Instagram can be studied through two different
perspectives: proactive and passive media use. Proactive use refers to purposive and conscious
media consumption, while passive use refers to mindless, unconscious, habitual use of media
(Finn, 1998). One example of the proactive use is that people watch television in order to gather
information about a specific issue or to feel enjoyment (Bryant et al., 2012). However, people do
not always watch a television program with a particular purpose or reason in mind. They just
turn on the television and unconsciously consume the broadcasted program. Based on these
perspectives, this thesis studies purposive Instagram use with the framework of Uses and
Gratifications theory (U&G), and passive Instagram use in the context of incidental exposure.
With the advent of technology, young people spend more time using digital media than
ever before. As a result, young people’s political participation has been shifting to the online
platform instead of the conventional face-to-face participation such as voting and demonstration
(Della Porta & Mosca, 2005). They prefer the cheap, fast, and convenient political activities
offered in the online environment to offline political engagement which requires more time and
effort (Calenda & Meijer, 2009). Online political participation can take various forms, from
reading online news, posting online comments about political issues and sharing political news,
to joining online activism and signing online petitions (Bakker & De Vreese, 2011; Ekström &
Shehata, 2018; Kushin & Yamamoto, 2010; Rojas & Puig-i-Abril, 2009; Valenzuela, 2013).
Altogether, this thesis aims to explore why and how young people use Instagram in
relationship to politics. To accomplish the goal, this study first investigates what kind of
motivations young people have when they are using Instagram and how the motivations of
4
Instagram use relate to their political participation on Instagram, such as getting political
information, expressing political opinions, and following political accounts. In addition to the
motivated political use of Instagram, this study further investigates how young people’s habitual
Instagram use increases the possibility to be incidentally exposed to political information on the
platform. This study is particularly important given that young people are heavily involved in
Instagram, many politicians have opened Instagram accounts with the specific intent of
communicating with Instagram users who are potential voters and political information is readily
available now on Instagram. Ultimately, this thesis expects to lay out a foundation for future
studies about the relationships between young people and their political uses of Instagram.
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Chapter 2
Literature Review
This chapter will review Uses and Gratifications theory as a fundamental framework to
investigate Instagram usage. Since this thesis is related to political use of Instagram, it will then
review scholarship about various types of political engagement that have appeared on Instagram.
Based on these issues, it will examine work on the relationships between motivations and online
political participation (e.g., political information consumption, political opinion expression).
Also, this chapter will investigate scholarship on types of political posts provided by two
different political accounts (e.g., politicians and news media) on Instagram, and then explore the
relationships between motivations and following these accounts. Lastly, in addition to motivated
political use of Instagram, this chapter will review studies on incidental exposure to political
information, which motivates further political activities.
Uses and Gratifications: A Theoretical Framework
This thesis is grounded in the Uses and Gratifications approach. The uses and
gratifications (U&G) theory explains why and how people actively choose specific media by
focusing on individual specific motivations (Basilisco & Cha, 2015). The U&G views people as
active users who purposefully use the media to gratify certain needs (Katz et al., 1974).
U&G is contrasted with early studies/theories of mass communication. The early mass
communication scholars regarded audiences as passive viewers who were directly influenced by
mass media, and thereby the foci of their studies were related to the effect of media on the
audience (McQuail & Windahl, 1993). For example, one of the early, non-scholarly theories of
mass media effects is “hypodermic needle theory.” It argues that mass media serve as
hypodermic needles to inject messages into viewers, who are unable to resist the messages since
6
they are passive and uncritical (Lasswell, 1970). In other words, mass media such as film and
radio had enormous power to affect the audience (Bryant et al., 2012). During 1940-1960s, social
scientists claimed that mass media has limited effects on consumers, which means there are
numerous intervening variables between consumers and media (Berelson, 1959; McQuail, 2010).
In other words, it was argued, people are indirectly affected by media through the influence of
opinion leaders, social relationships, and cultural contexts (McQuail, 2010). Starting in the mid-
1960s, scholars rejected the limited-effects hypothesis and argued that media indirectly or
directly have strong effects on consumers (G. Lang & K. Lang, 1981). They rediscovered the
powerful and long-term effects of media and developed several theories such as agenda-setting
and cultivation theory (McCombs & Shaw, 1972; Gerbner & Gross, 1976).
However, in response to these early theories that focused on media effects, scholars such
as Herzog (1944) and then Katz et al. (1974) looked first at audiences to view the relationship
between media and audience in a different way. They developed the U&G as one of several
audience-centered approaches to the study of media and society. Katz et al. (1974) focused on
what people do with media by considering the nature of users and functions of media. First, they
claimed, audiences are active, and thereby their media use is goal oriented. Compared to passive
viewers, active audiences are responsible for choosing media and have the power to interpret
media messages. Specifically, the audiences choose and use media in order to satisfy certain
needs and motivations and then achieve gratification (Bryant et al., 2012). As they are self-aware
of what needs and motivations they have when selecting media, they accomplish goals such as
enhancing knowledge and reducing stress through their media consumption (Katz et al., 1974).
Also, media itself constantly compete with other sources to fulfill audiences’ needs and
motivations (Bryant et al., 2012). Each medium from traditional media to social media has
7
different functions and the different characteristics satisfy distinct needs and motivations.
Therefore, active audiences have expectations about whether certain media will fulfill their
specific motivations. For example, when people need to get information about the 2020
presidential election, they consider which media gives them relevant information effectively. In
this case, they may choose Internet rather than television. This is because once they turn on CNN
these days, news regarding COVID-19 is reported first and primarily. Therefore, they have to
wait until the information they need is broadcasted. However, when they select the Internet, they
type the topic and acquire information of the 2020 presidential candidates quickly and easily.
Many previous studies on U&G identified and classified audiences’ needs and
motivations for television and other traditional media (Bantz, 1982; Berelson, 1949; Bryant &
Zillmann, 1984; Cazeneuve, 1974; Dobos, 1992; Eastman, 1979; Katz et al., 1974; Mcilwraith,
1998; Rubin, 1983). For example, Berelson (1949) examined the reasons people read newspapers
and found that people are motivated to read newspapers to get information about public affairs,
pass time without thinking, appear informed in social groups, and feel connected with society.
Several studies examined the motivations of watching television (e.g., Bantz, 1982;
Bryant & Zillmann, 1984; Cazeneuve, 1974; Dobos, 1992; Katz et al., 1974; Mcilwraith, 1998;
Rubin, 1983). People watch television because they need to relax or kill time through
entertainment content and spend time with their family at home (Katz et al., 1974). In addition,
those who have a motivation to stay generally knowledgeable and up-to-date on current issues
turn on television, especially news channels, and get the information they seek (Rubin, 1983).
Communication scholars have expanded and applied the U&G theory to explore why and
how people use new media (Basilisco & Cha, 2015). Compared to old media such as radio and
television, new media are computational and include the Internet, computer games, digital TV,
8
social media and social networking services (Leinonen, 2010). A distinct feature of new media is
“user-generated content,” which describes media content that users themselves create and
distribute (Quan-Haase & Young, 2010). In other words, the distinction between producer and
consumer becomes blurred in the new media environment. For example, Facebook users easily
build a profile, upload pictures and videos, update their status, write on other users’ walls, and
comment on posts and shared articles. Since users can in this way be more involved in a larger
variety of activities as than with old media, media scholars have explored what motivations new
media users have and what gratifications they gain through media use (Kaplan & Haenlein,
2010; Quan-Haase & Young, 2010).
For example, Shao (2009) reviewed existing studies that examined motivations and uses
of the Internet, Facebook, MySpace, Wikipedia and YouTube (e.g., Bowman & Willis, 2003;
Hamilton, 2007; Lenhart et al., 2007; McGirt, 2007; Miller 2007), and found four common
motivations for user-generated media use, including motivations for information seeking,
entertainment, social interaction, and self-expression. First, people use MySpace and Facebook
in order to learn the way their peers understand any subject and visit Wikipedia to get
information on topics they are interested in (Bowman and Willis, 2003). Miller (2007) analyzed
data on the most popular channels on YouTube and concluded that most people use YouTube to
get enjoyment, seek emotional release, and reduce stress. In addition, Lenhart et al. (2007)
conducted research about American teens’ Internet use and found out that 93% of teens use the
Internet as a social venue to reinforce pre-existing friendships and make new friends.
Another key shift from traditional media to new media is that users anonymously produce
and share their own contents (Al-Kandari et al., 2016). That is, they are able to post and
comment frankly on whatever they express. Therefore, motivation for self-expression is
9
significantly emerging when media scholars examine what motivates individuals to choose and
use social media rather than traditional media (Shao, 2009). Papacharissi (2002) defined the
motivation for self-expression as a desire to tell others a little bit about oneself; we see this on
social media in the use of personal webpages to display users’ identity and personality. Kaye
(2005) and Shao (2009) expanded the definition of motivation for self-expression to “represent
deliberate expression of one’s feeling and thoughts” (p.14). They found out that individuals
consider the Internet and weblogs convenient venues to present and share their opinions and
ideas.
Uses and Motivations of Instagram in 2020
Instagram was launched in 2010 and quickly became one of the fastest growing social
media platforms (Alhabash & Ma, 2017). Instagram has convenient features similar to Facebook
(its parent company) and Twitter (e.g., News feed, following, Instagram live, Instagram stories,
Direct Message). When a new technology is introduced to the world, media scholars are
interested in knowing why and how people actively select the media technology. The U&G
perspective guides researchers to find the answers (Quan-Haase & Young, 2010).
To date, there are only a few studies about the relationship between motivations and
general Instagram use (e.g., Alhabash & Ma, 2017; Sheldon et al., 2017). Alhabash and Ma
(2017) examined which motivations strongly predict college students’ Instagram use intensity.
They measured the Instagram intensity by asking about time spent daily on Instagram and the
extent to which college students feel attached to Instagram. They found that motivations for
entertainment and convenience are the strongest predictors of the intensity of Instagram use. In
other words, college students actively engage in Instagram activities because the platform is
convenient to use and provides enjoyable content. Sheldon et al. (2017) compared motivations
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for Instagram use between Croatian and American students to explore whether Instagram use
motivations are different depending on a user’s cultural background. They found that Croatian
students primarily use Instagram to see friends’ activities (i.e., motivation for social interaction),
while American students use Instagram to report their memories with photos they want to
remember (i.e., motivation for self-documentation). This suggests that Croatian culture reflects
collectivist trends, while American culture reflects individualistic tendencies. Further, both of
these studies found that college students mainly use Instagram for entertainment, social
interaction and self-documentation.
The Instagram environment has changed a lot in the last several years. The number of
Instagram users have rapidly increased since 2016, for example, from 400 million in 2016 to
more than 1 billion in 2020, leading to 150% growth for four years. It became the second biggest
social media platform in 2018 (Parmelee & Roman, 2019; Statistia, 2020). As a number of users
increased, Instagram launched new functions such as Instagram Stories/live and IGTV,
respectively in 2016 and 2018, to help users to engage in a variety of activities on the platform
(Wagner, 2018). Instagram Stories is a feature within the Instagram app where users can capture
and post related images and video content in slideshow format. Instagram lives allows users to
broadcast video to followers in real time (Danao, 2018). IGTV serves as a small television on
Instagram, in which users can upload videos with a maximum length of an hour (Carter, 2018).
In other words, as Instagram provides various features that allow users to create and distribute
contents, an array of information is now disseminated on Instagram. Therefore, young people
may consider Instagram as a convenient tool to get information and news they are interested in
and learn something about what is happening in the society as well as gain entertainment.
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Given the current trends concerning Instagram, this thesis poses the following research
question.
RQ: What are the primary motivations for Instagram use among college students?
Understanding of Instagram Use for Politics
As Instagram is quickly gaining popularity, many politicians, political organizations, and
news media have created their own Instagram accounts and have begun actively engaging in the
platform. As a result, considerable amount of political information is currently available on
Instagram (Murphy, 2019). News organizations upload posts several times a day on Instagram to
update important news regarding a wide range of topics (Russell, 2015). Also, politicians
increasingly use Instagram as part of their own communication strategy, an issue which has been
studied by several scholars (e.g., Ekman & Widholm, 2017; Towner & Muñoz, 2018). Ekman
and Widhom (2017) analyzed Swedish politicians’ posts on Instagram. They found that
politicians uploaded video clips from television news interviews and added their own comments
on those interviews. Their posts also included screen shots of opinion articles written by other
politicians and they provided negative or positive stances on those articles. They often talked
about news media and political issues to show their own political orientation. The most frequent
posts the Swedish politicians uploaded were related to self-promotion of policies and current
works. Similarly, Towner and Muñoz (2018) found that the 2016 U.S. presidential primary
candidates used Instagram to disseminate campaign and election messages and mobilizing
information.
Although diverse political information provided every day by politicians, political
organizations, and news media, as well as friends, family, and acquaintances is available on
Instagram, few studies have examined why and how young people seek out and consume such
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information. Therefore, this thesis aims to explore young people’s motivations for their use of
political information on Instagram and how these motivations influence their political behaviors
on Instagram. To analyze the relationship, this thesis first defines and conceptualizes political
behaviors on Instagram. Then, this thesis explores the relationships between motivations and
political participation on Instagram based on previous literature of the U&G on political use of
social media.
Online Political Participation: Political Information Consumption and Political Opinion
Expression on Instagram
Political participation can take a variety of forms such as voting, sending letters to
government, signing a petition, attending governmental meetings, participating in protests,
making donations, and the like (Delli Carpini, 2004; Hong & Rojas, 2016; Sylvester &
McGlynn, 2010). Della Porta and Mosca (2005) argued that young people are less interested in
the traditional and offline forms of political participation, but rather are involved in politics in a
new way, one that is in line with the emerging digital age. This is because digital media provides
faster and more convenient forms of political participation than conventional forms, and thereby
people easily engage in various types of political activities in the online environment. As young
people are heavily immersed in digital media, they have a great chance to participate in online
political activities (Bennett et al., 2009).
Online political engagement can be distinguished by passive and active types (Bakker &
De Vreese, 2011; Kushin & Yamamoto, 2010). Passive use incorporates one-way
communication, such as consuming political information and news online, while active use
embodies two-way communication, such as participation in online political discussions. In social
media, passive engagement includes reading online political news, comments, and videos. On the
13
other hand, active engagement consists of posting political text or photos, joining political
groups, writing comments, and participating in online conversation (Muntinga et al., 2011).
Several studies have classified political participation on social media into three
categories: political information consumption, political opinion expression and mobilization
(Ekström & Shehata, 2018; Rojas & Puig-i-Abril, 2009; Valenzuela, 2013). First, political
information consumption refers to information seeking and gathering by browsing friends’
profiles, following news media, searching for political or societal issues, reading news and
watching video clips about public issues. This is private, low-cost and easily accessible online
political participation (Ekström & Shehata, 2018). Second, political opinion expression refers to
cognitive and expressive participation, during which people reflect on news content they
consume and present opinions on political issues. People may engage in deep information
processing by commenting, sharing, and posting (Bergström & Jervelycke Belfrage, 2018).
Opinion expression can be riskier than information consumption since it is a public activity
(Ekström & Shehata, 2018). That is, when a person leaves comments and posts news on his or
her account, online friends easily see the content and recognize what the person is thinking about
on a specific issue. Lastly, mobilization is related to joining causes and participating in activism.
It includes following or signing up to be a member of interest groups, gaining information about
instructions about how to get involved in a protest, encouraging other contacts to participate in
the protest by spreading mobilizing information, organizing online protest, boycotting,
participating in online petition, and donations (Ekström & Shehata, 2018; Valenzuela, 2013).
Based on the review, this thesis focuses on two types of political participation on
Instagram: political information consumption and political opinion expression. To be specific,
political information consumption includes seeking and acquisition of news regarding public
14
matters (e.g., reading news, posts and comments about political issues). Political opinion
expression includes presenting and sharing personal opinions about public issues (e.g., clicking
“like” button, posting, commenting, sending direct message to politicians, adding news to
Instagram Stories). Mobilization activity was excluded because it is more demanding and
requires more efforts, costs and commitments when comparing to other two types of
participatory behaviors. It is possible to assume that college students who are not interested in
politics may be rarely motivated to engage in mobilizing behavior on Instagram. Reading news
and writing comments are less demanding, and thereby young people are easily involved in the
processes on Instagram.
Political Instagram Uses and Motivations
Motivation for information seeking is common and salient in political use of social media
as well as traditional media (Ancu & Cozma, 2009; Gantz, 1978; Kaye & Johnson, 2002, 2015;
Raine, 2008; Rubin & Perse, 1987; Quan-Haase & Young, 2010; Wu & Atkin, 2017).
Information seeking refers to a motive to actively search out information about current issues
(Kaye, 2005). Previous studies determined a significant relationship between informative
motivation and television news consumption (Gantz, 1978; Rubin & Perse, 1987). In both cases,
people need to gather information from news to personally keep knowledgeable about public
issues, stay abreast of major issues of the day, and learn about uncertain things and what happens
in the society (Ko et al., 2005). Therefore, those who have a strong motive for information
acquisition are more likely to pay attention to information itself and be interested in diverse
issues. To this end, the Internet and social media are convenient and accessible for people
seeking to get a wide range of information about a diversity of topics (Raine, 2008). As
politicians, political organizations, and news media turn to Instagram, information about public
15
matters is now abundant on Instagram (Murphy, 2019). Therefore, when people want to acquire
the latest information, Instagram easily fulfills their needs to seek out and acquire information
about specific issues. In addition, when scrolling down the page on News Feed, users easily
encounter political news that is incorporated into other posts that their friends create and share
(Bergström & Jervelycke Belfrage, 2019; Fletcher & Nielson, 2018). It is expected that those
who have a strong motivation for information seeking read carefully the information on their
News Feed to keep up with main issues of the day.
Accordingly, this thesis posits the following as its first hypothesis:
H1: Motivation for information seeking will be positively related to political information
consumption on Instagram.
In addition, the need for self-expression is another important motivation for political use
of social media (Kaye, 2005; Parmelee & Bichard, 2012; Shao, 2009; Parmelee & Roman,
2019). Motivation for self-expression refers to a need to present personal opinions (Kaye, 2005)
and critique (Parmelee & Bichard, 2012). Wu and Atkin (2017) explored motivations in relation
to individuals’ online news comment behavior. They found that self-expression is positively
associated with posting on online news comments sections. In addition, college students who use
Facebook primarily for self-expression are willing to list their party identification on their
Facebook profile in order to reveal their political positions (Pempek et al., 2009).
Social media provides convenient functions to fulfill the self-expression need. Social
media users easily disclose and share feelings/thoughts through easy-to-use functions anytime
anywhere (Quan-Haase & Young, 2010). For example, a previous study found that those who
have a strong motive for self-expression frequently entered Facebook, clicked “like” button and
commented on posts to reveal their opinions on issues (Hunt et al., 2012). Instagram has similar
16
functions with Facebook, and thereby people easily present their ideas of certain issue by using
convenient functions of posting, commenting, and clicking “like” button. Moreover, politicians
and news media actively utilize “Instagram Live” to communicate with Instagram users
(Thompson, 2019). Therefore, those who want to express views on public issue can engage in
politician’s live-streaming video, ask questions, and send comments on Instagram live.
As noted above, opinion expression on social media is a public activity, which means that
any users see what other people post, comment and share (Ekström & Shehata, 2018). People
who want to express their experiences and opinions about key issues search and acquire more
information to solidify and elaborate their viewpoints in order to influence others (Lyons &
Henderson, 2005). Therefore, it is expected that people seek out and consume information
carefully before sharing opinions with social networking contacts in an attempt to post coherent
and persuasive arguments about issues.
All of these taken together, it is possible to assume that people who want to express
personal thoughts and feelings about major issues of the day use Instagram to acquire news and
share opinions by posting, commenting, clicking “like” button, and engaging in Instagram live.
Therefore, the second hypothesis is as follows:
H2: Motivation for self-expression will be positively related to (a) political information
consumption, and (b) political opinion expression on Instagram.
Following Accounts on Instagram
People “follow” various accounts on Instagram from their friends and celebrities to
politicians and news media. Following is a unique activity in social media, where a person
chooses specific users to be listed on his or her social media networks. Once following others’
17
accounts, the person can receive constant updates of posts, articles, photos and videos from the
followed accounts (Notopoulos, 2019).
Previous studies have found that motivations for social media use are related to following
certain accounts on social media. (Frederick et al., 2012; Whitemkaper et al., 2012). For
example, people who have strong motivations to keep a parasocial relationship with a celebrity,
keep updated on athletes’ schedules and news, and feel enjoyment tend to follow athletes on
Twitter (Frederick et al., 2012).
However, there are only few studies that examine why people follow political accounts
on social media. Therefore, this thesis aims to provide an in-depth examination of the
relationships between motivations of Instagram use and following political accounts on
Instagram. In particular, this study distinguishes following political accounts into two types:
following news media accounts (e.g., CNN, NPR, The Washington Post, Fox News, etc.) and
following politicians’ accounts (e.g., Donald Trump, Elizabeth Warren, Joe Biden, Bernie
Sanders, etc.). While both types of accounts offer various political posts on Instagram, the types
of information might be quite different.
On the one hand, the trend of political posts on Instagram provided by news media is an
example of what is sometimes called “poster news.” Instead of presenting long articles and
captions, news media rely on images to create the equivalent of a poster with a photo and short,
concise, fact-centered text (Towner & Muñoz, 2018). For example, with regard to the recent
issue of Bernie Sanders dropping out of the 2020 Democratic race for president, news
organizations (e.g., Fox News, The Washington Post, NBC news, New York Times, CNN, Huff
Post, Buzz Feed News) posted content on Instagram, including Bernie Sanders’s photo with only
one sentence of short messages such as “Bernie Sanders drops out,” “Sen. Bernie Sanders ends
18
presidential bid,” “Bernie Sanders is dropping out of the presidential race,” “Sen. Sanders
suspends presidential campaign,” or “Bernie Sanders is ending his presidential campaign.” It is
possible to assume that news media developed a strategy to approach young people, the majority
of Instagram users, by disseminating eye catching and accessible news. Therefore, people easily
catch what the current important issue is.
On the other hand, political posts on Instagram offered by politicians contain lengthy,
one-sided, opinion-centered information. In the digital age, politicians can directly communicate
with citizens without going through news organizations and journalists (Rauchfleisch & Metag,
2015). Therefore, they create their own social media accounts to disseminate what they want to
say to the public without filtering and gatekeeping from news media. Shogan (2010) analyzed
the content of the tweets of U.S. politicians and found specific patterns of messages. Politicians
mainly posted tweets to describe an official action they were planning and to articulate their own
positions on a particular policy or issue. Also, politicians use Twitter for self-promotion by
announcing their upcoming campaign events, criticizing a counterpart’s policy, and devaluing
another’s political competence (Jackson & Lilleker, 2011). Thus, it is possible to assume that
political figures obviously express their own political beliefs and ideology (i.e., right-wing or
left-wing) on their social media accounts. In other words, the messages posted by politicians are
more likely to be subjective, opinion-centered, and biased than objective and fact-centered.
Furthermore, news media provide relatively more diverse news from living, social and health
issues to political issues, while politicians post content by focusing on political issues and
sharing their political viewpoints and strategies about controversial issues (Reuters Institute,
2017). Therefore, it is expected that politicians spread relatively opinion-centered messages,
19
which means people grapple to understand implication and reasoning of politician’s words,
compared to readily understandable posts from news media.
Since these two types of accounts that provide political information on Instagram are
distinct, Instagram users’ motivations to access each account type and use the different forms of
information may be different. On the one hand, those who want to know about what is going on
around them (i.e., motivation for information seeking) may feel uncomfortable when they
encounter complicated political information provided by politicians. For them, simple,
infographic-dominant news offered by news media on Instagram may be enough to keep up-to-
date on diverse issues. On the other hand, those who want to present opinions on public issues
(i.e., motivation for self-expression) desire to show their knowledge and positions about the
issues or to persuade others (Macafee, 2013). Since expressing opinion is a public behavior,
social networking contacts easily encounter what others post, see what others think about certain
issues, and evaluate other’s political stances on the issues. Therefore, people who are motivated
to show their own viewpoints may need to get in-depth information that helps them to deliberate
the issue and the reasoning of their arguments. It is expected that if they follow politicians and
visit their accounts, they can easily acquire and learn how politicians interpret current
issues/policies to make strong arguments about these issues.
This leads to the third and fourth hypotheses:
H3: Motivation for information seeking will be positively related to following news media
accounts.
H4: Motivation for self-expression will be positively related to following politicians’
accounts.
Incidental Exposure to Political Information on Instagram
20
Particularly, in terms of political information consumption, there are two ways in which
people are exposed to political information on social media. Users actively seek out political
news online or users are incidentally exposed to information while doing other things (Stroud,
2017). Information seeking refers to a conscious process of searching for facts about specific
issues and acquiring information on those issues, while incidental exposure refers to occasions
when people are using social media and accidentally encounter political information without
having any prior intention to look for such news (Fletcher & Nielsen, 2018).
Incidental exposure to news is important as it leads to further political behaviors,
ultimately resulting in participatory democracy. For example, people intentionally search and
seek further information after they randomly come across news because their interests on
specific issue are spontaneously motivated by a headline, picture, or item in the news
(Tewksbury et al., 2001). In other words, incidental news exposure can serve as a gateway which
encourages viewers to search for and consume additional relevant political information (Baum &
Jamison, 2011). Such attention to specific political issues has a positive influence on political
knowledge by informing citizens. Furthermore, when people inadvertently encounter mobilizing
information, they are more likely to engage in political participation, such as demonstration (Kim
et al., 2013). Given the significance, this thesis examines how the incidental exposure to political
information happens on Instagram. In a study of Facebook users, for example, Purcell and
colleagues found that more than half (59%) responded that they unexpectedly stumble upon
news almost every day (Purcell et al., 2010). More recently, Boczkowski and colleagues found
that incidental exposure to news on social media has increasingly risen in recent years,
particularly among young people (Boczkowski et al., 2018).
21
The inadvertent news exposure on social media is related to the structures and features of
the platforms. Social media users have a possibility to be exposed to diverse information from
non-politics to politics. This occurs because users’ networks are connected with many others
from friends to news organizations. For example, “News Feed” is assigned in the first page of
Facebook, in which friends’ updates (e.g., profile change, upcoming events, hyperlinks of news,
posts that friends click like button, comments) are shown every time users visit their feed (Bode,
2016). Friends post and comment on political news as well as daily information. Therefore, the
functions of loose boundaries and openness easily expose users to a variety of information and
engagement in discussion on public issues. In addition, when users tag specific friends, the
tagged persons are directly and unconsciously connected to specific information that users share.
Also, news organizations have their own social media presence, and thus users are easily
exposed to diverse news stories in which they are interested once they follow the channel (Ju,
Jeong, & Chyi, 2014). Instagram provides the similar function of News Feed. Furthermore,
young people intensely use the “Instagram Stories” function (Mohsin, 2020). People upload
various types of information from daily life to political posts on Instagram Stories. Instagram
Stories is always located at the top of users’ app when they log in, and colorful circles around
each friend’s profile photo are shown up on the top of the first page in order to notify users of
their friend’s update of new stories (Rouse, 2018). Most Instagram users first click the eye-
catching circles and check friends’ stories. This is because the posts shared through Instagram
Stories disappear within 24 hours, and the time limit may motivate users to promptly open the
stories. (Hsiao, 2019). Once they tap to view a person’s stories, the page is automatically moved
to next person’s stories within 20-30 minutes. Therefore, unless they click the exit button, they
are incidentally exposed to next posts that other friends share on Instagram stories. Accordingly,
22
the features of Instagram increase the possibility that people accidentally come across political
information.
Some scholars consider incidental information as a by-product of other online activities
(Kim et al., 2013; Tewksbury et al., 2001). In other words, people randomly encounter political
information while using social media for other things. This is because the social media
environment has a complicated information cycle rather than the linear news cycle of traditional
media (Bergström & Jervelycke Belfrage, 2018) and provides abundant and ubiquitous political
information. According to a study by Bakshy et al. (2015), more than one in ten posts on News
Feeds included hard news content. Many news organizations and political figures now have their
own Instagram presence and share their contents (Jung et al., 2017). A recent study found that
frequency of Web use is positively related to incidental exposure to news on the Web
(Tewksbury et al., 2018). Therefore, it is expected that the more that people routinely use social
media, the more they are unintentionally exposed to an array of news from non-political to
political information.
Along the same lines, when people log into their Instagram accounts, a bunch of new
posts is automatically disseminated on their News Feed. Therefore, it is possible to assume that
overall time spent in Instagram predicts inadvertent exposure to political information.
Based on the literature review and understanding of the characteristics of Instagram, the
fifth hypothesis is proposed:
H5: Frequent use of Instagram will be positively related to incidental exposure to
political information on Instagram.
23
Chapter 3
Methods
This chapter will cover data collection, measurement, and analytical framework. In terms
of data collection, this study aims to look at Instagram use in relationship to politics among
young people who dominantly utilize the platform. According to previous studies, college
population can represent young adults despite the limited generalizability of findings (Cooper et
al., 2011; Wiecko, 2010). Therefore, the unit of analysis in this study is college students,
particularly UNM undergraduate students. In addition, to test the research question and
hypotheses, this chapter will describe scales that measure the extent of motivations, political
information consumption, political opinion expression, follwoing politicians/news media,
frequent use, and incidental news exposure. Also, in terms of data analysis, this study uses
hierarchical regression analyses.
Data collection
A total of 399 college students were collected between February 3 and February 28,
2020, from University of New Mexico (UNM) and asked to participate in a survey as part of a
research project being conducted by a UNM graduate student. (See Appendix, which provides
the complete survey.) The minimum number of necessary samples is 377 among 17,859 UNM
undergraduate students, when confidence level is 95%, margin of error is 5%, and population
proportion is 50%. Survey respondents were selected using a random sample procedure. The
UNM Registrar’s Office randomly selected 3,000 email addresses among total UNM
undergraduate students which was used as a sampling framework. The 3,000 selected students
were sent the first recruiting email, including information about online survey and compensation,
on February 3. Four times reminders were sent to increase participation in the online survey on
24
February 5, 7, 10, and 12. Once they clicked the survey link on email, they encountered the
informed consent form to be asked about whether they were willing to participate in the survey.
The survey was proceeded after respondents clicked “Next” button. Most respondents completed
the survey within 15 to 20 minutes. The response rate was 13.3%. This survey was approved by
UNM IRB office. 15 winners were randomly chosen via “Pretty Random” number generator app
and offered a $15 Amazon gift card for compensation.
Among the total number of participants, UNM students who currently use Instagram are
only included in the analysis. The reason is that this thesis examines the political use of
Instagram. Therefore, the number of samples was 341 (86.3%).
The final participants included 219 females (66.4%), 108 males (32.7%), and 3
individuals identified as non-binary and/or queer (0.9%). 146 participants (44.1%) self-identified
as having Hispanic, Latino, or Spanish origin, and 157 participants (47.4%) self-identified as
either Hispanic, Latino, or Spanish. 28 participants (8.5%) revealed that their ethnicity is White,
Mixed, Asian, Native American, Caucasian, and/or Swiss-American. In terms of race, most of
the participants identified as White (70.9%), while 34 identified as Asian or Asian American
(10.4%), 20 identified as American Indian or Alaska Native (6.1%), 10 identified as Black or
African American (3.1%), and 1 identified as Native Hawaiian or other Pacific Islander (0.3%).
Moreover, 30 participants (9.2%) responded that they identified as Mexican, Mixed, Latino,
Hispanic, and/or Mestizo. In terms of class standing, 66 participants were freshmen (19.9%), 59
participants were sophomores (17.8%), 77 participants were juniors (23.2%), and 130
participants were seniors (39.2%). The annual family income of the participants averaged
between $35,000-$49,999 and $50,000-$74,999.
Table 1. Demographics
Variable
N (%)
25
Gender
Female
219 (66.4)
Male
108 (32.7)
Other
3 (0.9)
Ethnicity
Hispanic, Latino, or Spanish origin
146 (44.1)
No Hispanic, Latino, or Spanish origin
157 (47.4)
Other
28 (8.5)
Race
White
232 (70.9)
Asian or Asian American
34 (10.4)
American Indian or Alaska Native
20 (6.1)
Black or African American
10 (3.1)
Native Hawaiian or other Pacific Islander
1 (0.3)
Other
30 (9.2)
Class standing
Freshman
66 (19.9)
Sophomore
59 (17.8)
Junior
77 (23.2)
Senior
130 (39.2)
income
Less than $35,000
92 (28.7)
$35,000 - $49,999
54 (16.8)
$50,000 - $74,999
70 (21.8)
$75,000 - $99,999
42 (13.1)
$100,000 or more
63 (19.6)
Measurement
Motivations for Instagram use. To measure the motivations for Instagram use, I adapted
the existing scales of motivations for Internet, Facebook, and Twitter use. I used 18 items
primarily used and overlapped in previous studies of U&G (Chan et al., 2012; Hunt, Atkin, &
Krishnan, 2012; Parmelee & Bichard, 2011; Parmelee & Roman, 2019). Respondents were asked
to indicate how much the following statements describe their motivations for using Instagram on
a 5-point scale (1=strongly disagree to 5=strongly agree; see Table 2).
Table 2. Structure Matrix for Instagram Use Motivations with Oblimin Rotation of
Factor Analysis
Motivations
Information
Entertainment
Social
interaction
Self-
expression
To get useful information
.86
.26
.30
.30
26
To keep up with issues of the day
.85
.25
.35
.33
To broaden my knowledge base
.83
.18
.17
.35
To find out information about public
issues
.83
.26
.36
.42
To understand events that are
happening
.81
.28
.36
.26
To access information quickly
.80
.28
.31
.15
To forget about my problems
.28
.78
.26
.09
Because it relaxes me
.38
.73
.24
.05
To put off something I should be
doing
.16
.62
.32
.17
To pass time when bored
.13
.61
.41
-.16
Because it is entertaining
.34
.61
.51
-.21
To keep in touch with
friends/followers
.27
.23
.76.
-.04
To show others encouragement
.33
.29
.76
.09
Because I wonder what other people
are doing
.13
.37
.67
.07
To share my views, thoughts, and
experiences about current issues
.46
.22
.66
.32
To give me something to talk about
with others
.47
.42
.52
.20
To criticize politicians
.36
.07
.12
.88
To engage in discussion with political
figures
.47
.19
.23
.86
Eigenvalue
6.42
2.38
1.31
1.21
Variance accounted for, %
35.66
13.20
7.25
6.70
Note. Extraction method: Principal component analysis. Rotation method: Oblimin with
Kaiser normalization. Bold values represent items included in each factor.
First, I conducted factor analysis, which indicate the 18 items fell into 4 categories. First,
motivations for information seeking include (a) to get useful information, (b) to keep up with
issues of the day, (c) to broaden my knowledge base, (d) to find out information about public
issues, (e) to understand event that are happening, and (f) to access information quickly (M =
2.78, SD = .99, Cronbach’s α = .91). Second, motivations for entertainment include (a) forget
27
about my problems, (b) because it relaxes me, (c) to put off something I should be doing, (d) to
pass time when bored, and (e) because it is entertaining (M = 3.51, SD = .76, Cronbach’s α =
.77). Third, motivations for social interaction include (a) to keep in touch with friends/followers,
(b) to show others encouragement, (c) because I wonder what other people are doing, (d) to share
my views, thoughts, and experiences about current issues, and (e) to give me something to talk
about with others (M = 3.44, SD = .78, Cronbach’s α = .73). Fourth, motivation for self-
expression include (a) to criticize politicians, and (b) to engage in discussion with political
figures (M = 1.82, SD = .84, Cronbach’s α = .81).
However, Kaye (2005) and Shao (2009) defined motivation for self-expression as a need
to represent deliberate expression of one’s feeling and thoughts. Parmelee and Bichard (2011)
also conceptualized that self-expression refers to the expression of personal opinions. Based on
the evidence, I decided that the item “to share my views, thoughts, and experiences about current
issues” fit in with motivation for self-expression rather than motivation for social interaction.
Therefore, I tested reliability analysis for three items (e.g., to share my views, thoughts, and
experiences about current issues, to engage in discussion with political figures, to criticize
politicians) to check their consistency (Cronbach’s α = .66) (M = 2.23, SD = .81). Based on the
change, motivation for social interaction is changed to include (a) to keep in touch with
friends/followers, (b) to show others encouragement, (c) because I wonder what other people are
doing, and (d) to give me something to talk about with others (M = 3.55, SD = .77, Cronbach’s α
= .68).
Political information consumption. Acquisition of political information was measured
averaging six items (Cho et al., 2009) that asked respondents how frequently they do the
following activities on Instagram on a 5-point scale (1=not at all to 5=frequently): (a) get
28
political information from politician’s posts, (b) get political information from friends or
acquaintances, (c) get political information from celebrities’ posts, (d) read posts about political
issues, (e) read other’s comments about political issues, and (f) read news (M = 2.00, SD = .88,
Cronbach’s α = .80).
Political opinion expression. Political opinion expression refers to active political
behaviors of sharing personal opinions on public issues, compared to political information
consumption (Rojas & Puig-i-Abril, 2009; Cho et al., 2009). The variable was measured
averaging eight items that asked respondents how frequently they do the following activities on
Instagram on a 5-point scale (1=not at all to 5=frequently): (a) express own political views or
opinions, (b) click “like” button on political posts, (c) post a photo or video that have something
to do with politics, (d) add other’s political posts to your story, (e) send direct message (DM) to
politicians, (f) comment on posts about politicians, (g) comment on posts about the 2020
presidential election, and (h) comment on posts about current issues (M = 1.44, SD = .60,
Cronbach’s α = .89).
Following politicians. Respondents were asked to indicate how many politicians and
political organizations they have among their Instagram “following” with open-ended question.
The answers varied from 0 to 900 (M = 16.30, SD = 72.15). The value of skewness is 8.61 and
greater than 1.0. Thus, the distribution is right-skewed. Except the outliers, answers were
recorded based on the value of cumulative relative frequency to closely make normal
distribution. Thus, following politicians become a 5-point scale, including those who did not
follow politicians coded as 1 (N =148, 47.9%); those who followed 1-4 politicians coded as 2 (N
= 54, cumulative percent 65.4%); those who followed 5-10 politicians coded as 3 (N = 59,
cumulative percent 84.5); those who followed 11-25 coded as 4 (N = 25, cumulative percent
29
92.6%); and those who followed 30-100 politicians coded as 5 (N = 23, cumulative percent
100.0%) (M = 2.10, SD = 1.29).
Following news media. Respondents were asked to indicate how many news media
accounts (e.g., CNN, CBSnews, etc) they have among their Instagram “following” with open-
ended question. The answers varied from 0 to 900 (M = 7.94, SD = 52.47). The value of
skewness is 15.91, and thus the distribution is right-skewed. Except the outliers, answers were
recorded based on the value of cumulative relative frequency to closely make normal
distribution. Thus, following news media is a 5-point scale: Those who did not follow news
media account were coded as 1 (N = 150, 48.1%), those who followed 1-2 coded as 2 (N = 63,
cumulative percent 68.3%); those who followed 3-9 coded as 3 (N = 50, cumulative percent
84.3%); those who followed 10-15 coded as 4 (N = 32, cumulative percent 94.6%); and those
who followed 20-100 coded as 5 (N = 17, cumulative percent 100.0%) (M = 2.05, SD = 1.26).
Frequency of Instagram use. Respondents were asked to indicate how frequently they use
Instagram on a 5-point scale from “not at all” (1) to “frequently” (5), (M = 3.84, SD = 1.33).
Incidental news exposure. Respondents were asked to answer a question on a 5-point
scale: “In the past 3 months, have you randomly come across posts about the following issues on
Instagram?” (1=never to 5=frequently). The following issues included (a) the 2020 presidential
election, (b) Trump administration, (c) environmental issues, (d) immigration policy, (e) gun
ownership, (f) legalizing abortion, (g) impeachment of President Donald Trump, and (h) Iran
missile attack (M = 2.86, SD = 1.05, Cronbach’s α = .92). I chose eight specific issues for
measurement items because these controversial, polarized issues are prevailing, repeated and
discussed many times on social media.
30
Control variables. The study used demographic characteristics (e.g., gender, ethnicity,
race, class standing, income), political ideology and political interest as control variables. These
variables are known to be highly relevant to the associations that the present study is focusing
upon, such as the relationships between motivations for Instagram use and political behaviors,
and between frequency of Instagram use and incidental news exposure. For example, women are
more likely to use Instagram than men (Duggan & Brenner, 2013). There is a significant
difference in types and frequency of social media use among members of different ethnicities,
races, and age groups (Chen, 2020). Furthermore, people with higher income are more likely to
participate in politics than those with lower income (Solt, 2008). Also, political orientations,
such as ideology and political interest, have been shown to be positively related to political
behaviors. With regard to political orientations, political ideology was measured on a scale from
“very conservative” (1) to “very liberal” (5), (M = 3.42, SD = 1.00). Political interest was
measured using three items, how interested you were in (a) local, (b) national, and (c)
international politics, on a scale from “not at all” (1) to “very interested” (5), (M = 3.33, SD =
1.10, Cronbach’s α = .88).
Analytical Framework
To examine this study’s research question and hypotheses, various statistical analyses
were conducted including descriptive statistics, reliability test, factor analysis and multiple
regression analysis. All statistics were calculated using SPSS 26.0.
31
Chapter 4
Results
This study ran hierarchical regression models to test one research question and five
hypotheses. First, the research question, “what are the primary motivations for Instagram use
among college students?”, was posited to explore the relationship between specific
motivations and frequency of Instagram use. As presented in Table 3, the regression analysis
reveals that controlling for gender, ethnicity, race and class standing, motivations for
information seeking and entertainment are significant predictors of frequent use of Instagram
(β = .25, p < .001, β = .40, p < .001, respectively), together accounting for 34.8% of the total
variance. Therefore, in terms of the research question, Instagram users with motivations for
information-seeking and entertainment are positively related to their frequent use of
Instagram in general. In terms of motivations for social interaction and opinion expression,
there is no significant relationship between these motivations and frequency of Instagram
use.
Table 3. Regression Model Predicting Frequency of Instagram Use by Motivations
Variable
Frequent use of Instagram
Model 1
Model 2
Block 1: Control
Gender
-.07
-.02
Ethnicity
.04
.09
Race
.11
.03
Class standing
-.06
.01
Income
.08
.07
Block 2: Motivations
Entertainment
.40***
Information seeking
.25***
Social interaction
.11
Self-expression
-.01
ΔR
2
(%)
34.8
R
2
(%)
2.6
37.4***
32
Note. Sample size = 257. Cell entries are standardized beta coefficients for Blocks 1 and 2.
*
p
< .05.
**
p < .01.
***
p < .001.
Second, the first hypothesis expects that motivation for information seeking is
positively associated with political information consumption on Instagram. To test the first
hypothesis, I ran hierarchical regression analysis with motivations as independent variables,
and news consumption as a dependent variable. As presented in Table 4, motivation for
information seeking is a significant predictor of political information consumption (β = .30, p
< .001). Thus, the regression model supported the first hypothesis, which predicted a positive
relationship between motivation to seek out information and consuming political information
on Instagram.
Third, the second hypothesis anticipates that motivation for self-expression is
positively related to political information consumption and political opinion expression. As
presented in Table 4, motivation for self-expression is a significant predictor of political
information consumption (β = .30, p < .001) and political opinion expression on Instagram (β
= .49, p < .001). Thus, the regression model supported the second hypothesis, which
predicted a positive relationship between motivation to frankly express opinions and
consuming political information, and between the motivation and expressing political
viewpoints on Instagram.
Table 4. Regression Model Predicting Online Political Participation by Motivations
Variable
Online Political Participation on Instagram
Information Consumption
Opinion Expression
Model 1
Model 2
Model 3
Model 1
Model 2
Model 3
Block 1: Control
Gender
-.03
-.01
.07
-.07
-.04
.06
Ethnicity
-.08
-.11
-.05
-.01
-.04
.01
Race
.07
.06
-.03
.09
-.08
.01
Class standing
-.03
-.02
.06
-.04
-.04
.05
33
Income
.10
.13*
.09
.02
.06
.01
Block 2: political
orientation
Political ideology
.07
.06
.17**
.14*
Political interest
.35***
.27***
.31***
.21***
Block 3:
Motivations
Information
.30***
.04
Self-expression
.30***
.49***
ΔR
2
(%)
14.0
25.0
16.1
22.0
R
2
(%)
2.1
16.1***
41.1***
1.3
17.4***
39.4***
Note. Sample size = 258 for political information consumption; 257 for political opinion
expression. Cell entries are standardized beta coefficients for Blocks 1, 2, and 3.
*
p < .05.
**
p
< .01.
***
p < .001.
Fourth, the third hypothesis anticipates that motivation for information seeking is
positively related to following news media accounts on Instagram. As presented in Table 5,
motivation for information seeking is a significant predictor of following news media (β =
.25, p < .01), explaining 6.5% of the variance. Therefore, the regression model supported the
third hypothesis, which predicted a positive relationship between motivation to seek out
information about major issues and following news media accounts on Instagram.
Fifth, the fourth hypothesis expects that motivation for self-expression is positively
associated with following politicians’ accounts on Instagram. As presented in Table 5,
motivation for self-expression is a significant predictor of following politicians’ accounts (β
= .32, p < .001), accounting for 12.4% of the total variance. Therefore, the regression model
supported the fourth hypothesis, which predicted a positive relationship between motivation
to express personal opinions and following politicians’ accounts on Instagram.
Table 5. Regression Model Predicting Following Political Accounts by Motivations
Variable
Following on Instagram
News Media Account
Politicians’ Account
Model 1
Model 2
Model 3
Model 1
Model 2
Model 3
34
Block 1: Control
Gender
.09
.09
.11
.04
.06
.13*
Ethnicity
-.06
-.06
-.04
-.12
-.14*
-.11
Race
-.01
-.01
-.05
.01
-.01
-.06
Class standing
.07
.07
.10
-.02
-.02
.05
Income
.07
.08
.06
.03
.05
.02
Block 2: political
orientation
Political ideology
.02
.02
.01
-.01
Political interest
.08
.07
.31***
.24***
Block 3:
Motivations
Information
.25**
.09
Self-expression
.02
.32***
ΔR
2
(%)
0.8
6.5
9.7
12.4
R
2
(%)
2.0
2.8
9.3***
1.6
11.3***
23.7***
Note. Sample size = 258 for following news media; 257 for following politicians. Cell entries
are standardized beta coefficients for Blocks 1, 2, and 3.
*
p < .05.
**
p < .01.
***
p < .001.
Sixth, the fifth hypothesis expects that frequent use of Instagram positively influences
frequency of incidental news exposure. As presented in Table 6, frequency of Instagram use
is a significant predictor of incidental exposure to political information (β = .26, p < .001),
explaining 5.2% of the total variance. Therefore, the regression model supported the fifth
hypothesis, which predicted a positive relationship between frequent use of Instagram and
incidental exposure to political news.
Table 6. Regression Model Predicting Incidental Exposure on Instagram by Frequency
Variable
Incidental Exposure on Instagram
Model 1
Model 2
Model 3
Model 4
Block 1: Control
Gender
-.10
-.08
-.03
-.02
Ethnicity
.02
-.00
.04
.02
Race
.05
.04
-.03
-.04
Class standing
-.17**
-.17**
-.11*
-.11*
Income
.01
.03
.00
-.01
Block 2: Political orientation
35
Political ideology
.02
.01
-.01
Political interest
.31***
.26***
.26***
Block 3: Motivations
Information
.21**
.10
Self-expression
.22**
.21**
Block 4: Usage
Frequency of Instagram use
.26***
ΔR
2
(%)
8.3
12.6
5.2
R
2
(%)
5.9
14.2***
26.8***
32.0***
Note. Sample size = 259. Cell entries are standardized beta coefficients for Blocks 1, 2, 3,
and 4.
*
p < .05.
**
p < .01.
***
p < .001.
36
Chapter 5
Discussion
Instagram does matter in the social media network scene because this platform has a
strong following among teens and young adults (Pew Research Center, 2019). In other
words, although Facebook and Twitter are still popular social networking services, they are
losing young people, and thereby Instagram may become the biggest platform for future
generations. As Instagram has increasingly attracted young users, politicians and news
organizations are turning to and using Instagram, an array of political information is currently
available on Instagram, and Instagram provides convenient functions to engage in a variety
of political activities on Instagram. Despite the rapid adoption of these many important
Instagram uses, prior to the current thesis, few studies have examined the way young people
engage in political behaviors on the platform. It is important to explore how they use
Instagram in relationship to politics because social media influence processes of being
political creatures among young people (Lee et al., 2013).
This thesis approached college students’ political use of Instagram based on uses and
gratifications theory. To be specific, it aimed to identify how motivations of Instagram use
influence young people’s political behaviors such as getting political information, expressing
political opinions, and following politicians/news media accounts on Instagram. Furthermore,
this thesis focused on how young people’s Instagram use affect incidental exposure to
political information on Instagram.
First, this study found that motivations for entertainment and information seeking are
positively related to frequent use of Instagram. Previous studies found that young people
intensely use Instagram to reduce stress and feel enjoyment. In addition to the evidence, the
37
present study also found that college students actively use Instagram in order to get
information they need. This finding implies that Instagram plays an important role as a major
information source, and thus young people select and enter Instagram frequently when they
need to get various information.
Second, in terms of political use of Instagram, this study found that motivation for
information seeking has a positive influence on political information consumption. That is,
young people who want to learn about unknown things and keep abreast of current issues
select and log in to Instagram to read news, comments and posts about public issues. This is
because a large number of Instagram users update a myriad of posts every day, and thus they
easily get necessary information on social and political issues on Instagram. Furthermore,
this study found that motivation for self-expression is positively related to political opinion
expression as well as political information consumption. It implies that young people who are
strongly motivated to present their opinions on major issues and to criticize politicians enter
Instagram and gather relevant information to organize and strengthen their ideas, and then
upload posts and comments on the issue based on the consumed information.
These findings may be further interpreted with relation to following Instagram
accounts of news media and politicians. In this study, motivation for information seeking
predicts following news media, while motivation for self-expression influences following
politicians. On Instagram, news media and politicians provide somewhat different types of
political information. News organizations offer poster-type news, which contains a photo and
concise message about various issues from daily life to politics. However, politicians upload
lengthy opinion-based posts specifically about politics to promote their political competence
and qualification on their Instagram accounts.
38
When all of these facts are taken together, it is possible to interpret them to mean that
young people who have a strong motivation for information seeking want to know about
what is going on around society, and therefore follow news media accounts that provide
overall information about major issues of the day. Once following these news accounts, they
easily encounter accessible political information and read news when they enter Instagram.
On the other hand, young people who have a strong motivation for opinion expression need
to show their knowledge about current issues and persuade others to support specific issues,
and thus they need more in-depth information to strengthen their opinions. Once following
politicians, they are exposed to contents the politicians share, and thus able to read and learn
the way politicians interpret specific issues and policies. Based on these types of information,
they can express their political viewpoints about the issue with logical reasoning on
Instagram by posting, commenting, sending DMs, clicking the “like” button, and engaging in
Instagram live.
Lastly, this thesis found that frequent use of Instagram is positively associated with
incidental exposure to political information on Instagram. It means that young people who
frequently enter Instagram inadvertently come across political posts on Instagram. This may
be due to the functions of Instagram (e.g., openness). When college students do other things
on Instagram, they are exposed to various posts updated by their Instagram contacts and the
posts are mixed up with diverse information, including from daily life as well as politics.
Therefore, those who frequently enter Instagram have a great chance to unexpectedly
stumble upon political news. The incidental information is important since it leads to further
political information seeking that result in knowledge gain, opinion expression, and protest
participation (Baum & Jamison, 2011; Kim et al., 2013). Moreover, it has a potential to reach
39
out to young people who are less interested in politics and use Instagram mainly for
entertainment (Boczkowski et al., 2018).
This thesis has several limitations. First, this thesis is grounded on U&G theory as a
theoretical framework, but the approach has been often criticized as the focus is too
individualistic and ambiguous (Rayburn, 1996). The approach does not consider other
contextual and cultural factors that may influence motivations for social media use and
political behaviors. Second, there is an issue of generalizability of the findings. The samples
used in the study were collected from UNM undergraduate students. That is, the participants
were college students. This study aimed to explore young people’s political use of Instagram,
however, not all young people attend college. Therefore, it is hard to assume that the samples
can represent young people in general. Third, there is a significant discrepancy between total
respondents and samples used in data analysis. This thesis set the minimum number of
samples as 377 by using sample size calculator and successfully collected responses from
399 respondents. However, only 341 students currently use Instagram, and thus I lost over 50
samples. Among the 341 participants, about 80 respondents were also removed from analysis
because they had missing responses mostly in demographic questions such as gender and
race. When creating the online survey, the “required answer” function was not applied to the
survey questionnaire. Thus, respondents could easily skip questions which they felt
uncomfortable to answer. Fourth, there is an issue of the extent of credibility. As this study
relies on an online survey, self-reported answers result in unclear and inaccurate data. This is
because participants do not interpret questions and items in a similar way in accordance with
researcher’s intention. Also, their lack of memory about the subject could lead them to
answer with uncertainty. For example, in the case of incidental news exposure, respondents
40
were asked to answer how often they randomly encountered political posts on Instagram in
the past three months, using a five-point scale. It is hard to remember the experience of being
inadvertently exposed to political news on Instagram, and thus participants could answer the
question with speculation. Fifth, in data analysis, there are several assumptions to check for
multiple regression model. Specifically, in terms of independence of residuals, the Normal P-
P plot was skewed in the case of the second and third hypotheses, which entail dependent
variables of political opinion expression and following news media. This suggests that the
data set was not normally distributed (Pallant, 2007).
Conclusion
This thesis posited a question: whether young people use Instagram for political
information and express their political opinions on Instagram. Instagram serves as a major
political information source and provides convenient functions to easily engage in a variety
of online political participation. Therefore, young people who are motivated to keep up-to-
date on what is going on around the society are inclined to select and use Instagram to seek
out and consume information on the latest issues. They may follow news media accounts to
easily get various information they need. Furthermore, young people who need to present
personal opinions on public issues and critique politicians are more likely to enter Instagram,
gather relevant information to make a clear argument about the issues, and engage in various
expressive participation such as posting, commenting on current issues, clicking “like”
button on debated posts, joining politicians’ Instagram live to ask questions and share their
political viewpoints, and sending direct messages to politicians. They may gather useful
information to support their opinions by following politicians’ accounts on Instagram.
41
In addition to the motivated political use of Instagram, young people’s habitual use
also influences their political activity on Instagram. To be specific, their active access to
Instagram increases the opportunity to incidentally encounter diverse posts, including
political information. This is because users are connected to each other and a variety of
contents are mixed up on Instagram like Facebook and Twitter. Therefore, when they
frequently enter Instagram and scroll down their News feed without intention to seek out
news, they are incidentally exposed to news shared by their social networking contacts and
stumble upon political information mixed up with entertaining information.
Overall, despite several limitations, this thesis sheds light on the potential of
Instagram being a political sphere in which young people consume political information and
express political opinion. The findings indicate that Instagram is an appropriate and
convenient platform for college students to easily get what they want to consume about
public issues and express what they think about the issues.
42
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APPENDIX: Survey
A. How frequently do you use the following social media? (1=not at all, 2=rarely,
3=sometimes, 4=often, 5=frequently)
1. Facebook
2. Instagram
3. Snapchat
4. Twitter
5. TikTok
6. YouTube
B. Do you currently use Instagram? 0 No; 1 Yes
C. Among your Instagram “following,” how many politicians and political organizations do
you have? (approximately)
D. Among your Instagram “following,” how many news media accounts (e.g., cnn, cbsnews,
etc) do you have? (approximately)
E. How much do you agree or disagree with the following statements? “I use Instagram…”
(1=strongly disagree, 2=disagree, 3=neither agree nor disagree, 4=agree, 5=strongly agree)
1. To pass time when bored
2. Because it is entertaining
3. To access information quickly
4. To keep up with issues of the day
5. To broaden my knowledge
6. To give me something to talk about with others
7. To share my views, thoughts, and experiences
64
8. To keep in touch with friends/followers
F. How much do you agree or disagree with the following statements? “I use Instagram…”
(1=strongly disagree, 2=disagree, 3=neither agree nor disagree, 4=agree, 5=strongly agree)
1. To put off something I should be doing
2. Because it relaxes me
3. To forget about my problems
4. To understand events that are happening
5. To get useful information
6. To find out information about public issues
7. Because I wonder what other people are doing
8. To engage in discussion with political figures
9. To show others encouragement
10. To criticize politicians
G. How frequently do you do the following activities on Instagram? (1=not at all, 2=rarely,
3=sometimes, 4=often, 5=frequently)
1. Get political information from politicians’ posts
2. Get political information from friends or acquaintances
3. Get political information from celebrities’ posts
4. Read posts about political issues
5. Read other’s comments about political issues
6. Read news
H. How frequently do you do the following activities on Instagram? (1=not at all, 2=rarely,
3=sometimes, 4=often, 5=frequently)
65
1. Express own political views or opinions
2. Click “like” button on political posts
3. Post a photo or video that have something to do with politics
4. Add other’s political posts to your story
5. Send direct message (DM) to politicians
6. Comment on posts about politicians
7. Comment on posts about the 2020 presidential election
8. Comment on posts about current issues
I. In the past 3 months, have you randomly come across posts about the following issues on
Instagram? (1=never, 2=rarely, 3=sometimes, 4=often, 5=frequently)
1. The 2020 presidential election
2. Trump administration
3. Environmental issues
4. Immigration policy
5. Gun ownership
6. Legalizing abortion
7. Impeachment of President Donald Trump
8. Iran missile attack
J. How interested are you in? (1=not at all, 2=rarely interested, 3=neutral, 4=somewhat
interested, 5=very interested)
1. Local politics
2. National politics
3. International politics
66
K. What is your political ideology? (1=very conservative, 2=conservative, 3=moderate,
4=liberal, 5=very liberal)
L. What is your gender? (1=woman, 2=man, 3=other: please describe your gender identity)
M. What is your ethnicity? (1=Hispanic, Latino, of Spanish Origin, 2=No Hispanic, Latino,
or Spanish Origin, 3=other: please describe your ethnicity)
N. What is your race? (1=Black or African American, 2=White, 3=Asian or Asian American,
4=American Indian or Alaska Native, 5=Native Hawaiian or other Pacific Islander, 6=other:
please describe your race)
O. What is your class standing? (1=freshman, 2=sophomore, 3=junior, 4=senior, 5=graduate
student)
P. When were you born? (year)
Q. What is your major?
R. What is your annual family income? (1=less than $35,000, 2=$35,000-$49,999,
3=$50,000-$74,999, 4=$75,000-$99,999, 5=$100,000 or more)
