TikTok’s Latest Study Looks At Users’ Motivations Behind Vertically Scrolling Their ‘For You’ Page
In their latest study, TikTok gained greater insight into the motivations behind the usage of the app, commissioning Nielsen to delve deep into how it really makes users feel.
Nielsen interviewed over 8,000 users about their thoughts on different aspects of Gen Z’s favourite social platform:
“Nielsen’s study shows users around the globe find TikTok content to be authentic, genuine, unfiltered and trendsetting. At the same time, when looking specifically at advertising content, users still associated terms such as authentic and genuine, while adding honest, real, unique and fun.”
What is magnified is the joy in consuming content on the app, and how over 50% of respondents believe that they can trust others to be their authentic selves on it.
This is an interesting finding – in previous research, it has been found that other social media apps can have a negative impact on users, due to the ongoing pressure to appear “perfect.” This comes with the manipulation of photos and a showcasing exclusively of the positive sides of their lives, whereas TikTok has a much more casual feel where users can share less filtered content.
Due to the app’s lighthearted nature, the experience while using the app can have a positive effect on the user’s mood. Nielsen shows us that, “Globally, an average of 31% of TikTok users included “lifting my spirits” as one of the top three reasons for returning to the TikTok platform again and again.”
Another of the study’s findings was the percentage of users which said that they found community on the app.“Globally, an average of 59% of TikTok users feel a sense of community when they are on TikTok.”
Easily accessed hashtags related to communities and highly specific algorithms, feeding the the user exactly what they want, creates this sense of community. Commenting trends and features on clips also encourage participation, allowing users to ‘duet’ videos or use the same sounds that the original creator used.
This concept is reflected within the statistics, with Nielsen saying, “Globally, an average of 77% of TikTok users say they read the comments on the posts and videos on TikTok.”
Overall, we can see that users’ experiences on the app are, on the whole, positive and that in general, users come to this social media platform to find entertainment and community rather than comparison.
Finally, for our previous #SocialShort, click here.
