是歡愉還是寂寞──以認知專注探討短影音社交App的依賴成癮

Enjoyment or Loneliness: The Influence of Cognitive Absorption on Addiction to Short-Form Video Apps

短影音社交App已嵌入年輕世代的生活文化。先前探討短影音社交App的依賴成癮，焦點多在孤獨、焦慮等負面心理特質影響。然而使用一種科技產生的最優經驗對依賴成癮的影響卻鮮少被注意。本研究以認知專注為理論基礎結合無手機焦慮及孤獨感探索人們對TikTok的依賴成癮，並比較認知專注、孤獨感、無手機焦慮對TikTok依賴成癮的強弱程度。認知專注被操作為二階構念，由享樂提升、時間解離、好奇心、以及專注沉浸四個一階構念形成。以線上問卷進行資料收集，從327份受訪者中選出169位每天使用TikTok的用戶，並以偏最小平方法分析資料。結果發現，用戶其實並不感到孤獨，而認知專注對於依賴成癮的影響最大，其次是無手機焦慮及孤獨感。本研究貢獻於以偏最小平方法進行二階模型分析的準確性，並釐清焦慮感與無手機焦慮構念的混淆。結論及意涵在文末進行討論。

Behavioral addiction triggered by internet usage or online gaming has been investigated and acknowledged by global health organization as a valid behavior disorder. It can lead to impairments of people’s abilities to operate in daily life, and could be displayed as deteriorations in work performance, academic performance, social skills, and insomnia. As mobile phone becomes the major vehicle used by people to surf online for all kinds of activities in recent years, it is essential to take a deep-dive into the relationship between behavioral addiction and mobile applications, to examine and investigate the causal relationship between the two, and the strength of lower-level, potentially addictive factors in forming impacts on users’behaviors.
Among these applications, short-form video apps such as TikTok, Instagram, Snapchat, Vimeo, WeChat, Triller, YouTube shorts, Mojo, Mitron and so on, are notably the most popular kind of apps with users around the world. These short-form video apps are easy to use and designed with entertainment in mind, supplying short videos ranging from 30 seconds to 3 minutes that can be played one after another, bringing users an experience of endless fun- and yet at the same time, enticing users to repeat their using behavior at a higher frequency and for a longer duration, and ultimately users may become overly rely on the apps, or even develop a“TikTok brain”that constantly seeks instant gratification, as identified in some studies.
TikTok, an application that combines Musical.ly and TikTok, was launched and operated by Chinese company ByteDance in 2016, and swept across the world in a short period of time. The majority of its users are generations born between 1995 and 2000 and beyond, with 85% of users under the age of 24. In 2018, it was downloaded more than 45 million times on the Apple App Store, championing the number of downloads among mobile apps all over the world that year. In Q1 2022, its number of global downloads reached a new high, surpassing Instagram and becoming the most popular short-form video app in the world. The powerful appeal of“TikTok-Make your day”keeps users refreshing their“For You”feed constantly, and its algorithm can accurately deliver relevant content based on user characteristics. It is rated as the most addictive app.
But why do people stick to TikTok, and depend on TikTok to the point of behavioral addiction? The experience that people are so obsessed with the usage of software technology and unable to extricate themselves is described as cognitive absorption by Agarwal and Karahanna. The concept of cognitive absorption emphasizes that the greatest gain from using technology is the experience during the process, instead of the outcome per se. People do not focus only on what they get from using the software technology, but pay more attention to the feelings and experiences during the using process, considering them as the most valuable part. Studies showed that cognitive absorption can drive people to continue using a specific software, but for some users, long-term and heavy usage may lead to compulsive usage or even behavioral addiction.
In view of the above, it is a reasonable extension of theories to further explore the relationship between cognitive absorption and short-form video apps behavioral addiction. While existing studies often investigate behavioral addiction in terms of avoidance, depression, stress, sense of loneliness, and social impairment, there is a relative lack of study on behavioral addiction from the perspective of user experience, which requires further investigation. On the other hand, there is also a lack of understanding of the relationship between user experience and emotional factors, and behavioral addictions. In other words, there is a lack of examination and comparison regarding the individual impacts of cognitive absorption, nomophobia, and loneliness on behavioral addiction. Accordingly, two questions that this research aims to answer. First, what is the relationship between cognitive absorption and short-form video apps dependence, and behavioral addiction? Second, what is the individual impact of cognitive absorption, nomophobia, and loneliness on short-form video app dependence and behavioral addiction and how are their strengths ranked in forming behavioral addictions?
This study uses cognitive absorption as the theoretical basis to develop a research model to explain people’s behavioral addiction to short-form video apps. Cognitive absorption was operationalized as a second-order construct, combining a first-order reflective pattern and a second-order formative pattern (reflective-formative type), and is composed of four first-order reflective dimensions- heightened enjoyment, focus immersion, temporal dissociation, and curiosity. At the same time, nomophobia and loneliness are also regarded as constructs directly related to behavioral addiction to compare the level of impact of different constructs on behavioral addiction.
For data collection, the study solicited respondents on PTT (https://term.ptt.cc/), one of the largest e-bulletin board systems in Taiwan, to fill in an online questionnaire and then selected only those that were qualified for the purpose of this study. 169 respondents among the 327 respondents collected use TikTok every day, therefore these 169 respondents were taken as the material for further data analysis. More than 60% of the respondents are under the age of 30, and more than 60% of the respondents are students. Partial least squares technology with SmartPLS 4.0 was used for analysis.
The results show that cognitive absorption has the greatest impact on behavioral addiction, followed by nomophobia and loneliness. This means that these young users depend on TikTok not because they are lonely, but because of the cognitive absorption that they experience when using TikTok- it has the greatest impact on their behavioral addiction. Nomophobia comes in as the second greatest factor in causing behavioral addiction, echoing previous studies to encourage more mobile-free anxiety outcomes.
The study analyzes the dependence and behavioral addiction of short-form video apps from a different perspective and yielded results different from conventional wisdom. A more traditional line of research believes that the dependence on these platforms of the younger generation stems from loneliness or anxiety, but this study found that cognitive absorption, an optimal experience, is the most powerful drive toward behavioral addiction to short-form video apps. Cognitive absorption, mostly, has been associated with positive effects in the discussion of technology usage. However, the findings of this study further acknowledged that cognitive absorption could be the catalyst of negative results of technology usage. The research supplements people’s understanding of the relationship between cognitive absorption and the negative effects of technology usage so that people can better control their technology-using behavior and reduce the risk of behavioral addiction.
The study contributed significantly to both theory and practice. It provides evidence to extend existing theories about cognitive absorption from the scenario of fixed, location-bound desktop computers to mobile phones. It also guides for behavioral therapy institutions to understand behavioral addictions from the perspective of using experience, and develop effective strategies for management and treatment.
However, as the study focuses on TikTok, the results may not be applicable to other short-form video apps, since each short-form video app has its own features and target audience, and may trigger different psychological and behavioral effects on users. It is important to bear this in mind when attempting to extrapolate the results of the study to other short-form video apps or user groups.