Investigation and Research on the Use of Tik Tok of College Students in Beijing

This paper sets university students using Tik Tok APP as the research object, combining theoretical basis with empirical research. Based on use and gratification approach, questionnaire and interview ithe core to convey this research. Analysis of characteristics of Tik Tok lay a foundation for the research as well. At the same time, according to the specific use behavior of college students from Beijing area, the reasons and influences of use of Tik Tok by college students will be analyzed. This paper aims to help college students rationally deal with their own use of Tik Tok and provide suggestions for the further development of Tik Tok in the future.


Introduction
Along with the development of economic society and the modern science and technology, smart phones are becoming more and more accessible to the public, the spread form of mass media is making a new innovation.Using a mobile phone to watch a short video becomes a new form of communication and diffusion of information, Short video software represented by Tik Tok is gradually thriving.According to announcement of latest beta released by the CEO of the Beijing Byte Dance Limited Company, until the August of 2020, Including the other version of Tik Tok, Tik Tok has more than 600 million daily active users.As Tik Tok stands out in the whole industry, it is becoming more and more widely used among college students nowadays.The user group of college students is growing day by day, with its coverage rate also increasing, which is changing the media and habits of college students to watch videos.According to statistics, 85% of Tik Tok users are under the age of 24, and a high proportion of them are college students.As of Dec 31, 2022, Tik Tok had more than 26 million college students users, accounting for 80 percent of all college students in China.Students, who receive higher education, master knowledge, are curious about new things and have good acceptance ability, are more likely to be attracted by short videos as a form of communication, and they are also one of the groups with the highest stickiness of Tik Tok users.Tik Tok has a profound impact on young people's social interaction, learning, consumption, entertainment and other aspects, and has penetrated into all aspects of young people's lives.
Therefore, short videos on Tik Tok are developing rapidly and exerting a profound influence on college students, which has great research value.Taking college students in Beijing as an example, this study mainly focuses on the following questions: What is the proportion of college students in Beijing who use Tik Tok?What do they usually tend to watch?What kind of impact does this have on their study and life?Thus, the reasons, purposes and the duration of using Tik Tok, the viewing preference, and the impact on their life and study are summarized.
With the continuous development of short videos, relevant experts and scholars have carried out diversified academic research with a wide range of research fields and rich research results.Among them, it mainly focuses on the motivation and the influence of using Tik Tok among college students, and most of them use questionnaires for quantitative research.On this basis, in addition to quantitative research, this study will conduct qualitative research methods such as in-depth interviews and focus group interviews to study the reasons, experiences and influences of use of Tik Tok by college students.
The number of college students is huge and they are in a important position in communication.What's more, the current era of new media is constantly updated.Taking college students as the starting point, seeing small as big, and studying the use of Tik Tok by college students to explore how to correctly use the media can not only provide a reference for college students to build a healthy and positive study life, but also have great significance for the whole society.

literature review
As short videos spread more and more widely among college students, researches on this aspect are gradually expanding.Many scholars at home and abroad have studied the use of Tik Tok by college students from many different levels.
In addition to studying the basic situation, such as time, content of attention, age and gender ratio, etc., the paper SHS Web of Conferences 155, 02021 (2023) https://doi.org/10.1051/shsconf/202315502021SDMC 2022 also studies the influence of Tik Tok on college students' study, entertainment, social communication and many other aspects.It can be seen that Tik Tok has attracted the attention of college students because of its video length and concise content.Among its users, young female users are a group of users with a long time and high stickiness under the premise that young users account for a large proportion.[1] Moreover, it has a positive influence on college students, but also has a negative potential risk.For example, in terms of values, Tik Tok helps college students establish correct interpersonal values, political values and happiness values, but the negative induction of values also distorts the cognition of occupation, morality and aesthetics.[2] In addition, the popularity of Tik Tok also has a variety of effects on college students' moods and emotions.While bringing positive incentives and enhancing college students' happiness, it also causes psychological confusion and anxiety.At the same time, Tik Tok addiction will also hinder the personal development of college students.[3] [4] [5] With the deepening of communication research, the research center gradually shifts from communicator to receiver.This is because, with the continuous expansion of the network information space, more media that can meet the needs appear in the public's view, and the public's needs gradually show the characteristics of multi-level, multifield and diversification.[6] In foreign studies, the proportion of young adults using Tik Tok accounts for more than half.Researchers mainly study the motivation, experience and attitude of young people using Tik Tok through the use and satisfaction theory.According to the results of the study, young people mainly use it to meet their needs of entertainment, socializing, reading news and pursuing fashion trends.It also studied young people who have not used the APP to find out what needs are not being met by Tik Tok, such as feeling that it is too childish, encroachment on personal privacy and cyber violence.[7] At the same time, there are also studies on the impact of Tik Tok on college students' learning.The results showed that there was an inverse relationship between the duration of Tik Tok use and their ability to focus on study.This proves that Tik Tok has some negative effects on college students' learning.[7] From the perspective of research field, the current research direction mainly focuses on the causes and influences of Tik Tok use by college students, and the form and content are relatively simple.From the perspective of research methods, previous studies on the use of Tik Tok by college students mainly use questionnaires to understand the basic situation of the use of Tik Tok by college students, and then analyze the data, which is difficult to have a deeper understanding.In terms of theory, most analyses are based on the theory of use and satisfaction.In this research, questionnaire survey and indepth interview are combined, and both qualitative and quantitative research are used to have a deeper understanding of the basic situation of Tik Tok use by college students and to analyze more profound problems behind it.Based on the theory of use and satisfaction, meme theory and media dependence are also used for discussion.
On the basis of these, this study will continue to study the following issues in depth: first, the use of Tik Tok short video software by college students; Second, the purpose of students using Tik Tok; Third, what kind of impact does the short videos that college students prefer to watch have on their lives and how to deal with them?Through the exploration and analysis of the above problems, the evidence that can verify the theory of use and satisfaction in the process of using Tik Tok by college students is found, and the prominent problems in the process of using Tik Tok are discussed.

methods and materials
This research adopts a combination of quantitative and qualitative research methods.In addition to distributing questionnaires, in-depth interviews and focus group interviews are also used for research.Firstly, among college students in Beijing, questionnaires were distributed through several Internet social platforms, such as Wechat, Weibo and Douyin, and samples from colleges and universities in Beijing were obtained.At the beginning of the questionnaire, the researcher has informed the respondents that the questionnaire will be filled in anonymously without disclosing the personal information of the respondents.The questionnaire will be filled in after the respondents agree.After the questionnaire was collected, it was screened, invalid samples were eliminated, valid samples were retained, and the obtained data were analyzed to grasp the general situation of Tik Tok use by college students in Beijing from a macro perspective, so as to obtain a basic understanding.
Then, 8 students from college students in Beijing were selected as the interviewees, and 4 of them were interviewed in depth one to one, and the other 4 were interviewed in focus group.The in-depth interviews were conducted by phone on the afternoon of August 20, 2022.The college students who participated in the in-depth interviews were from 4 different grades majoring in computer science, civil engineering, English and business administration, among whom two were male and two were female.Before conducting in-depth interviews with the four college students, they were informed in advance that the interviews would be recorded and sorted out for this research, and the interviewees' consent was sought before starting the interviews.During the interview, paper was used to make notes and audio recording equipment was used for recording; And ask some divergent questions to the respondents to get more profound answers than those on the questionnaire.At the end of the interview, the recorded interview content was sorted into written form for further analysis.
Focus group discussions were conducted online.The four college students who participated in the focus group interview were from the four majors of information management and Information system, Japanese, public administration and English, including two sophomores and two juniors, all of whom were female.Before the start of the discussion, please inform all the participants that the meeting will be recorded, no personal privacy will be disclosed, and all the content will be used for research only.
At the beginning of the meeting, the moderator began to ask questions, and the respondents answered in turn.After the focus group interview, the content of the meeting was organized into a document form and finally analyzed.After the in-depth interview and focus group interview, not only the basic information about the use of Tik Tok by these students, but also some more in-depth references can be obtained, such as the various influences of Tik Tok use on life and study, and the existing problems of Tik Tok platform at the present stage.

Population distribution characteristics of respondents
As the research object of this paper is college students from Beijing who use Tik Tok, the participants were screened at the beginning of the questionnaire.A total of 254 people participated in the questionnaire survey and 210 valid questionnaires were collected.Among them, male samples accounted for 29.1%, and female samples accounted for 71.9%.The number of female samples was relatively large.The sample of the questionnaire covered natural sciences and humanities, with natural sciences accounting for 40.0% and humanities accounting for 60.0%.

Basic usage analysis
First of all, in terms of the starting time of using Tik Tok, 66.6% of students started using Tik Tok in 2017.Secondly, college students who start to use Tik Tok after being influenced by their family and friends and are attracted by the functions of the software itself account for the highest proportion, followed by acquaintances' recommendation and favorite Internet celebrities or stars.It can be seen that the motivation of college students to use Tik Tok is largely influenced by their social relationships.At the same time, they start to use Tik Tok because some of its own functions can meet their needs to a certain extent.Second, the questionnaire shows that the main purpose of using Tik Tok is to relax body and mind, accounting for the highest proportion, reaching 92%.It can be seen that Tik Tok, as a short music video software, its entertainment properties are in line with the needs of college students to relax.Second, in terms of the average daily use time, the highest proportion is between half an hour and one hour and more than two hours, followed by one hour to two hours and less than half an hour.It can be inferred that among college students who use Tik Tok for more than two hours a day, some of them may be addicted to Tik Tok.Among the evaluation of their addictions to Tik tok, the number of people who are addicted to Tik tok ranks the highest, accounting for 42%, and the rest are evenly distributed.Meanwhile, when asked if they can control how long they use Tik Tok, most people basically agree.Third, in terms of preferences for watching videos, videos in the field of leisure and entertainment are the most popular among college students, while videos in other fields of beauty, science education and current affairs are evenly distributed.In the questionnaire survey, the most popular types of bloggers watched by college students are food bloggers and funny bloggers.In terms of video content, college students value the innovation of video content most.
Finally, in terms of the influence of Tik tok on college students, most of the samples believe that the positive influence of Tik tok on them is greater than the negative influence, but the negative influence still exists.The positive effects include a relaxed mind and body that can be more productive at work and school, as well as a greater perspective on the world and new knowledge and insights.

Develop an outline for in-depth interviews and focus group discussions
The use of Tik Tok by college students varies from person to person, and it is not possible to fully summarize the use of Tik Tok by college students in Beijing through questionnaire research.In order to explore the use of Tik Tok at a deeper level, the author decided to use in-depth interviews and focus group interviews to conduct in-depth interviews and focus group interviews with college students in Beijing, so as to further understand the deep reasons and influences of the use of Tik Tok by college students from a more extensive dimension.
This interview mainly focuses on the reasons why college students use Tik Tok, and the influence of using Tik Tok is also considered.Therefore, the interview outline is as follows.

Analysis of results of in-depth interviews and focus group interviews
According to the analysis and induction of the results of questionnaire survey, in-depth interview and focus group discussions, the starting point of using Tik Tok by college students is mostly for the purpose of entertainment, and the fields of the videos they watch also overlap and overlap with the fields they are interested in.In terms of the impact of Tik Tok on college students, it mainly has a significant impact on their life, study, aesthetics and study.While bringing positive effects such as relaxing the body and mind, broadening the vision and showing oneself, there are also negative effects such as addiction to Tik Tok, wasting time and generating negative emotions.At the same time, college students also pointed out that the existing problems of Tik Tok platform, such as repeated advertisements, comment sections and pushed content, will affect the user experience.
The research results of this paper are basically consistent with the previous research conclusions, because their research also proves that the use of Tik Tok by college students mainly meets the cognitive needs, emotional needs and aesthetic needs of college students.Tik tok can not only meet any one of these needs unilaterally, but also meet any two of them at the same time or the integration of all the needs.College students Tik tok users can obtain information on Tik tok platform.The simple process of information interaction makes the process of obtaining information easy to operate, which is in line with the fragmented usage habits of college students.Tik tok can not only entertain college students, but also accompany them and show themselves in a diversified way.In terms of the influence of Tik Tok on college students, both positive and negative effects exist.This paper and previous studies have also proved that Tik Tok can provide emotional and knowledge support to college students, enrich life interest, broaden horizons, realize self-value, and thus gain more self-identity and sense of belonging.But it is also easy to indulge, by the network violence and invasion of privacy and other bad aspects of the influence.At the same time, long-term use of Tik tok will also cause distraction and addiction.
Starting from the use of Tik Tok by college students in Beijing, this study provides a different perspective for the public to understand the situation related to the use of Tik Tok by college students.Tik Tok platform can timely correct questions according to the results of questionnaires and interviews, and college students can also timely adjust the time and way of using Tik Tok.At the same time, the research also verifies the correctness of the theory of use and satisfaction through quantitative research and qualitative methods.For the use of Tik Tok to make deeper research and contribution.
Due to my own academic level is limited, involved in the research of the theory is rich and deep enough, I hope that more and more scholars in the related studies, the community for college students or other representative of a group for further research, expanding the scope of the study, modify the problem of questionnaire, and expand the scope of the questionnaire distributed to explore trill use more questions, To facilitate the continuation of subsequent research.

conclusions
According to the analysis and induction of the results of questionnaire survey, in-depth interview and focus group interview, the starting point of using Tik Tok by college students is mostly for the purpose of entertainment, and the fields of the videos they watch also overlap and overlap with the fields they are interested in.In terms of the impact of Tik Tok on college students, it mainly has a significant impact on their life, study, aesthetics and study.While bringing positive effects such as relaxing the body and mind, broadening the vision and showing oneself, there are also negative effects such as addiction to Tik tok, wasting time and generating negative emotions.At the same time, college students also pointed out that the existing problems of Tik Tok platform, such as repeated advertisements, comment sections and pushed content, will affect the user experience.
The research results of this paper are basically consistent with the previous research conclusions, because their research also proves that the use of Tik Tok by college students mainly meets the cognitive needs, emotional needs and aesthetic needs of college students.Tik tok can not only meet any one of these needs unilaterally, but also meet any two of them at the same time or the integration of all the needs.College students Tik tok users can obtain information on Tik tok platform.The simple process of information interaction makes the process of obtaining information easy to operate, which is in line with the fragmented usage habits of college students.Tik tok can not only entertain college students, but also accompany them and show themselves in a diversified way.In terms of the influence of Tik Tok on college students, both positive and negative effects exist.This paper and previous studies have also proved that Tik Tok can provide emotional and knowledge support to college students, enrich life interest, broaden horizons, realize self-value, and thus gain more self-identity and sense of belonging.But it is also easy to indulge, by the network violence and invasion of privacy and other bad aspects of the influence.At the same time, long-term use of Tik tok will also cause distraction and addiction.Starting from the use of Tik Tok by college students in Beijing, this study provides a different perspective for the public to understand the situation related to the use of Tik Tok by college students.Tik Tok platform can timely correct questions according to the results of questionnaires and interviews, and college students can also timely adjust the time and way of using Tik Tok.At the same time, the research also verifies the correctness of the theory of use and satisfaction through quantitative research and qualitative methods.For the use of Tik Tok to make deeper research and contribution.
Due to their own academic level is limited, involved in the research of the theory is rich and deep enough, I hope that more and more scholars in the related studies, the community for college students or other representative of a group for further research, expanding the scope of the study, modify the problem of questionnaire, and expand the scope of the questionnaire distributed to explore trill use more questions, To facilitate the continuation of subsequent research.

Figure 1
Figure 1 Propose of Using Tik Tok (The diagram is drawn by the author's own.)

Figure 2
Figure 2 Average Time Spent on Tik Tok Everyday (The diagram is drawn by the author's own.) (Zambrano-Vazquez, L. (2016).The interaction of state and trait worry on response monitoring in those with worry and obsessive-compulsive symptoms [Doctoral dissertation, University of Arizona].UA Campus Repository.https://repository.arizona.edu/handle/10150/620615 Wen, Y. (2022) Analysis of College students' social media addiction from the perspective of Meme Theory: A case study of Tik Tok.Communication research.5:119-120)