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Heavy episodic drinking among college students is a common but scarcely researched public health problem in China. Although social drinking could be regarded as an enjoyable activity across cultures, the Chinese cultural belief about alcohol use is different from that of its Western counterpart, which has been richly evidenced in the research literature. Specifically, Chinese college students may consider social drinking as a venue for practicing an important social skill and preparing for life after college. This project introduces and tests the concept of “drinking as preparation for adulthood.” An approximate longitudinal study was conducted with a purposive sample of 338 college students (65.5% as females) in Southern China. An event history analysis confirms that drinking as preparation for adulthood is a significant predictor of college drinking onset. Findings indicate that culturally unique psychological factors can provide valuable alternative explanations and expand the scientific validity of theories established in the West.

This study examined the Chinese public’s use of Weibo (a microblog platform) and their cognitive, affective, and behavioral responses to a series of food safety crises. Based on a sample of 1,360 adult Weibo users across China, the study found that Weibo use contributed to cognitive and behavioral responses to food safety concerns, but access to other online and off-line news and information outlets was largely irrelevant. Emotional response toward the food safety incidents was a stronger predictor of both food safety risk perception and prevention action, relative to food safety incident awareness and factual awareness. Theoretical and social implications of study findings are discussed.

Even though online radio services have been available since the mid-1990s, academic research on online radio diffusion remains scarce. The present study explores how online radio's value-added affordances may help shape the cognitive and affective responses to influence the adoption process among terrestrial radio listeners. Results show that online radio's fluid technology attributes, positive adoption beliefs and attitudes, and functionally similar technology clusters are significant predictors of online radio adoption. A lack of familiarity with online radio and low affinity with radio listening might have contributed to the lack of interest in online radio adoption.

In the current Internet environment, media must not only compete with one another but with a host of newcomers, including online companies with no traditional media ties and a variety of other entrepreneurs. To what extent do the media reflect their traditional strengths and features? Furthermore, since the Internet allows for two-way communication, which of the media are taking advantage of this feature to connect with their audiences? This paper reports the results of a content analysis of 422 websites associated with local newspapers, radio stations, and television stations in twenty-five of the largest metro markets in the United States. Results show that each medium (including newspaper, radio station, and television station) has a relatively distinctive content emphasis, while each attempts to utilize its website to maximize institutional goals. Market size is found to be a relatively unimportant factor in shaping the content of these websites, but media type helps explain how these websites are differentiated.

This study surveyed respondents in three disparate communities regarding their willingness to express their opinions about “Official English.” The findings raised questions as to whether perceived media opinion influenced their willingness to “speak out.” People were more likely to express their opinions when they perceived that national opinion (public and media) corresponded with their own opinions.

This study of video viewing explores the emergence of home entertainment culture, focusing on the attitudes of the audience toward the medium and how well the medium meets audience expectations. These attitudes are found to be significant in predicting types of video cassette recording use.

Audiences make television news choices based on several factors, such as liking the newscaster, the content and scope of news programs, or from the carry-over effect of the preceding or following programs. Here, evaluation of the anchor person appeared to be most important in picking a weather program, less important for selected news and sports programs. Viewers reported that quality and scope of local news also drew them to particular programs. Findings are based on a telephone survey.