How Gay, Bi, And Straight Male Students At ChulalongkornudUniversity Use Facebook?

摘要

The way in which people with different sexual orientations use certain types of media is anudimportant topic of interest among communication scholars. Understanding the communication patterns inudFacebook use among gay, bi, and straight people could shed light on differences in communication in thisuddigital era. The objective of this study was to evaluate Facebook use among heterosexual and homosexualudmale students. Self-administered questionnaires were used to collect data from 400 undergraduate maleudstudents at Chulalongkorn University. Overall, male students were less actively engaged in conversationsudon Facebook compared to their female counterparts. Our results showed that approximately 1 out of 5udparticipants indicated that they liked to or used to have sex with men. Compared to straight men, gay andudbisexual men are more active Facebook users. This group more frequently updated their status,udcommented on their friends' photos, posted photos and messages on their friends' pages, and showedudsupport for others. We also found that gay and bisexual men gave advice to their friends on Facebook, asudwell as shared their personal problems. These results suggest that gay and bisexual men use Facebook toudescape stress, entertain themselves, and cope with problems compared to straight men, who did not useudFacebook to satisfy those needs and were found to be more reserved and less communicative.