Navigating new media: The impact of short video platforms on political news consumption among Chinese university students

Recent years, political news consumption among Chinese youth has been notably low, leading to a phenomenon of political apathy. In recent years, the popularity of short video social media platforms, characterized by their vivid, visual, and straightforward content, has grown among young people and has become an essential channel for daily information consumption globally. This paper focuses on Chinese university students and the short video platform Douyin (TikTok), utilizing the Technology Acceptance Model (TAM) as the theoretical framework. Considering the background of the study, which involves political news consumption and the political culture of China, this study developed the Technology Acceptance Model (TAM) by adding perceived credibility and perceived political efficacy as independent variables. The findings indicate that attitude towards using is positively impacted by perceived usefulness, perceived ease of use, and perceived credibility, and that behavioral intention to use is positively impacted by attitude towards using. These findings align with hypotheses (H1, H2, H3, H5), while hypothesis (H4), which posits that perceived political efficacy has a positive effect on attitude toward using, was not supported. This may be due to the fact that the do not have high expectations for the political efficacy generated by paying attention to political news. The media and relevant government departments should pay more attention to strengthening the control of the quality of political information when publishing and disseminating political news. Ultimately, enhances the public's enjoyment of obtaining political news through social media, improve the political apathy among young Chinese people, and enhance their political literacy and democratic level.