Binge Watching: Motivations and Factors Behind Young Adults' Addiction to Television

Running head: BINGE WATCHING
Binge watching
Name of the student:
Name of the University:
Author’s note

1BINGE WATCHING
Introduction:
With the increase in engaging and attractive television content, binge watching
television has become a new form of addiction in adults. As binge watching is associated
with higher sedentary time and less amount of physical activity, it is going to have negative
impact on health of individuals (Walton-Pattison, Dombrowski and Presseau (2018). To find
appropriate intervention to reduce addiction to television, finding the motivation behind the
binge watching TV among young adult is important.
Aim:
The aim of the research proposal is to propose a research design to evaluate the
factors and motivation behind binge watching TV in adults. The research hypothesis is that
identifying the factors may help to take actions in the area and engage young adults in other
activities for entertainment. The research question that will guide the research process and fiil
the gap in past research are as follows:
What are the factors and motivation behind young adults to engage in binge watching TV?
Literature review:
Review of past research shows several types of research done to gain idea
about the additive potential of television binge watching. The study by Riddle et al. (2018)
explains that binge watching can be intentional and unintentional and online survey method
was used to explore both types of binge watching. Majority of participants reported having
engaged in intentional binging in the past. However, one major finding was that binging
pattern was dependent on time as some engaged in binge watching during semester breaks,
whereas other did so in the weekend. Despite this outcome, the gap left behind in past study

2BINGE WATCHING
was that the number of hours spent in binge watching was not considered and the factors
motivating individual to prefer binge watching television was not reported. Hence, it cannot
be inferred from the study why adults preferred binging instead of other activities. Therefore,
developing a research design that specifically considers the motivational aspects of binge
watching is important.
The significance of the study by Walton-Pattison, Dombrowski and Presseau (2018) it
explored about the theoretical correlates of television binge watching. Unlike the above
study, this study evaluated duration of binge watching by using an online questionnaire.
Average binge watching among participants was 1.42 days per week. In addition, variation in
binge watching was seen based on different intention and outcome expectation among
participants. The study revealed the use of findings to develop theory and interventions
related to binge watching. The limitation of the study was dependence on self-report
suggesting the need for collective objective data on binge watching. In view of this limitation,
review of motivation behind binge watching can help to interpret whether contextual factors
or real-time versus on-demand service influence the rate of binge watching.
Significance of the research:
There are two rationales for investigating about the motivation behind binge watching
television among young adults. The first rationale is that understanding and interpreting
motivation will help to uncover theoretical idea regarding the reasons for extreme
engagement in certain behaviour in adults. It will also help to identify the areas where change
in needed to control binge watching. In the past, various theories has been applied to mass
media content and matching relevant theory with relative media content can help to interpret
how addiction to television watching can be controlled (Pena, 2015).