Research
A quantitative study investigating what factors influence college students' use of digital music streaming services, using Spotify as the primary context.
This study investigated what factors influence college students' use of digital music streaming services, using Spotify as the primary context. The research question was: what factors influence the use of digital streaming services for music listening among college students?
Grounded in the UTAUT2 theoretical framework, I conducted a literature review to identify potential predictors, then designed and pre-tested a multi-item survey instrument to measure them. The study collected 149 responses from college students, of which 127 were complete and valid.
I started with a literature review to identify the most supported predictors of music streaming behavior across existing research. From that, I selected 10 constructs under the UTAUT2 framework, including perceived usefulness, price value, habit, music affinity, and attitude towards piracy. I then developed and adapted multi-item survey measures for each construct, tested them for overlap in meaning, and administered the survey on Qualtrics. I analyzed the results in SPSS using exploratory factor analysis and reliability testing to evaluate the validity of each measure.
The constructs with the strongest reliability were price value (α = .815), perceived ease of use (α = .866), subjective norm (α = .861), and music affinity (α = .861), suggesting these are the most stable predictors of streaming behavior among college students.
Music piracy awareness and attitude towards piracy showed significant overlap in meaning, suggesting they may be measuring the same underlying construct rather than two distinct ones.
Habit and perceived ease of use also showed meaningful overlap, which required removing several items from the final instrument to improve construct validity.
The revised instrument accounted for 66–70% of the variance across construct groupings, producing a cleaner and more reliable survey for future use in studying music streaming behavior.
The study produced a full research report including a literature review, theoretical framework, development of multi-item measures, factor analysis, reliability testing, and a revised survey instrument ready for full-scale administration.
