Music Information Behaviors and System Preferences of University Students in Hong Kong

This paper presents a user study on music information needs and behaviors of university students in Hong Kong. A mix of quantitative and qualitative methods was used. A survey was completed by 101 participants and supplemental interviews were conducted in order to investigate users’ music information related activities. We found that university students in Hong Kong listened to music frequently and mainly for the purposes of entertainment, singing and playing instruments, and stress reduction. This user group often searches for music with multiple methods, but common access points like genre and time period were rarely used. Sharing music with people in their online social networks such as Facebook and Weibo was a common activity. Furthermore, the popularity of smartphones prompted the need for streaming music and mobile music applications. We also examined users’ preferences on music services available in Hong Kong such as YouTube and KKBox, as well as the characteristics liked and disliked by the users. The results not only offer insights into non-Western users’ music behaviors but also for designing online music services for young music listeners in Hong Kong.