Drivers of social media application satisfaction among students in higher vocational colleges — an empirical analysis based on uses and gratifications theory

Introduction Social media in higher vocational colleges commonly faces problems such as content homogenization, insufficient interactivity, and disorderly vocational resources, which lead to lower student satisfaction. Existing studies mostly focus on general universities or general user groups, and insufficiently examine the demand differences and satisfaction driving mechanisms of vocational college students. Therefore, based on Uses and Gratifications Theory (UGT), this study takes vocational college students as the research objects and systematically analyzes the drivers and influencing mechanisms of their satisfaction with social media applications. Methods We quantitatively collected 18,085 valid questionnaire responses from higher vocational colleges and used partial least squares structural equation modeling (PLS-SEM) to test the hypotheses. Results The results show that interactive engagement has a direct and significant positive effect on satisfaction; content quality, platform usability, and information release efficiency indirectly enhance satisfaction by improving interactive engagement; privacy and security perception positively moderates the relationship between interactive engagement and satisfaction, whereas occupational social support negatively moderates the relationship between interactive engagement and satisfaction. Discussion The findings provide predictive evidence and managerial implications for optimizing official social media platforms in vocational colleges.