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1 Introduction of this chapter本章简介
本章回顾相关理论和实证研究，通过对这些文献的批判性分析，指出本研究的理论创新。
This chapter reviews relevant theories and empirical studies, through a critical analysis on these literatures to point out the theoretical innovation of this study.
1.2 Theoretical basis理论依据
1.2.1 Visual culture视觉文化
视觉文化是与传统印刷文化相对应的一种新的意识形态和艺术形式，它以影视形象符号为基本的表意系统，以电影和计算机多媒体为传播媒介。视觉文化的外在表现形式以形象符号为构成要素，以视觉感知为感知样式（Mamur，2012）。在更深层次上，视觉文化是指文化从以语言为中心的理性主义形式中分离出来，逐渐转向以形象为中心的感性形式。视觉文化不仅标志着一种文化形式的变化和形成，而且也意味着人类思维范式的转变（Walden，2011年）。
Visual culture can be defined as a new ideology and art form corresponding to traditional printing culture, it takes film and television image symbols as the basic ideographic system, as well as takes film and computer multimedia as the communication medium. The external manifestation of visual culture takes image symbol as a constituent element and takes visual perception as the perceived style (Mamur, 2012). At a deeper level, visual culture refers to that culture separates itself from the rationalist form taking language as the center to increasingly turn to the perceptual form taking image as the center. Visual culture not only marks the change and formation of a cultural form, but also means the transformation of human thinking paradigm (Walden, 2011).
巴拉克是历史上第一个解释“视觉文化”理论的人（鲍尔，2016年）。上世纪初，他预言随着电影的出现，一种新的视觉文化将取代印刷文化。他认为，印刷术的发明使得视觉在日常生活中的作用开始逐渐下降，抽象的印刷符号取代了面部表情来传达意义（Bauer，2016）。他认为电影的出现是人类文明史上的一次重大变革，它的出现使人类开始重新关注视觉，人类文化回归视觉文化（Bauer，2016）。
It was Baraz who first interpreted the theory of "visual culture" in the history (Bauer, 2016). At the beginning of the last century, he predicted that with the advent of film, a new visual culture would replace the printing culture. According to his view, the invention of printing makes the role of vision begin to decline gradually in daily life, abstract printed symbols replace facial expressions to convey meaning (Bauer, 2016). He believed that the emergence of film is a major change in the history of human civilization, its emergence makes human beings begin to re-focus on vision, human culture goes back to visual culture (Bauer, 2016).
伊格尔顿（1981）指出，人们正面临一个视觉文化时代。形象生产在现代社会中涉及政治、科技、商业、美学这四个主题。
Eagleton (1981) pointed out that people are facing a visual culture era. Image production profoundly involves politics, science and technology, business, aesthetics, these four themes in the modern society.
Virilio（1999）认为，互联网和卫星的出现标志着视觉文化的新时代。与传统的延迟文本传输相比，视觉电子媒体通信更接近于实时通信，视觉文化的主导地位使得文本传播居第二位。
通过前面的讨论，可以看出视觉文化自古就存在。正如巴拉兹（1945）所强调的，图像的出现使人们重新关注视觉文化，随着电子媒体技术的进步，视觉文化的主导地位越来越明显。Virilio (1999) believed that the emergence of the Internet and the satellite mark a new era of visual culture. Compared with traditional delay text transmission, visual electronic media communication is more close to real-time communication, the dominant position of visual culture makes text spread take a second place.
Through the previous discussion, it could be seen that visual culture existed since ancient times. As what Baraz (1945) stressed, the appearance of images makes people restore attention to visual culture, and with the advancement of electronic media technology, the dominant position of visual culture is becoming more and more obvious.
1.2.2 Visual communication视觉传达
People are through their own different sensory organs to recognize the world, one of the most important sensory organs is vision. Vision is the dominant feeling that people have in perceiving objective things, 70% of information that individuals receive from the objective environment is acquired through vision (Ryan, 2016). Visual communication refers to that information transfers in visual communication select appropriate symbols, patterns, color signs, typography, drawing and other visual elements, through a reasonable layout of these elements and symbols to pass a message to information receivers, when the information receivers respond to this visual information, the visual communication process is completed (Cornish, Goodman-Deane, Ruggeri, Clarkson, 2015).
Compared with other means of communication such as language communication, physical communication, visual communication has its different characteristics. First, the content of visual communication is more abundant, in communication, it can use a small amount of visual elements, through appropriate technology and the use of originality to transmit a large number of information (Figueiredo, 2015). Second, visual communication has a variety of forms, information transfers can use different forms and ideas to express different meanings, different information transfer can use different forms to express a same meaning (Ryan, 2016; Figueiredo, 2015). Third, visual communication can convey a lot of information, but different people may differ in the interpretation of these kinds of information. Fourth, in visual communication, if information receivers and the information transfers have more similar interests, knowledge structure, appreciation level, cultural background and so on, the information receivers can more understand the information that the information transfers try to transmit more accurately. On the contrary, it is difficult for the information receivers to understand the information that the information transfers intent to transfer exactly, and they will even distort the intention from the information transfers (Ryan, 2016; Figueiredo, 2015). Finally, visual communication often involves the exchange of emotions between the two sides, Cornish, Goodman-Deane, Ruggeri, Clarkson (2015) believed that information transfers are not only through visual language to express their intentions to the audience, but also hope that through visual communication to impress people's emotions, causing emotional resonance between the two sides.
The use of expression pack is also a type of visual communication, this study is based on visual communication theory to analyze Chinese Internet users’ use of expression pack.
1.2.3 Meme theory
In the 1970s, a British ethnologist named Richard Dawkins was on the basis of the core concept of genetics: “gene” to create the word "Meme". "Meme" is a human "cultural gene", it can be transmitted, spread, copied, it will also derive and vary, so that human culture innovates, continuously develops and evolutes in the inheritance of generations (Ross and Rivers, 2017).
Piata (2016) pointed out that in newspapers, radio, television and other traditional media platforms, the audience can only passively accept the information left by their predecessors or the content produced by the media, they can not interact and communicate with the producers, so it is difficult for them to edit or modify these information and content. In other words, the economic cost and technical threshold of Meme spread are quite high (Piata, 2016).
The leading role of Meme in cultural communication is fully demonstrated in the mobile Internet and social media era, and it has gradually developed into the “prism” to reflect the contemporary digital culture. In the social media platform, information and content producers and users can interact with each other across time and space to achieve cross-cultural interaction. More importantly, in this platform, users can not only edit and modify existing content, but also freely produce and disseminate new content and information (Williams at el., 2016). In view of this, digital Meme has become the main means of cultural communication and media integration. Meme mainly includes text, images, audio, video, these four categories (Piata, 2016). With the rapid development of Internet technology and the arrival of web2.0 era, Meme develops from the early maintenance model, through the medium-term expansion model, gradually into a later modification model (Ross and Rivers, 2017; Piata, 2016). Maintenance model of Meme refers to the multimedia information which has not been modified to maximize the retention of the original content, that is, "the original Meme." The expansion model of Meme refers to information and content which can be added or derived by secondary production and dissemination, they become "dynamic Meme". Modification model is the use of UGC of social media platform to change the "dynamic Meme", through remix, parody, and even thoroughly rewriting and subversion, as well as other disruptive innovation to eventually develop into "mature Meme" (Ross and Rivers, 2017; Piata, 2016).
Judging from Meme theory, expression pack has the characteristics of Meme. First, expression pack carries a certain amount of information communicated in the network, and in the process of communication, it will be edited by users to produce a certain variation. Second, the development of expression pack technology is also similar to the development of Meme, from the beginning, it can not be edited, and then it can be edited, and ultimately it develops into expression pack which can be greatly modified to express mood and opinion. Therefore, expression pack is not just visual or network technology works, to a certain extent, the existence and development of expression pack are closely related to the development of the network and social culture. In the analysis on strategies of the use of expression pack by Chinese young and middle-aged people, this study should also attach importance to the impact of Chinese society and network culture. #p#分页标题#e#
1.3 Network communication
1.3.1 Performance of visual communication in the network
In the network era, visual communication has its own characteristics, first of all, because of the support of computer and network, people have more material to produce visual works, people have a more optimized choice in terms of color, contrast, transparency and other aspects, people can make use of video or expression pack to create dynamic visual works, therefore, in the Internet age, visual works can be more attractive (Ryan, 2016; Ross and Rivers, 2017). Then, in the Internet age, visual works have more mobility, once a visual work is accepted by the majority of Internet users, it can be quickly spread to the rest of the world. Again, contents of visual works can be easily edited to express different meanings, for instance: same pictures with different words can express different meanings, different pictures coupled with the same text can express the same meaning (Ryan, 2016; Ross and Rivers, 2017). Finally, anyone can make visual works in the network to communicate with people, but limited by relevant network technology, producers have to master relevant network technology to produce good visual works (Piata, 2016).
1.3.2 Differences between middle-aged and old, as well as young people in terms of communication behavior in the network
Chao et al. (2017), Han et al. (2017), Yang et al. (2015) contrasted the difference of network communication behavior between middle-aged, old people and young people in China from the perspectives of attitudes, communication objects, communication contents and communication software. The research results revealed that the middle-aged, old people were more serious in communicating with other people on the Internet. Middle-aged, old Internet users were relatively mature, inclusive, they would not abuse and vent with no reason, nor did they parody. Compared with young Internet users’ entertainment, venting, game features, the middle-aged, old Internet users have quite serious attitude in communication (Chao et al., 2017; Han et al., 2017).
Communication objects of middle-aged and old people were usually relatively fixed, and they usually maintained a more frequent and long-term communication frequency with the communication objects, the communication objects were usually those who the middle-aged and old people were familiar with in reality, only a few were new friends made through the Internet, and the middle-aged and old people usually made less new friends. And young people communicated with more people, they loved to communicate with different objects and young people were better than the elderly at finding new friends on the network, young people usually only communicated frequently with those who have the same interest as they have (Han et al., 2017; Yang et al., 2015). The middle-aged and old people were happy to share their life experiences in their communication, they were willing to care about others and liked to make suggestions for others. And the communication between the young people was more sharing their emotions, expressing their views, or discussing a problem (Chao et al., 2017).
The middle-aged and old people communicated with people on the Internet usually only by one or two communication software, and usually most of the communication software functions were rarely used. And young people would be skilled in the use of a variety of communication software, most of the functions of the communication software were used (Han et al., 2017; Yang et al., 2015).
The use of expression pack is an important part of communication on the network. This study was based on the above content to analyze the differences between middle-age, old people and young people in using expression pack, as well as reasons for the existence of these differences.
1.4 Expression pack
1.4.1 Definition and characteristics of expression pack
Expression pack is a way to use pictures to express feelings. Expression pack is a popular culture formed after the active of the social software, expression pack is popular on the Internet, almost everyone uses expression pack. In the period of the mobile Internet, people take popular stars, quotations, animation, video screenshots as the materials, coupled with a series of matching text to express a specific emotion (Oleszkiewicz et al., 2017).
Expression pack is essentially a popular culture. Relying on the continuous development of social contact and networking, ways of communication between people change accordingly, from the earliest text communication to using some simple symbols, emoji expression, and it is gradually evolved into an increasingly diverse expression pack culture, Internet users use some self-made expression pack with popular elements to communicate. Most expression pack is funny, and the composition is exaggerated, through the collection and sharing of expression pack, people can get fun, while showing their own expression pack, people can be recognized by others to achieve psychological satisfaction (Xiang et al., 2016).
1.4.2 Functions of expression pack
Expression pack has many functions, which may lie in the following five aspects. Firstly, fast-paced modern life brings people a sense of tension and oppression, production and dissemination of expression pack is Internet users’ a way of going out of the pressure. In the process of production and dissemination of expression pack, Internet users are involved in the discussion, collection, forwarding and other network interaction, expression pack contains humorous comic elements for Internet users to get fun (Vidal, Ares and Jaeger, 2016). Secondly, expression pack gives Internet users opportunities to express their views. The self-made expression pack by netizens represents a grassroots culture, which a kind of resistance to the mainstream elite culture, it is also a subversion of the mainstream values. Internet users can be through the spoof of classic discourse to deconstruct and reproduce, to create their own words (Kavanagh, 2016). Thirdly, expression pack is combined with current hot events and characters, with the advantages of social network platform in disseminating, it is easy to quickly resonate with Internet users, thereby enhancing the discussion of a topic on the Internet. In addition to popular stars and stars on line, some variety show, movies, TV series and animation works can be taken as materials by netizens to make expression pack (Derks et al., 2007). Fourthly, Emotional symbols can lead to association to add chat content, emotional symbols become an important medium for people to communicate, it is an effective complement to text (Mahajan and Mulay, 2015). Jaeger and Ares (2017) said that people have once resorted to the abstract meaning delivered by literal symbols, which has been beginning to give way to reality and feelings based on image propagation. Jaeger and Ares (2017) believed that emotional symbols can visually represent the information exchanged and add the text content. The appearance of expression pack to a certain extent avoids the monotony of pure text communication and makes up for the lack for visual experience to provide attitude, emotion, voice and other important supplementary information. Rodrigues et al. (2017) found, emotional symbols can lead to people's association, reflecting the connotation and extension of things. As the language symbols are ambiguous, in communication, people can use expression pack to understand meaning. Finally, with the development of network culture, many users are not satisfied with the official expression pack provided by instant messaging software, they begin to find their own material to produce, reproduce and disseminate expression pack (Jaeger and Ares, 2017). For example, a fan group who like a star will be keen on spread of the expression pack of the star, the elderly group like the expression pack with traditional neon font and expression pack full of positive energy, and young people who are keen on moe culture and shut-in culture have their exclusive expression pack (Jaeger et al., 2017). Those ho produce and use the same kind of expression pack form a small circle, people interact in the circle to form cultural identity, which invisibly promotes the development of network culture, reflecting the inclusive and diversified characteristics of network culture in the new media era (Marengo, Giannotta and Settanni, 2017).
1.4.3 Types of expression pack
Since the birth of expression pack, there are a number of types in China, from the functional point of view, expression pack can be divided into the following types: those which can reflect the current hot people and events, expression pack used to express emotion, expression pack used to greet in communication and expression pack used to ridicule, spoof, and so on (Mahajan and Mulay, 2015; Jaeger and Ares; 2017). Considering from the protagonists of expression pack, expression pack can be divided into: stars, folks, animation, animals and so on (Marengo, Giannotta and Settanni, 2017; Jaeger and Ares; 2017). In terms of the format, expression package usually uses PNG format, JPG format, JPG format, EIF format and so on. JPG format is usually used to create a static expression pack, gif is usually used to make dynamic expression pack, EIF can be used to create dynamic and static expression pack, but it can only usually be used in the production of expression pack used in QQ, PNG format has all the advantages that gif and JPG format has, and it also has some of its own unique advantages, such as: the color is more real and it is easier to be spread (Jaeger et al., 2017; Marengo, Giannotta and Settanni, 2017).
This study was based on the characteristics, functions and types of expression pack to analyze the differences between middle-age, old people’s and young people’s motivation, preference, behavior in the use of expression pack.#p#分页标题#e#
1.5 Critical analysis
Visual culture, visual communication theory and Meme theory show that visual communication has become more and more important in today's society. Expression pack has become an important part of network visual communication. The above empirical study has also confirmed that the use of expression pack in China's online society has been a widespread phenomenon, its development is not only related to the network and technology, but also concerned with the network and social culture, Internet users’ habits. There has been a study on differences in network communication between Chinese middle-aged, old people and young people, but there is no research on the differences in the use of expression pack. This study explored the differences in the use of expression pack in order to fill the gaps in this area. The theoretical innovation of this study was not only to fill the gaps, but also to provide a theoretical analysis framework for the future study on the differences in the use of expression pack in other segment markets.
1.6 Summary
This chapter reviews the theories of visual culture, visual communication, Meme and so on, as well as reviews the empirical research on expression pack and the differences of online communication behavior between middle-aged, old people and young people. The next chapter, it will introduce the methodology of this study.
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