A study examined the relationship between newspaper gratifications sought and media use during and after a 1985 strike by unions of two Philadelphia newspapers, and the compensatory media behaviors, if any, people adopted to make up for the loss of their daily newspaper(s). It was hypothesized that during the strike, people would read more alternative newspapers (nonstriking) then when the newspapers were not on strike, and that during the newspaper strike, people would use compensatory media to satisfy the gratifications no longer served by the striking newspapers. Telephone interviews were conducted during the strike, and approximately three weeks after the strike had been settled, with 357 Philadelphia residents regarding their media use, demographic information, and gratifications sought for daily newspaper use. The completion rate was 55.5%. The results indicated no evidence that entertainment and advertising gratifications were associated with consistent differences in media use among subjects interviewed during and after the newspaper strike. However, media use differed in predictable ways for subjects at that time, primarily when the medium investigated was another newspaper. On the more specific predictions relating surveillance/contact gratifications correlationally with specialized newspapers, news magazines, local television news, and network television news use, a consistent pattern of positive correlations between the surveillance/contact dimension and each of the media use measures occurred. The results suggest that media gratifications are primarily the result of social situation and background factors and not of internal states. (HTH)