Siddimaula

a speculator would typical buy an option without owning the underlying asset/security. if the option ends up in the money, the speculator would take the profit. otherwise let it expire worthless.

a hedger usually owns a security and wants to protect their postion from a downward movement of the market, or they want to take the profit without selling the security. they use put option/ short futures to do that, so any loss from downward movement of the security is compensated by gain in the option/future contract. this effectively "locks" price of a secuirty at the strick price of the option.