摘要 :
With the popularity of question-and-answer (Q&A) communities, widespread dissemination of scientific knowledge has become more viable than ever before. However, those contributing high-quality professional scientific knowledge are confronted with the challenge of making their contributions popular, since nonexpert readers may not recognize the importance of their contributions given the massive amount of information available online. In this study, we show that nonexpert readers are capable of evaluating the professionalism of content contributed in such communities as well as experts. However, we discovered that a salient discrepancy exists between the content nonexperts favor and the content they perceive as professional. In line with studies that have suggested that writing techniques play an important role in how expert content is received by laypersons, we investigated how the use of linguistic devices affects both the perceived professionalism and the popularity of contributions in Q&A communities. Based on both secondary data and a scenario-based survey, we identified specific linguistic devices that can increase content popularity without reducing perceived professionalism. Additionally, we revealed linguistic devices that increase popularity at the expense of perceived professionalism in this context. Finally, we conducted a laboratory experiment to more firmly establish the causal effects of the linguistic device use. The triangulated findings have important implications for both research and practice on communicating scientific knowledge in Q&A communities....
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With the popularity of question-and-answer (Q&A) communities, widespread dissemination of scientific knowledge has become more viable than ever before. However, those contributing high-quality professional scientific knowledge are confronted with the challenge of making their contributions popular, since nonexpert readers may not recognize the importance of their contributions given the massive amount of information available online. In this study, we show that nonexpert readers are capable of evaluating the professionalism of content contributed in such communities as well as experts. However, we discovered that a salient discrepancy exists between the content nonexperts favor and the content they perceive as professional. In line with studies that have suggested that writing techniques play an important role in how expert content is received by laypersons, we investigated how the use of linguistic devices affects both the perceived professionalism and the popularity of contributions in Q&A communities. Based on both secondary data and a scenario-based survey, we identified specific linguistic devices that can increase content popularity without reducing perceived professionalism. Additionally, we revealed linguistic devices that increase popularity at the expense of perceived professionalism in this context. Finally, we conducted a laboratory experiment to more firmly establish the causal effects of the linguistic device use. The triangulated findings have important implications for both research and practice on communicating scientific knowledge in Q&A communities.
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Online policy deliberation forums (OPDFs) have been increasingly initiated by governments to allow citizens to provide their input and discuss policy issues. Yet, failure to garner participation, in terms of both quantity and qual...
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Online policy deliberation forums (OPDFs) have been increasingly initiated by governments to allow citizens to provide their input and discuss policy issues. Yet, failure to garner participation, in terms of both quantity and quality, prevents the realization of their benefits. In this regard, prior research has suggested different antecedents for the quantity and quality of participation in online forums, but without systematically considering their differences. To address this research gap, in this study we develop a theoretical model to explain the antecedents of quantity and quality of OPDF participation and test the model using a survey and content analysis of forum logs. The results indicate that quantity of participation is enhanced by the information-technology-enabled resource factor of communality but negatively influenced by collective incentives. In contrast, the antecedents of the quality of participation include both motivational and resource factors. Furthermore, communality accentuates the perceived collective incentives and persuasion benefit of participation. This study contributes to the research by proposing and testing a theoretical model that explains the different antecedents of the quantity and quality of participation in OPDFs. More broadly, the findings inform research and practice on how outcomes of web-enabled cocreation, such as those generated through OPDF participation, can be evaluated and enhanced in these online communities.
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Mobile technologies, with their seamless integration into people's everyday life, are said to enable "perpetual contact" with the users always accompanied by their mobile devices. This creates unprecedented opportunity to better u...
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Mobile technologies, with their seamless integration into people's everyday life, are said to enable "perpetual contact" with the users always accompanied by their mobile devices. This creates unprecedented opportunity to better understand the relationship between time and information technologies (ITs), in particular, how time of day may influence users' IT behavior. With this understanding, companies may also be able to promote IT products by highlighting their value that appeals to users in a particular time segment of a day. Building primarily on the ego depletion theory and through conducting a combination of field experiment and survey, we show that matching IT product value appeal to people's psychological state during different times of day can lead to more optimal outcome (higher adoption). The findings advance our understanding of how IT behavior, as a behavior embedded in time, is affected by time of day, and provide actionable guidance to practitioners in performing mobile time-based targeting.
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Purpose The purpose of this paper is to investigate what may influence participation in mobile collaborative consumption (CC). In particular, the authors investigate the effects of individual sociability and psychological antecede...
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Purpose The purpose of this paper is to investigate what may influence participation in mobile collaborative consumption (CC). In particular, the authors investigate the effects of individual sociability and psychological antecedents including enjoyment, social connection, altruistic motivation, reputation, trust and embarrassment on the participation intention in this emerging phenomenon, as well as their relationships. Design/methodology/approach Survey approach was employed to validate the research model. Findings Hedonic factor, i.e. enjoyment, and social-related factors including altruistic motivation, reputation and embarrassment emerge as important antecedents of participation in mobile CC. On top of these factors, individual sociability plays an important role, by acting as a direct antecedent of the dependent variable, while also influencing their perceived greater altruistic motivation and reputation from participating in the CC. Yet, sociability has no significant effect on perceived enjoyment and embarrassment associated with the activity, suggesting that addressing these factors may encourage individuals with low sociability to participate. Originality/value This study taps into mobile technology to support CC in daily consumption activities, and highlights the factors that influence people's participation in such activities. More importantly, the findings suggest that while it is more likely for individuals with high sociability to participate in this emerging form of social activities, for consumers with low sociability, addressing the enjoyment aspect and embarrassment issue of the activities may nonetheless promote their participation.
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Social media-based expert blogs are a crucial and credible online information source for consumers, yet little is known about the role of expert blogs for general consumer brand perceptions that bestow long-term value for the firm...
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Social media-based expert blogs are a crucial and credible online information source for consumers, yet little is known about the role of expert blogs for general consumer brand perceptions that bestow long-term value for the firm. On the basis of a novel dataset with 7,871 brand-day observations of over 131,000 expert blogs on major brands in the PC industry, this study reveals how expert blogs may act as a quality signal leading general consumers' perceptions of rival brands. Our analyses reveal three key insights: (1) Expert blog sentiments and volume on a focal brand have a positive relationship with consumer perceptions of the focal brand but a negative relationship with those of its competing brands. (2) The focal brand's blogs have a reinforcing relationship with its subsequent blogs and a cannibalistic relationship with competitors' subsequent blogs. (3) Brand position (leading versus non-leading in the market) plays a nontrivial role in these competitive, dynamic relationships. For example, a 1 percent unexpected increase in Acer's expert blog sentiment would be associated with a 1.5 percent lift in its own brand quality as perceived by consumers, thus winning more consumer hearts and minds. Also, a 1 percent unexpected increase in Acer's expert blog sentiment would be associated with a.7 percent (Toshiba) to 1.5 percent (Sony Vaio) drop in its rival brand quality, thus undermining consumer hearts and minds of competing brands in the same industry. Also, the effects are asymmetrical across leading versus non-leading brands as a 1 percent unexpected increase in expert blog sentiment is associated with a 1.6 percent drop in rival-brand quality perceptions among consumers for non-leading brands, vis-a-vis only a 0.88 percent drop for leading brands. For researchers and managers, these results unravel some neglected benefits of expert blogs.
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Although it seems intuitive for firms to leverage social connections and interactions to influence consumers' goal attainment and spending, the authors present a caveat of such strategies. Using two large-scale data sets with more...
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Although it seems intuitive for firms to leverage social connections and interactions to influence consumers' goal attainment and spending, the authors present a caveat of such strategies. Using two large-scale data sets with more than 5 million people-day observations from online gaming markets, Studies 1 and 2 show consistently nonlinear effects. Although some social connections and interactions boost goal attainment and spending (positive linear term), after a certain point too many of them have a diminished marginal effect (negative squared term). The results are robust to a wide array of modeling techniques addressing self-selection, unobserved individual heterogeneity, and endogeneity. In addition, novices can benefit more from greater social connections and interactions, yet also suffer more from the diminishing effects. Regarding the underlying mechanism, the follow-up experiment Study 3 shows that consistent with the information processing theory, some social connections and interactions can provide information support for goal attainment, but too many of them can introduce an information overload problem and, thus, hamper goal attainment intention. Together, these findings refute a simple, linear view of the effects of social connections and interactions and provide pivotal theoretical and practical implications.
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Organizations are setting up online forums to obtain inputs and feedback from key stakeholders, such as employees, customers, and citizens. Examples of such virtual spaces are online policy deliberation forums (OPDFs) initiated by...
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Organizations are setting up online forums to obtain inputs and feedback from key stakeholders, such as employees, customers, and citizens. Examples of such virtual spaces are online policy deliberation forums (OPDFs) initiated by government organizations to garner citizens' views on policy issues. Incorporating the inputs from these forums can result in more inclusive policies for societal benefit. Yet, as with other such forums, a common issue facing OPDFs is the sustainability of participation. When examining this issue, previous research has mostly explored the participation antecedents of existing contributors. However, engaging lurkers is also important, because these forums need to compensate for contributor attrition and become more effective with greater reach. Thus motivated, this study develops a model to explain the antecedents of both contributors' and lurkers' participation deriving from public participation and information technology-enabled public goods theories. It hypothesizes differences in the antecedents for contributors versus lurkers based primarily on construal level theory. The model was empirically validated through a survey of contributors and lurkers in a nationwide OPDF. The results reveal significant differences in the participation antecedents of the two groups as hypothesized. Specifically, contributors are influenced by political career benefit and political efficacy motives, whereas lurkers' future participation intention is driven by collective benefits, possession of civic skills, and mobilization. Furthermore, perceived connectivity of the OPDF directly influences participation intention for contributors and indirectly impacts participation intention for both groups via perceived communality. Perceived communality, on the other hand, influences collective and persuasion benefits for both contributors and lurkers. These findings are useful for understanding and promoting participation through differential strategies for contributors and lurkers in OPDFs in particular, and by extension, other feedback or online forums.
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Business-to-business (B2B) e-marketplaces serve local small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) by assisting them in connecting with potential overseas buyers. They leverage multiple channels to connect with and bring potential le...
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Business-to-business (B2B) e-marketplaces serve local small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) by assisting them in connecting with potential overseas buyers. They leverage multiple channels to connect with and bring potential leads to SMEs. The authors' understanding of such an intermediary has been either largely impaired by limited studies on the services that e-marketplaces should offer or implicitly deduced from business-to-consumer studies. In this work, the authors attempt to unveil whether the efforts that an e-marketplace has made are associated with the continuance of its SME clients. To answer this research question, a set of data from a B2B e-marketplace connecting qualified SMEs with overseas buyers was used for analysis, and they discovered three results. First, generating many online leads is negatively associated with SMEs' continuance with such an e-marketplace company. Second, organizing many online videoconferencing meetings between SMEs and buyers can promote this tendency, which is different from organizing many offline meetings. Third, onsite visits that e-marketplace salespersons make can attenuate the negative effect of the generation of online leads. Their follow-up interviews unveiled that SMEs only desire sufficient attention to obtain tangible results from a B2B e-marketplace.
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Purpose While previous research underscored self-presentation desire as an important motivator of digital item purchase, user needs for digital items may become increasingly inner-focused with the maturation of virtual communities...
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Purpose While previous research underscored self-presentation desire as an important motivator of digital item purchase, user needs for digital items may become increasingly inner-focused with the maturation of virtual communities (VCs). The purpose of this paper is to posit that self-discrepancy and self-gratification are key to explaining user purchase of digital items. Design/methodology/approach A survey of 310 users of a social media-based VC well supports the hypotheses. Findings The tenet of this study is that individuals purchase digital items in VCs not only for self-presentation purpose per se, but more importantly for reasons of more inner-focused, such as due to their self-discrepancy that motivates them to purchase digital items to enhance self-esteem, and also for self-gratification. Furthermore, self-discrepancy arising from comparing ones' current self against how they perceive others expect them to ideally be (i.e. self-other discrepancy) increases their self-presentation desire. Originality/value Overall the findings enrich the current view that individuals purchase digital items mainly to present themselves to others (Kim et al., 2012), thus affording a more complete understanding of this behavior that has both important research and practical implications.
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Public service availability and quality remain relatively low in the rural areas, particularly in developing countries. Microblog has been employed in the rural areas to enhance public services. We propose that by facilitating col...
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Public service availability and quality remain relatively low in the rural areas, particularly in developing countries. Microblog has been employed in the rural areas to enhance public services. We propose that by facilitating collaboration among public employees and enabling supervision of their services, microblog can help enhance the public service climate and improve public service performance in the rural areas. A research model is developed to evaluate the importance of microblog affordance and public service capabilities based on the service climate theory. Through surveying the grassroots public employees in 382 villages, we find that the collaboration and supervision affordances of microblog are important in leading to better public service climate. While the collaboration affordance of microblog has both direct and indirect effects, its supervision affordance effect is indirect through enhancing the content delivery and service fulfillment capacities. Furthermore, our additional analysis shows that public service climate can raise the service satisfaction of the rural citizens. The findings show that microblog adoption enhances public service climate in the rural areas where less attention is given. A set of important recommendations are provided to public administrators on how they can more effectively leverage on the emerging microblog technology in the rural context.
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