An examination of the factors contributing to participation in online social platforms
| Published date | 21 November 2016 |
| Pages | 793-818 |
| Date | 21 November 2016 |
| DOI | https://doi.org/10.1108/AJIM-05-2016-0059 |
| Author | Jenny Bronstein,Tali Gazit,Oren Perez,Judit Bar-Ilan,Noa Aharony,Yair Amichai-Hamburger |
| Subject Matter | Library & information science,Information behaviour & retrieval,Information & knowledge management,Information management & governance,Information management |
An examination of the factors
contributing to participation
in online social platforms
Jenny Bronstein, Tali Gazit, Oren Perez, Judit Bar-Ilan and
Noa Aharony
Bar-Ilan University, Ramat Gan, Israel, and
Yair Amichai-Hamburger
Interdisciplinary Center Herzliya, Herzliya, Israel
Abstract
Purpose –The purpose of this paper is to examine participation in online social platforms consisting
of information exchange, social network interactions, and political deliberation. Despite the proven
benefits of online participation, the majority of internet users read social media data but do not directly
contribute, a phenomenon called lurking.
Design/methodology/approach –A survey was administered electronically to 507 participants and
consisted of ten sections in a questionnaire to gather data on the relationship between online
participation and the following variables: anonymity, social value orientation, motivations, and
participation in offline activities, as well as the internet’s political influence and personality traits.
Findings –Findings show that users with high levels of participation also identify themselves, report
higher levels of extroversion, openness, and activity outside the internet, the motivations being an
intermediary variable in the relationship between the variables value.
Originality/value –The study shows that participation in online social platforms is not only related
to personality traits, but they are impacted by the nature of the motivations that drive them to
participate in the particular social platform, as well as by the interest toward the specific topic, or the
type or nature of the social group with whom they are communicating.
Keywords Participation, Motivations, Online forums, Anonymity, Extroversion, Openness
Paper type Research paper
Introduction
Online social platforms are internet spaces that allow people with similar interests to
congregate and to discuss common problems and issues and to offer information and
support about a variety of topics such as health, recreation, professional, and technical
subjects (Kummervold et al., 2002). Theseonline spaces are ever developing and evolving
to fit the needs of their creators and users (Ridings and Gefen, 2004). The primary
functions of online social platforms are information exchange, social network
interactions, and political deliberation (Burnett, 2000; Ridings and Gefen, 2004; Perez,
2013). However, despite the benefits gained from participation in these types of online
social media,research has shown that only about 1 percent of users accountfor almost all
the online action,9 percent contribute to some degree (Nielsen, 2006) and the majority are
inactive, passive readers ( Jones et al., 2004; Kozinets, 1999; Nonnecke, 2000). The
literature distinguishes in this contextbetween “lurkers”and “posters.”Yeow et al. (2006)
define lurking as “persistent peripheral participation.”That is, lurkers read social media
data, but do not directlycontribute (Muller, 2012)and prefer passive attention overactive Aslib Journal of Information
Management
Vol. 68 No. 6, 2016
pp. 793-818
©Emerald Group Publis hing Limited
2050-3806
DOI 10.1108/AJIM-05-2016-0059
Received 18 May 2016
Revised 14 August 2016
Accepted 5 October 2016
The current issue and full text archive of this journal is available on Emerald Insight at:
www.emeraldinsight.com/2050-3806.htm
This research was funded by grant no. 3-8907 from the Ministry of Science, Technology
and Space.
793
Participation
in online social
platforms
participation (Rafael i et al.,2004).Leeet al. (2006) proposed a differentview about lurking
claiming that their seemingly silent participation conveys an even deeper engagement
than that of the non-lurkers.
Contrarily, posters are active members in online discussions who are generally
regarded as more constructive members of online communities and considered
essential for sustaining the online community as a dynamic social group. Therefore,
persistent lack of involvement among lurkers could endanger the continuity of the
online community (Yeow et al., 2006) “as some active participants may be disheartened
to continue with the discussion when they fail to get any feedback, verbal or
non-verbal, from others”(Ping and Chee, 2009, p. 58). Lurking could also unde rmine the
legitimacy of the online discussion in some settings such as e-democracy forums, where
broad participation is considered essential to the legitimacy of the discussions taken
within the forum and of the conclusions it might generate (Perez, 2013). Hence,
understanding lurking is central to the study of socialization in online social beha vior,
especially as lurkers have opinions, ideas, and information that can be of value to the
online and offline community (Edelmann, 2013). The phenomenon of lurking as an
aspect of online behavior is also important because prior research has found that online
participation enhances social well-being (van Uden-Kraan et al., 2008), has a positive
influence on social self-esteem, and reduces the levels of stress and depression (Herrero
et al., 2004). Therefore, lurkers should be encouraged to participate more actively in
online discussions. For this reason, it is important to understand the factors behind
active participation in online social platforms. This paper aims to improve our
understanding of participation and the factors underlying it. It focuses on the
relationship between the following factors of participation in online social platforms:
anonymity, social value orientation (SVO), motivations, and participation in offline
activities, as well as the internet’s political influence and personal traits, as explained in
the methodology section.
Literature review
Several studies have investigated the factors involved in online participation. In an
early study Nonnecke and Preece (2001) interviewed ten members of online social
platforms and found 79 personal, group’s characteristics and work-related reasons for
lurking and seven lurkers’needs were identified and categorized into a gratification
model that explained lurker’s behavior. The gratification model proposed explained
why lurking is a way of satisfying a variety of the lurkers’wants/needs. In a later study
Preece et al. (2004) administered a survey containing both coded and open-ended
questions to 375 online communities randomly selected. They observed five main
reasons for lurking: not needing to post; needing to find out more about the group
before participating; thinking that they were being helpful by not posting; not being
able to make the software work (i.e. poor usability); and not liking the group dynamics
or the community was a poor fit for them. Muller (2012) analyzed statistical patterns of
contributions and lurking data on IBM’s enterprise online community services that
provided a different explanation for online participation. He claimed that each person’s
actions (i.e. lurking, contributing, or a combination) are driven in part by the person’s
overall traits, but are strongly modified by the person’s attitude or disposition toward a
topic, a group of colleagues, and/or individual or shared tasks. Muller (2012) further
stated that the nature of each type of community (team, community of practice, etc.)
and the role of each member within those teams and communities is crucial in
determining the degree and type of contribution to be made. Other studies have found
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