From sPassion to sWOM: the role of flow
| DOI | https://doi.org/10.1108/OIR-09-2016-0243 |
| Date | 09 April 2018 |
| Pages | 191-204 |
| Published date | 09 April 2018 |
| Author | Carolina Herrando,Julio Jimenez-Martinez,M. Jose Martin De Hoyos |
| Subject Matter | Library & information science,Information behaviour & retrieval,Collection building & management,Bibliometrics,Databases,Information & knowledge management,Information & communications technology,Internet,Records management & preservation,Document management |
From sPassion to sWOM: the role
of flow
Carolina Herrando, Julio Jimenez-Martinez and
M. Jose Martin De Hoyos
Department of Marketing and Market Research,
Faculty of Economics and Business Studies,
University of Zaragoza, Zaragoza, Spain
Abstract
Purpose –Social commerce websites entail a completely new scenario for sharing experiences and opinions
due to its richness in terms of social interactions. Nowadays, users can interact with the company and with
other users; hence, it seems important to study how social stimuli affect users. Drawing on the stimulus-
organism-response framework and flow theory, the purpose of this paper is to propose that the social
stimulus (named social passion (sPassion)) has a positive effect on the organism (state of flow), which leads to
a users’positive response (via social word of mouth (sWOM)).
Design/methodology/approach –The data were collected through an online survey in 2015. The sample
consists of 771 users of social commerce websites, of which 51 percent are male and 49 percent female, aged
between 16 and 80 years old. Structural equation modeling was used to analyze the data with the statistical
software SPSS version 22 and EQS 6.
Findings –The empirical results confirm that passionate users are prone to experience a state of flow and, as
a consequence, share positive sWOM.
Originality/value –This study contributes to the literature on customers’online participation, and the findings
are hoped to help companies in developing social commerce websites that boost users’exchange of information.
Keywords Flow theory, Social commerce, sWOM, SOR framework, sPassion
Paper type Research paper
1. Introduction
Social commerce appears as a consequence of the evolution of e-commerce combined with
the Web 2.0 features on the websites (Zhang and Benyoucef, 2016), making possible users’
online participation (Huang and Benyoucef, 2013). Different from e-commerce,
social commerce involves customers within the firm, gives them active roles, and
optimizes their social experience because it allows users to generate and share information
(Brodie et al., 2013). Nevertheless, social commerce allows users to share both positive and
negative social word of mouth (sWOM); hence, companies are on a constant search to
identify how to encourage positive, and avoid negative, sWOM. It is assumed that if users
have positive experiences on a website, their attitude will be positive, making it more
likely that they will spread the word in a positive way, and thereby acting as website
evangelists. This highly interactive environment shaped by social interactions can
contribute to boosting social passion (sPassion); that is, to creating a positive affective
feeling as a result of navigating, interacting with, and socializing with users and the
website (Herrando et al., 2017). Likewise, social commerce websites allow users to enjoy,
concentrate, and lose track of time when surfing and interacting with other users, and
ultimately to experience a state of flow (Gao and Bai, 2014; Zhang et al., 2014).
Some authors have studied the positive relationship between passion and flow
Online Information Review
Vol. 42 No. 2, 2018
pp. 191-204
© Emerald PublishingLimited
1468-4527
DOI 10.1108/OIR-09-2016-0243
Received 1 September 2016
Revised 24 May 2017
Accepted 29 June 2017
The current issue and full text archive of this journal is available on Emerald Insight at:
www.emeraldinsight.com/1468-4527.htm
This paper forms part of a special section on Information flow and Wom in Social Media and
Online Communities. The authors are grateful for the financial support of the Government of Aragon
and the European Social Fund (GENERES Group S-09) and the Spanish Ministry of Economy and
Competitiveness and FEDER (project ECO2015-64567-R).
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From sPassion
to sWOM
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