Negative effects of enterprise social networks (ESNs) and technostress: empirical evidence from R&D centres operating in India
| DOI | https://doi.org/10.1108/AJIM-08-2021-0228 |
| Published date | 21 January 2022 |
| Date | 21 January 2022 |
| Pages | 956-988 |
| Subject Matter | Library & information science,Information behaviour & retrieval,Information & knowledge management,Information management & governance,Information management |
| Author | Sunanda Nayak,Pawan Budhwar |
Negative effects of enterprise
social networks (ESNs) and
technostress: empirical evidence
from R&D centres operating
in India
Sunanda Nayak
Management Development Institute, Gurgaon, India, and
Pawan Budhwar
Aston University, Birmingham, UK
Abstract
Purpose –Nowadays, technostress is a common problem for many organisations. The purpose of this
research is to investigate the underlying mechanisms under which enterprise social networks (ESNs) leads to
technostress and their consequences.
Design/methodology/approach –The authors collected data from 242 employees working in research and
development (R&D) centres in India and analysed the data using partial least squares structural equation
modelling (PLS-SEM).
Findings –The findings of the study contribute to the growing body of knowledge in “dark side of social media
research”by researching the phenomenon of higher use of ESNs in organisations and the consequences while
theoretically delineating the effect of social, hedonic and cognitive use of ESNs in organisations on technostress, thus
extending prior research on adverse impact of social media and technostress research. The results revealed that both
ESNs’need and technostress is adversely related to mental health, performance and greater turnover intention, and
perceived organisation support (POS) played a moderating role in this relationship such that with higher POS, employee
turnover intention reduces. By uncovering the role of POS as a potential moderator, the findings provide empirical
evidence for POS and technostress in organisations, thus offering practical implications for the ESNs strategists,
managers and practitioners to develop ESNs’usage policies to avoid adverse outcomes of technostress in organisations.
Research limitations/implications –This researchadvances theoretical understandingof the relationship
betweenESNs, technostress, mentalhealth, performance and turnover”intention while contributingextensively
to the technostress literature and to the scholarship of ESNs. In addition, by uncovering the role of perceived
organisationalsupport as a potential moderator, thisstudy contributes to the existing literatureon POS.
Practicalimplications –The empiricallytested model delivered by this research will enable organisations to
understand different excessive usage patterns of ESNs at work, which contribute to negative outcomes for
organisations and employees. The findings support the maintenance of social life at work affecting better
employee mental health, and the application of cognitive use of ESNs can reduce technostress. Hence,
organisational strategies should implement employee policies and interventions that facilitate better work–
social life and well-being, simultaneously encouraging usage of ESNs largely for work-related information
transmission and sharing within the organisations.
Originality/value –This study constructed a moderated-mediation model by introducing the potential
mediating effect of technostress, mental health and performance and the moderating effect of POS to reveal the
mechanism through which ESNs related to technostress, mental health, performance and turnover intention in
the Indian context.
Keywords Enterprise social networks, ESNs, Technostress, Mental health, Performance, Turnover intention,
Perceived organisation support
Paper type Research paper
Introduction
The last decade has seen a surge in research focussing on the dark side of technology
(Tarafdar et al., 2013;Cheikh-Ammar, 2020), particularly highlighting the grey effects of
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The current issue and full text archive of this journal is available on Emerald Insight at:
https://www.emerald.com/insight/2050-3806.htm
Received 15 August 2021
Revised 19 November 2021
Accepted 2 December 2021
Aslib Journal of Information
Management
Vol. 74 No. 5, 2022
pp. 956-988
© Emerald Publishing Limited
2050-3806
DOI 10.1108/AJIM-08-2021-0228
human–computer interaction (HCI) (Fox and Moreland , 2015;Baccarella et al., 2018,2020).
Stress related to the use of HCI is one such example of adverse outcomes thathave emerged
as a critical issue. There is no denying that technology has now been perceived as a stress
symbol (Barley et al., 2011;Sun et al., 2018). Moreover, current technologies representing
HCI in varied forms, such as email systems, virtual worlds and social network sites (SNSs),
enterprise social networking sites (ESNs), have been alleged to be stressful. Hence, with the
riseofcomputingineverydaylife(Legner et al., 2017) and with the increasing importanceof
technologies people’s personal and social lives (Cheikh-Ammar, 2020;Gao et al., 2010;Syn
et al.,2020), research on stress in these emerging settings is becoming more critical
than ever.
The concept of stressis as old as the presence of humanity. Van den Berget al. (2010) have
defined stress as adversefeelings such as anxiety, irritation, pressure and fear caused by an
imbalance between the individual’s motivations and abilities and the environment’s
requirements. Employees who work in a compute rised environment are argued to
experience higher levels of stress due to varied reasons such as (1) increased workloads, (2)
multitasking, (3) an inability to keep up with or adapt to technology, (4) the threat of being
replaced by technology, (5) a compulsion to work quickly and immediately respond to
workplace requests and (6) the need for frequent training (Agervold, 1987;Korunka and
Vitouch,1999;Kinman and Jones, 2005;Tarafdaret al., 2007,2011) and so on. The physicaland
psychological response experienced by individuals due to engaging with rapidly changing
technology is referredto as “technostress”(Brod, 1984;Clark and Kalin, 1996). It also refers to
“the stress that results from both the use of information and communication technologies
(Ragu-Nathan et al.,2008) and the pervasiveness and expectations of information technology
use in society in general(Riedl et al., 2013)”(Fischer and Riedl, 2017,p.376).
In the context of technology-induced stress, recent research suggests that social media
use in the workplace is associated with technostress and technostress creators (Maier
et al.,2012;Bucher et al., 2013;Maier et al., 2015a,b). Social media can decrease the well-
being of employees because of the stress induced by the use of these technologies (i.e.
technostress) (DeLone and McLean, 2003;Tarafdar et al.,2015). Nevertheless, desp ite the
overwhelming evidence of their stressful effects, most research on technology use has
focused on the potential impact of public SNSs behaviours to discuss the impact of social
media technology (Zha et al.,2020). ESNs’, though they have been an integral part of
almost all organisations, research on how they exert stress on the employees are limited.
Hence, research is needed on employee ESNs’experiences, which can shed light on ESNs
stimulated adverse effects (Baptista John et al.,2017;Brooks and Califf, 2017;Heymann
et al., 2020). This article argues that employees may experience ESNs-induced
technostress after getting exposed to ESNs’tools or platforms for extended periods
in the organisations and can have adverse work-related and non-work related
consequences. In this study, we thus focus on the consequences (such as mental health,
performance and turnover intention) of technostress and the technostress that employees
of research development centres experience. By doing so, we extend the existing
literature of technostress and contribute to the scholarship of adverse effects related to
ESNs-induced technostress.
This paper offers several contributions to existing research. First, the results of the study
contribute to the growing body of knowledge in “dark side of social media research”by
researching the phenomenon of higher use of ESNs in organisations and the consequences
while theoretically delineating the effect of social, hedonic and cognitive use of ESNs in
organisations on technostress, thus extending prior research on social media research.
Second, this study is investigating technostress and the consequences of technostress at
work while exploring the social, hedonic and cognitive use of ESNs in organisations, thus
further enhancing understanding of this novel phenomenon. Finally, this study delves into
Negative
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957
the underlying interlinking mechanisms of ESNs, technostress and mental health,
performance and turnover intention, thus extending the research context to the
organisational environment. In addition, this research advances our theoretical
understanding of the relationship between ESNs, technostress and turnover intention, and
by uncovering the role of perceived organisation support as a potential moderator, it provides
empirical evidence for perceived organisation support (POS), offering practical implications
for the ESNs’strategists, managers and practitioners to develop ESNs’usage policies to avoid
adverse outcomes of technostress in organisations.
Enterprise social networks
In the last few years,a wave of information communicationtechnologies (ICTs)usage has been
represented with the emergence of collaborative information systems in organisations (Aron
et al., 2011). ESNs,also known as Internal socialnetworking servicesof organisations, are partof
an organisationonline broader networksystem that provides many opportunities to exchange
ideas, information and knowledgewithin the organisation(Berraies et al.,2020;Luo et al., 2017;
Meske et al.,2019). McAfee (2016) was one of the first to defineESNs when he coined the term
“Enterprise2.0”to explain a socialtechnology groundedon a collection of Web 2.0 technologies
that simplify communication, collaboration and knowledge sharing among employees in an
organisation (Chin et al.,2015). Richter and Riemer (2013, p. 2) define ESNs as “the result of
applying technologies that emerged on the public Internet within organizations as a way of
facilitating workplace communication and collaboration”. Unlike public social networking
websites(i.e. Facebook), ENSs runon the host organisation’s servicesare protected by firewalls
and are restrictedto use by employees (Jarrahi, 2011;Chin et al.,2015). The generic ESN tools
include employees’social profiles, activity streams, microblogging, groups and communities,
instantmessaging, content managementsystem, enterprisesearch, and ratings and reviews.In
thisarticle, we are adapting the broaddefinition of ESNs to be the organisational socialnetwork
designed foremployees within an organisationto build corporate communitiesand create and
exchangecontent (Kim et al.,2010;Von Krogh,2012;K€
uglerand Smolnik, 2014;Chin et al.,2015).
While the study of ESNs’use within an organisational setting is still in its infancy (Leonardi
et al.,2013;Richter and Riemer, 2013;Chin et al., 2015),an in-depth understandingof what is the
impact of ESNs on the technostress of the employees especially working in research and
developmentcenters is crucial to alleviatethe issues of the dark sideof ESNs in order to enable
organisationsto leverage their ESNs’investmentsaptly.
Hence, the research question of the study is
Research questions:
RQ1. “What is the impact of ESNs on the technostress of the employees working in R and
D organisations, and what are the consequences derived?”
RQ2. “What is the effect of organisation support mechanisms such as POS on the
consequences of ESNs-prompted technostress?”
Research objectives
Hence, the research objective of the study is:
RO1. To understand the effect of social, hedonic and cognition dimensions of ESNs’use
on technostress, mental health, employee performance and turnover intention.
RO2. To understand the effect of POS on ESNs, technostress, mental health, employee
performance and turnover intention of employees.
The remainder of the paper has been organised in the following way. The above first section
focused on introduction, research questions and research objectives of the study. The second
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