The mediating role of sense of virtual community

Impact of Social Support and Reciprocity on Consumer Well-Being in Virtual Medical Communities

This study pursues a better understanding of consumer well-being in online medical cosmetics communities by investigating the antecedents of well-being and moderating influence of community norms. A total valid sample of 484 respondents was collected from 2 popular medical cosmetics discussion platforms. A partial least squares analysis was used to validate the research model. Emotional support, informational support, and sense of belonging were important predictors of well-being. Among these 3 antecedents, emotional support showed the strongest influence on consumer well-being. Sense of belonging was significantly and positively influenced by emotional support and reciprocity, and hence plays a pivotal role in mediating the effects of emotional support and reciprocity on well-being. However, informational support does not appear to significantly influence sense of belonging. Members' compliance with community norms positively moderates the influence of sense of belonging on well-being. This study contributes to the literature on realizing members' social behaviors specifically in virtual medical cosmetics communities and provides insights for the management of online communities.

Research on the formation mechanism of product contribution in online product communities: content contribution as a mediating variable

Purpose

Enterprises build online product community to expect users to contribute: opinion sharing (content contribution) and product consumption (product contribution). Previous literature rarely focused on both. The purpose of this paper is to explain user contribution mechanism by identifying content contribution and product contribution.

Design/methodology/approach

This research chose Xiaomi-hosted online product community (bbs.xiaomi.cn) and Huawei-hosted online product community (club.huawei.com) where users can freely share ideas and buy products at the same time. Data were crawled from 109,665 community users to construct dependent variable measurement, and 611 questionnaires were used to verify research hypotheses.

Findings

The results indicate that both cognitive needs and personal integration needs have a significant positive impact on browse behavior; social integration needs and hedonic needs have a significant positive impact on content contribution behavior. Browse behavior not only directly affects but also indirectly influences product contribution through content contribution behavior.

Research limitations/implications

Findings of this research provide community managers with useful insights into the relationship between content contribution and product contribution.

Originality/value

This study explains the formation mechanism of user product contribution and reveals the relationship between user content contribution and product contribution in online product community. This paper provides a different way of theorizing user contributions by incorporating uses and gratifications theory into the “Motivation-Behavior-Result” framework.

The Yale model of green message sharing and environmental consciousness on social media platforms

Purpose

In this paper, Yale model was adopted to understand how the characteristics of a green message (goal framing, argument volume and argument consistency), its source (source credibility) and its receivers (environmental consciousness) influence the communication process regarding the receivers' perceptions and attitudes (information value, persuasiveness and communication effectiveness) and their intention to spread the green message.

Design/methodology/approach

Eight scenarios of factorial design were developed to test the effects of a message on receivers' perceptions and attitudes. 1,157 valid questionnaires were used to conduct AMOS-SEM and ANOVA analyses.

Findings

The analytical results showed significant differences between the persuasive effects of Scenarios 1 and 8. A high level of environmental consciousness significantly affected the relationships between the message characteristics, source credibility and information value, leading to a higher intention to share the green messages.

Research limitations/implications

The Yale model was applied to online persuasion to examine the receivers' perceptions of and attitudes toward a green message and their intention to share it on social networking sites (SNSs). Being environmentally conscious can strengthen the perception that the receivers of an online green message have of the source credibility and information value. The Yale model proved to represent the online green message-sharing context and explain how to persuade online users more effectively.

Practical implications

This study suggests that green message providers should present content emphasizing the losses associated with inaction, thus increasing the receivers' acceptance of the message's persuasiveness. Additionally, with the assistance of supportive measures, such as national education programs, government policies and actions showing corporate social responsibility, the environmental awareness of individuals can encourage them to share green message posts on SNSs and engage in green practices.

Social implications

A significant effect of the message characteristics (goal framing × argument volume × argument consistency) was observed on SNS users' perceived source credibility and information value. Therefore, key opinion leaders, governments, and organizations who want to promote green ideas and attract public attention are encouraged to provide messages emphasizing the costs of inaction and contain arguments with a sufficient number of responses strongly supporting the original message. This could arouse the concern for green issues among online communities.

Originality/value

A Yale model research framework was developed to investigate the effect of message characteristics on the intention to share green messages online. Receivers' environmental consciousness played a vital role in this message-sharing process.

How can I Be as attractive as a Fitness YouTuber in the era of COVID-19? The impact of digital attributes on flow experience, satisfaction, and behavioral intention

In the past decade, the social media platform has dramatically changed individuals’ daily activities in real life and on the Internet, including shopping, socialization, entertainment, study, and even health and fitness. In the era of COVID-19, particularly, consumers tend to rely more on digital attributes of social media platforms for their decision-making process by reducing the physical touchpoint. Responding to this ongoing trend, this study investigates how fitness YouTube channel attributes and fitness YouTuber attributes influence flow experience, satisfaction, and behavioral intention of YouTubers who work out at home via a fitness YouTube channel during the COVID-19 pandemic. Based on the social media literature and the cognitive appraisal theory, this research formulates a research model that specifies the influence of three dimensions of fitness YouTube channel attributes (i.e., social interaction, information quality, and visual content) and three dimensions of fitness YouTuber attributes (i.e., social attractiveness, physical attractiveness, and attitude homophily) on flow experience, YouTube channel satisfaction, and behavioral intention in the context of YouTube. This study recruited participants in the United States who currently work out via a fitness YouTube channel through three waves of data collection during the COVID-19 era. The empirical results revealed that flow experience was significantly affected by information quality, visual content, and physical attractiveness. Also, YouTube channel satisfaction was significantly affected by social interaction, information quality, and visual content. Lastly, behavioral intention was significantly affected by flow experience and YouTube channel satisfaction. Based on the findings, this study proposes meaningful implications for the extant literature and social media industry during the COVID-19 pandemic.