More and more Internet users, including me :), participate in online social networking sites to share, comment, and express how they feel about things that happened to them. This phenomenon let us notice an interesting question in which why internet users incline to share things to online social networking sites, such as Facebook, blogs, youtube, and online forums, where others may read and comment. They may even use the things you shared without returning anything back. Why people are willing to do that?
Unlike commercial activity, sharing information online does not contain any intention to promote any product or service but instead is a motivation in which I wan to share. Theoretically, sharing the information online seems to be an irrational behavior because the things you shared are so called " public good," the feature of which is purely non -rival and nonexcludable. In other words, it is possible that you spend your time and effort to share online but do not get anything in return. ~ so kind? not really!
Indeed, around only 20% of people, called critical mass, share most of information to online social networking while the rest of 80% enjoy access free resources. Thus, why they share? (the idea can be seen as following figure)
People who belong to critical mass are not really irrational but instead have some reasons to motive them to share. The factors that affect people to share can be categorized into three types [1] :
- Intrinsic Factors means the level of satisfaction will be enhanced by the actions of generating contents and contributing to online social networking.
- Extrinsic Factors refer to the motivation of sharing driven by external stimulus.
- Internalized Extrinsic Factors represent the self-regulated instead of directly being influenced by external environment induces the motivation and satisfaction of sharing.
Based on this category, I summarize a variety of sharing behaviors into each type (some of categories are arguable ~ welcome to share your ideas)
Intrinsic Factors (IF) :
- Fun and Joy in solving challenges [1] [2]
- Enjoyment in helping others[3] [13]
- Knowledge self-efficacy [3]
- Sense of self-worth [4] [5]
- Enriching knowledge [6] [7]
- Skilled, knowledge- able or respected. [8]
- Senders share their positive and negative experiences out of a desire to help others make better decisions, [9] [10][11]
- Individuals in the critical mass (higher outdegree) will have greater interests in seeingthe good realized and greater resources to contribute. [12]
Extrinsic Factors (EF):
- Organizational rewards [4]
- Career opportunities [1] [2] [14]
- Reduction of network congestion in file sharing networks[15] [16] [17]
- Making friends [6] [7]
- Helping the virtual community to accumulate its knowledge, continue its operation, and grow [18] [19] [20]
- Believing that their effort is important to the group’s performance[21]
- Shared Vision [32]
Internalized Extrinsic Factors (IEF):
- Reputation [3]
- Social identity [22] [32]
- Reciprocity [2] [3] [4] [5] [12] [29] [32]
- Fairness [4] [13]
- Subjective norm [13] [4]
- Use value [1] [2]
- Seeking support [6] [7]
- To decrease doubts about their own behavior, or to experience feelings of prestige and power [23] [24] [25]
- Express oneself about a positive consumption experience may boost enthusiasm for and satisfaction with the decision outcome [26] [27]
- Talking to others about disappointing experiences may relieve negative feelings and reduce dissatisfaction [27] [28].
- Believing that their contributions to the group are identifiable[21]
- Liking the group they are working with [21]
- Longer professional association tenure and higher levels of expertise are associated with responding to others[12]
- A generalized exchange takes place when one's giving is not reciprocated by the recipient, but by a third party [30]
- Generalized exchange emerges in electronic networks of practice because people typically do not know each other and participation is discretionary.[12]
- Social Ties [32]
While this classification is easy to understand, it is not sophisticated enough to really catch every idea of sharing behavior in online social networking. To improve this deficiency, I add one more concept which is very important and always be adopted in social networking literature.
Group v.s Individual
In social setting, decision making may be based on three different levels: "(1) individual based models (a personal intention to perform an individual act by oneself), (2) normative based models (a personal intention to perform an individual act but with consideration of the social influence), and (3) a group-based model (the model comprises of both personal intention and social intention to perform a group act)". There is a key concept under these levels : Group and Individual [31] . In social networking, people may not just think about themselves as individual but also perceive that they are part of group. Therefore, it is essential to view sharing behavior from group and individual perspectives.
So, based on above reason, I, combining intrinsic factors, extrinsic factors and internalized extrinsic factors, further classify sharing behavior by creating a matrix bellow.
Others
There are some other classifications which are hard to be categorized:
1. Circumstantial contribution and Motivational contribution:
Circumstantial contribution refers to unintentionally share their private resources publicly.
Motivational contribution refers to intentionally share their resources that are of no interest to him but for the benefit of the bookmarking community. [13]
Building upon my classification, it will be interesting to know everyone's motivations while sharing information to online social networking. Please note that the results are always not sole but mixed. So, what are your motivations?
For me, I think my motivations to use share information include IF 1-7, EF 4, 6 , IEF 1, 2, 3, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 14, 15.
Reference ( do not follow any journal format, a little be disordered)
[1] Hann, I. J. Robert, and S. Slaughter (2006) Understanding the motivations, participation and performance of open source software developers: a longitudinal study of the apache projects. Management Science 52(7) 984-999.
[2]Shah, S. K. 2006. Motivation, governance and the viability of hybrid forms in open source software development. Management Science 52(7) 1000-1014.
[3]Wasko, M. and S. Faraj. 2005. Why should i share? Examining knowledge contribution in electronic networks of practice. MIS Quarterly 29(1) 1-23.
[4]Bock, G.-W., R. W. Zmud, Y.-G. Kim, J.-N. Lee. 2005. Behavioral intention formation in knowledge sharing: Examining the roles of extrinsic motivators, social-psychological forces, and organizational climate. MIS Quarterly 29(1) 87–111.
[5] Xia, M., Y. Huang, W. Duan, A. B. Whinston. 2008. To Keep Sharing Or Not To Keep Sharing? -- An Empirical Analysis On User Decision In Peer-to-peer Sharing Networks. UIUC Working Paper.
[6]D. Andrews, J. Preece, M. Turoff, A conceptual framework for demographic groups resistant to on-line community interaction, International Journal of Electronic commerce 6 (3) (2002)9–24
[7]Y. Zhang, S.R. Hiltz, Factors that influence online relationship development in a knowledge sharing community, Proceedings of the Ninth American Conference on Information Systems, 2003, pp. 410–417.
[8]B. Butler, L. Sproull, S. Kiesler, R. Kraut, Community effort in online groups: who does the work and why, in: S. Weisband, L. Atwater (Eds.), Leadership at a Distance, Lawrence Erlbaum Publishers, Mahwah, NJ, 2002.
[9] E. Dichter, How word-of-mouth advertising works, Harvard Business Review (November- December 1966).
[10] P. Fitzgerald Bone, in: J.F. Sherry, B. Sternthal (Eds.), Determinants of Word-of-Mouth Communications During Product Consumption, Advances in Consumer Research, vol. 19, 1992, Provo, UT.
[11] A. Hemetsberger, R. Pieters, When consumers produce on the internet: an inquiry into motivational sources of contribution to joint-innovation, Conference Proceedings La Londe Seminar: Marketing Communications and Consumer Behavior, 2001, Aix-en-Provence.
[12] Wasko, M.M., Teigland, R. & Faraj, S. (2009) The provision of online public goods: Examining social structure in an electronic network of practice, 47, 254–265
[13] Arakji, R., Benbunan-Fich, R. and Koufaris, M (2009), Exploring contributions of public resources in social bookmarking systems, Decision Support Systems. Volume 47 , Issue 3 (June 2009) 
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