Purpose

This study aims at exploring users' motives to form attachments within the social Q&A community context and identifying the differences between active users and lurkers when building emotional attachments. By utilizing the media system dependency (MSD) theory, this study investigates into the driving factors of dependency relations (understanding, orientation and play) to user attachments (i.e. attachment to the social Q&A community, attachment to content creators).

Design/methodology/approach

The research model is empirically validated by an online questionnaire among users of a social Q&A community. Deriving from the actual behavioral data, the authors divide 262 valid responses into 157 active users and 105 lurkers according to whether they post or not. The partial least squares (PLS) method is exploited to analyze the relationships in the model. In addition, the PLS-based multi-group analysis is conducted for comparing active users and lurkers.

Findings

The empirical results confirm that dependency relations (understanding, orientation and play) significantly influence user attachments. Multi-group analysis suggests that the effect of understanding dependency relations on attachment to content creators is stronger for active users than for lurkers. However, the effect of orientation dependency relations on user attachment is significant for lurkers but not significant for active users.

Originality/value

This study enriches the knowledge of the MSD theory by extending it to the social Q&A community setting. Based on the MSD theory, the relationships between three sides of dependency relations and two types of user attachments are hypothesized in the research model. Besides, the impact of user heterogeneity in building user emotional attachment still lacks consideration. This study is one of the first in the field of comparison studies to compare active users and lurkers in such context, providing a novel contribution in understanding the motivations and emotional responses of different users.

中文翻译：

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社交问答社区中的媒体系统依赖性和用户依恋：活跃用户和潜伏者有区别吗？

目的

本研究旨在探索用户在社交问答社区背景下形成依恋的动机，并确定活跃用户和潜伏者在建立情感依恋时的差异。本研究利用媒体系统依赖（MSD）理论，研究了用户依恋（即对社交问答社区的依恋、对内容创作者的依恋）的依存关系（理解、定向和游戏）的驱动因素。

设计/方法/方法

该研究模型通过社交问答社区用户的在线问卷进行实证验证。作者根据实际行为数据，将262个有效回复按照是否发帖分为157个活跃用户和105个潜伏者。利用偏最小二乘 (PLS) 方法来分析模型中的关系。此外，还进行了基于 PLS 的多组分析来比较活跃用户和潜伏者。

发现

实证结果证实依赖关系（理解、方向和游戏）显着影响用户依恋。多组分析表明，对于活跃用户而言，理解依赖关系对内容创作者依恋的影响比潜伏者更强。然而，方向依赖关系对用户依恋的影响对潜伏者显着，但对活跃用户不显着。

原创性/价值

本研究通过将 MSD 理论扩展到社交问答社区环境，丰富了对 MSD 理论的了解。研究模型基于MSD理论，假设了依赖关系的三个方面与两类用户依恋之间的关系。此外，用户异质性对建立用户情感依恋的影响仍然缺乏考虑。这项研究是比较研究领域中第一个在这种情况下比较活跃用户和潜伏者的研究，为理解不同用户的动机和情绪反应提供了新的贡献。