Information & Management 51 (2014) 833844

Contents lists available at ScienceDirect

Information & Management

journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/im

Exploring the linkages between perceived information accessibility

and microblog stickiness: The moderating role of a sense of
community
Chien-Lung Hsu a,*, Yi-Chuan Liao b
a
b

Department of Marketing Management, Takming University of Science and Technology, Taipei, Taiwan
Department of Business Administration, National Taipei University, Taipei, Taiwan

A R T I C L E I N F O

A B S T R A C T

Article history:
Received 4 June 2012
Received in revised form 29 July 2013
Accepted 7 August 2014
Available online 19 August 2014

In the context of the exponential increase of information in society, this study examines the relationship
between perceived information accessibility and microblog stickiness. The results indicate an inverted
U-shaped relationship between perceived information accessibility and stickiness. To determine how to
avoid the information overload that can compromise the stickiness of the microblog site, this study
examines the moderating effects of sense of community. The inverted U-shaped relationship becomes
linear as levels of sense of community increase. The results suggest microblog service providers can
increase the sense of community in order to reduce the negative impact of information overload on
stickiness.
2014 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

Keywords:
Perceived information accessibility
Stickiness
Sense of community

1. Introduction
The Internet and the World Wide Web have become a major
source of information and knowledge [1,58,60,62]. These resources
represent a powerful disseminative tool for users to acquire and
share information efciently and easily. The microblog is a new
form of communication that has been enabled by a variety of
online social networking tools (e.g., Facebook, Twitter, Jaiku, and
Pownce) [51]. The term microblog refers to a set of activities in
which users broadcast brief text updates about small events in
their daily lives and work, such as what they are reading, thinking
and experiencing. Because microblog entries are typically posted
via mobile phone text messages and are currently restricted to a
limited number of characters per entry, the messages are brief,
sharp and to the point [12]. Microblogs are used for a wide variety
of social purposes and have rapidly become a popular option for
online social networking. Twitter is the best known microblog [10].
Approximately 65 million tweets were posted each day in the
month of June 2010an astonishing 750 tweets sent per second
among nearly 174 million users worldwide (Twitter, 2010).
The problem of information overload has become widely
recognized [31]. People in todays information society are
bombarded with information regardless of whether they actively

* Corresponding author.
E-mail address: alanhsu8399@gmail.com (C.-L. Hsu).
http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.im.2014.08.005
0378-7206/ 2014 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

seek such information. The particular characteristics of microblogs

allow users to receive a variety of messages from different sources
via a wide range of communication channels presented in an
innite number of ways. The exponentially increasing amount of
information provided by microblogs may result in what has
become known as information overload [32]. Information
overload is the state in which an individual has been presented
with an overabundance of information [50,64,86] to the point that
he or she is no longer able to process messages [83]. This problem
causes the process of discovering and retrieving information from
microblogs to become an inefcient, time-consuming activity.
Furthermore, users experiencing information overload may easily
become frustrated and stressed [57]. All individuals are affected by
the ever-increasing number of information sources. The rate of
increase in the quantity of available information is both stunning
and unpredictable [87]. While too little information may render a
virtual community useless, too much information can cause users
to feel overwhelmed and frustrated because they cannot nd what
they seek. Microblog service providers need ways to ameliorate the
challenges caused by users limited processing capacity. Thus, this
study addresses the inverted U-shaped relationship between the
stickiness of a microblog and users perceptions of the accessibility
of its information.
The literature on communication theory [69,75,76] notes that a
users information seeking motivation and ability are the main
factors constituting information processing capacity. Experienced
online users have been shown to be more capable of processing

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C.-L. Hsu, Y.-C. Liao / Information & Management 51 (2014) 833844

information efciently and effectively with less perceived information load than are novice online consumers [24]. A typical
microblog provides a dynamic message platform that requires live
interactions between members to maintain the community
infrastructure and generate new and updated information. When
people are highly involved with the topic being communicated and
are able to process the arguments, they are more likely to be
persuaded. Therefore, the degree to which a user is involved and
has the capacity to process information may inuence both the
users degree of loading perception [90,99] and the extent to which
he or she can provide social or emotional support to other
members [77,80]. Thus, this study discusses the logic behind
effective communication messages that can increase the stickiness
of microblogs without inducing information overload.
Because a microblog is not only an information site but also a
social networking service, this study asserts that social interaction
is the microblog factor most worthy of investigation. However,
surprisingly few studies have examined how social interaction
moderates the relationship between the perceived information
accessibility and stickiness of a microblog. Therefore, this study
adopted the sense of community (consisting of two subfactors:
membership and shared emotional connection) as a moderating
factor.
This study addresses these issues in the literature by examining
(1) the inverted U-shaped curve in the relationship between the
perceived information accessibility and stickiness of a microblog
and (2) the social interaction factor (sense of community) that
moderates this curvilinear linkage between perceived information
accessibility and stickiness.
The remainder of this paper is structured as follows. In the next
section, we review some of the literature regarding microblogs,
perceived information accessibility, sense of community and
stickiness. We then present our research model and hypotheses.
The following section describes the methodology used to verify the
hypotheses. The next section includes the analysis and discussion
of the results, followed by the theoretical contributions of this
study and a discussion of the managerial implications. After
describing the limitations of this study and making suggestions for
further research, we present our conclusion.
2. Literature review
2.1. Microblog
A microblog is a form of communication in which users can
describe their current status in short posts distributed in the form
of instant messages (e.g., G-talk, Yahoo!), mobile phones (SMS),
RSS, email or websites [12]. A microblog combines the features of
social networking and mobility to share thoughts and opinions, to
invite discussion, and to tell others about ones life. This form of
communication provides an opportunity for individuals to share
their activities, interact with others, build a reputation and release
pent-up emotionsall in real time. Users are becoming
producers and consumers rather than simply being the audience
[19]. While a traditional blog allows entries of unlimited length,
microblog entries are typically posted via mobile phone text
messages, in which the number of characters is limited. Messages
on microblogs are brief, sharp and to the point. Twitter, which was
launched in 2006, may be the best-known example of a microblog.
Other examples, both active and defunct, include Plurk. Twitter is
similar to an instant messenger that allows users to respond to the
question what are you doing now? Twitter users post short
information updates without a headline or additional information
on their page. Users can follow (i.e., receive feeds from) anyone
else using the service, from friends and family to public gures and
news outlets. Once users choose whom they want to follow,

Twitter provides them with a live news feed of tweets from those
sources. Thus, users receive a constant, real-time stream of news in
short text bites from almost anyone of interest. Users can also send
tweets, which involves instantly delivering messages to their own
followers. All of the messages from a members social network are
listed together in chronological order on the members start page.
The microblog fullls the need for a mode of communication
that is even faster than a blog. By encouraging shorter posts,
microblogs reduce the amount of time and thought that users must
invest to generate contentone of the key factors that distinguishes microblogs from blogs in general [51]. The second
important distinction is the update frequency. On average, a
prolic blogger updates his or her blog once every few days. By
contrast, a microblogger may post several updates within a single
day. The main reasons for microblogging are maintaining contact
with others, raising the visibility of interesting things, gathering
useful information, seeking help and opinions, and releasing
emotional stress [100]. Using Twitter as an example, researchers
have dened four types of user intentions: daily chat, conversation,
information sharing, and news reporting news.
2.1.1. Daily chat
Daily chatting is the most common intention for Twitter users.
The original idea of Twitter was to ask people What are you
doing?; therefore, most Twitter posts pertain to users daily
routines or current activities.
2.1.2. Conversation
The microblog is not a unidirectional information dissemination website; users can interact in two-way conversations on a
microblog. Approximately 12.5% of all posts in our collected data
contain a conversation, and almost 21% of the users in the
collection have used this form of communication.
2.1.3. Sharing information
Users share information with their friends or followers.
Approximately 13% of all posts in the collected data contain a
link that was shared.
2.1.4. Reporting news
Twitter emphasized its news-and-information network strategy in November 2009 by changing its question to users from What
are you doing? to Whats happening? Since then, reporting the
news as it occurs has become an important microblogging activity.
Many people now use Twitter to report the latest news or to
comment on current events. Some users or agents automatically
post updated information, such as weather reports and new stories
from RSS feeds [51].
Scholars have categorized microblogs into three types based on
their purpose: information sharing, information seeking, and
friend-wise relationship building. News is posted from information sources that tend to have a large base of followers; these sources
may be individuals or automated services. Users who rarely post but
who follow others statuses regularly are called information
seekers. Friend-wise relationship is a broad term that includes
relationships with many other users, such as family members, coworkers and strangers. Typically, users are motivated to use a
microblog that has a community with which they have developed a
strong association [51], that helps keep them informed of activities
[73] and that graties their need for contact with others [67].
2.2. Perceived information accessibility
Perceived information accessibility has been a critical factor
affecting information system usage and success [27]. Scholars have
dened perceived information accessibility as a combination of the

C.-L. Hsu, Y.-C. Liao / Information & Management 51 (2014) 833844

type and quantity of information as well as how that information is

organized to be accessible to participants [91]. The communication
channel is also a major component of perceived information
accessibility. Nearly every virtual community has certain entry
barriers that prevent some participants from accessing the full
range of services or information available on the website [94]. In
particular, microblogs provide a public place in which users can
communicate and post messages via e-mails, text messages,
instant messages or websites.
However, caution is advised, as microblogs sometimes provide
too much or too little information. Users are surrounded by a data
smog, which is an expression for the muck and druck of the
Information Age [87]. Scrutinizing the plethora of messages
received daily is both irrational and impossible [72]. Whereas
too much information can make it difcult for users to nd what
they want, too little information renders the virtual community
useless. Hence, we consider the optimal quantity of microblog
information to be an important issue for discussion.
Each person engages his or her cognitive system to process
information [68]. When people are exposed to a certain amount
of external information, their cognitive process can inuence
their decision regarding which portion of the information will be
perceived and comprehended. Specically, a perception of
information overload results when the information load appears
to exceed the limits of an individuals cognitive process [42].
Accordingly, researchers have identied the information overload phenomenon, which is an inverted U-shaped relationship
between the amount of information and the number of subjects
who make the correct choices [50]. In the study conducted by
Jacoby et al. [50], the authors acknowledged that they had
omitted individual differences in the ability to process information and had presumed a universally critical information
overload point. The inverted U-shaped feature of the model is
found to be the result of information processing limitations on
the part of individuals and is consistent with various other
information processing models [74]. Similarly, the critical
mass effect occurs when the information received becomes a
hindrance rather than help, even if such information is
potentially useful [64].
A large amount of information or information that is received
rapidly essentially becomes noise [55]. Under such situations, the
receivers of information cannot process it efciently. They become
easily distracted or stressed and are thus prone to making more
decision errors, possibly raising the costs in terms of time and
effort. Information overload is the point at which there is so much
information that using it effectively is no longer possible [36].
Psychological symptoms associated with information overload
include feeling overwhelmed or lost [11], frustrated [45], stressed
[21], anxious, confused or depressed [39].
The ability to process information differs from individual to
individual. People apply different information processing strategies to minimize the effect of information overload [42].
Information processing is a dynamically complex procedure that
is heavily inuenced by a persons past experiences [93], which
may act as a type of internal ltering mechanism. On a social
network platform, users dynamically interact with others and
accumulate experiences, thereby increasing their information
processing capacity. Therefore, the current study proposes sense of
community (consisting of two subfactors, membership and shared
emotional connection) as a moderating factor.
2.3. Sense of community
The use of the term community most often refers to a placeoriented concept dened as a group of socially interdependent
people who participate together in discussions and decision

835

making and who share certain practices that both dene the
community and are nurtured by it [13]. According to the Dictionary
of Sociology [66], the most common elements that dene a
community are the grouping of people within a singular social
structure and a sense of belonging to that social structure.
Currently, the meaning of the word is changing from its original
geographically specic connotation to a more relationship-specic
meaning. A distinction can be drawn between geographic
communities and relational communities. The former refers to a
neighborhood, town, or region, and the latter involves human
relationships without reference to location (e.g., communities of
interest such as hobby clubs, religious groups or fan clubs). A
virtual community is a set of social relationships forged in
cyberspace through repeated contacts within a specied boundary
[56]. A community is characterized primarily by the relational
interactions or social ties that draw people together. Such a
community does not form quickly. Throughout history, such a
community has been regarded as a community of memory, dened
in part by its past and its memory of the past.
Sense of community is dened as a result of interactions and
deliberations by people united by similar interests and common
goals [96]. Furthermore, a sense of community is dened as the
feeling that group members have: the feeling that members matter
to one another and to the group as well as the shared faith that
members needs will be met through their commitment to be
together [70]. Since at least the 1960s, community researchers
have been interested in exploring this sense of community because
it is believed to have benecial outcomes that do not occur when
this feeling is absent [17].
The current study proposes that when members have a strong
sense of community, they may spend more cognitive effort dealing
with relevant information. Members may become deeply involved
with their community, thereby increasing their information
processing abilities and allowing them to manage a larger number
of messages [90]. Members of online groups can experience a sense
of virtual community, as the cyberspace equivalent of the sense of
community experienced in traditional face-to-face encounters
[16,92]. This sense of virtual community reects the feelings that
individual members have when belonging to an online social
group.
As a construct, the sense of virtual community is complex and
still lacks an established conceptualization. Membership and
shared emotional connection are the community factors most
commonly mentioned in studies discussing the sense of virtual
community [16,17,34,56]. From one perspective, membership
includes self-reinforcing aspect boundaries (knowledge of who is
within the community), emotional safety (boundaries that provide
protection for intimacy), personal investment (to become a
valuable member), the sense of belonging, identication with
other group members, and a common symbol system [85].
Membership includes the sense that one has invested part of
himself/herself to become a member and therefore has the right to
belong [6].
From a different perspective, the shared emotional connection
is derived from a shared community history, shared events,
positive interactions, and identication with the community. The
more frequently people interact, the more likely they are to form
close relationships, which subsequently leads to stronger bonds
[70]. According to the theory of planned behavior and the theory of
reasoned action, if individuals believe that others who are
important to them (e.g., part of their virtual community) want
them to perform a given behavior, then they will be more likely to
perform that behavior. Thus, the sense of virtual community can be
regarded as a major source of social inuence that clearly affect
users behavioral intentions. Therefore, the current study proposes
that the sense of community (membership and shared emotional

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836

connections) moderates the effects of the perceived information

accessibility and stickiness of a microblog.
2.4. Stickiness
A sticky website is critical to success for a sites service provider
[84]. Stickiness is the ability of a website to attract and retain
customers [101]. The term is used to describe not only the ability of
a website to attract and retain visitors [62] but also the sites ability
to induce repeated visits [58]. A website has stickiness when a user
visits the site repeatedly, spends more time browsing than the
average user does, and digs deeper into site than other users do.
Stickiness has been recognized as one of the keys to protability
because users who linger on a website will buy more goods or
services, view more advertisements or participate in other site
activities [56]. Stickiness is typically used to indicate how well a
website converts visitors to customers and retains existing
customers. A users willingness to return is a strong indicator of
loyalty to a website [79]; thus, many recent studies focus on
website stickiness to understand user intentions to revisit a
particular website [23,60].
The intention to spend more time on a website is believed to be
inuenced by users perceptions of the websites value; in this
manner, a website will attract its appreciators, inducing them to
linger on the site [61]. If individuals feel a website is not
interesting, then they will quickly leave and will not continue to
support the site. By contrast, users will continue visiting those
websites that provide interesting information and satisfy their
needs; this factor is important in maintaining individuals loyalty
[20]. Three indicators are generally used to measure stickiness:
duration, frequency and depth. A website is considered sticky
when its users spend an above-average amount of time browsing
it, when they visit the site frequently, and when they browse the
site in depth. These indicators are determined primarily by web
trafc metrics that measure the average time spent at the site per
visit and the average number of pages viewed per visit [29]. A
preferred website will have increased stickiness when its users
become deeply committed to reusing the site consistently in the
future. Moreover, stickiness to a community includes user
dependency on certain areas and functions of the community or
a cross-dependency on certain groups of people within the
community.

3. Research method and hypotheses

3.1. Effect of perceived information accessibility on stickiness
The purposes of this study are to examine the inverted Ushaped relationship between the perceived information accessibility and stickiness of microblogs and to explore the moderating
effect of sense of community on this curvilinear linkage (see Fig. 1).

Fig. 1. Conceptual model.

We posit that there is an inverted U-shaped relationship

between perceived information accessibility and stickiness. In
accordance with [91], this study denes perceived information
accessibility as the users perception of the type and amount of
information that is accessible. If the perceived information
accessibility level is too high, then it may cause information
overload. Information overload is dened as a decline in response
rates that occurs when the input of information surpasses a users
processing capacity limits [89]. Decision scientists have described
human beings as information processing systems with limited
information processing capacity [24]. When a given information
load increases, a decision maker will also increase his or her effort
to process this information. Once the input surpasses users
processing capacity, people are overloaded by the processing of
information, and the response rate declines [42,86], Therefore,
because of their limited processing capacity, users can become
cognitively overloaded if they attempt to process too much
information in a limited amount of time, resulting in confusion,
cognitive strain and other dysfunctional consequences. In the same
vein, previous studies have shown that when too much information is readily available, users feel less capable of processing such
information, and they perceive that the informativeness of the site
is lower [75].
For virtual communities, communication channels constitute a
major component of perceived information accessibility [91].
Users with low levels of perceived information accessibility will
sense a lower level of access to such communication channels and
will thus experience a smaller quantity and less variety of
information. By contrast, a higher level of perceived information
accessibility leads to easy access to a greater amount and variety of
information, which can lead to higher usage of that information
and stronger perceptions that a certain site is easy to use. The
microblog platform provides many access channels, such as instant
messages (e.g., G-talk and Yahoo!), mobile phones (SMS), RSS,
email or websites, and users can easily access their microblogs at
any time in any place where connectivity is available. Thus,
perceived information accessibility has been found to have a
positive effect on perceived usefulness [78]. The rapid, almost
instantaneous character of microblogging allows users to quickly
choose what information they want to follow from a vast diversity
of possible sources. Thus, this study argues that microblog usage
allows users to gain a digestible amount of information via instant
messages while simultaneously facilitating interactions with other
participants. Therefore, the combination of information and an
instant community channel with friend or follower relationships
will induce participants to spend more time on a site, thus
increasing their intention to return. This combination increases the
stickiness of a site.
However, time and capability limitations cause information
overload, in which people with too much information become
confused and make poor decisions [15,53,63]. The impracticability
of too much information is caused by bounded rationality.
However, it is importantboth theoretically and practicallyto
consider that people need sufcient information to be able to
perform effectively at work (a desirable outcome), while considering that excessive amounts of information can lead to stress and
distress (an undesirable outcome) [64]. Along similar lines, when
users perceive information overload on social networking sites,
they may become less attentive and signicantly decrease their
activities on such networks. This situation can lead to emotional
stress and dissatisfaction for users [35]. The current study infers
that interactions in real-life situations and sustainable dynamic
interactions that occur through virtual publics (online sites where
the public can gather) are similarly restricted by information
overload. We argue that such a situation is the result of limitations
in an individuals ability to effectively process a variety of patterns

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of virtual public interactions over sustained periods of time [52].

When microblog users obtain all the information that they desire
and believe that the sources are correct, they may increase their
efforts to process and respond to various types of information.
However, because individuals continue to interact dynamically
with different parts of a community and because incoming
messages constantly emerge, an individuals limited processing
capacity can be easily overwhelmed. An excessive amount of
communication (i.e., messages) thus results in information
overload. Therefore, when too many messages are delivered,
individuals who are unable to respond adequately may become
easily distracted or stressed and may reduce their time on the
microblog.
As a consequence, the current study argues that when perceived
information accessibility increases, the stickiness of microblogs
will also increase. However, too much information could cause a
reduction in the level of stickiness.
H1. The relationship between perceived information accessibility
and stickiness is an inverted U-shaped curve.
3.2. Moderating role of sense of community
Membership is the rst subfactor of the sense of community
factor postulated to moderate the curvilinear relationship
between perceived information accessibility and stickiness.
Accordingly, this current study denes membership as one of
the main aspects of individuals identication with a group in the
sense that people come to view themselves as members of a
community [30,70]. Membership is a feeling of belonging, of being
a part of something. This sense of belonging is crucial for
participation in virtual communities because no involvement or
participation would occur if this feeling were absent [59].
Membership also has boundaries, which means that individuals
form a certain self-awareness of the virtual community membership of the microblog, allowing them to distinguish people who
belong from those who do not [7]. These boundaries provide a
sense of emotional safety that encourages the development of
intimacy [70]. Furthermore, members use common language and
symbols in their virtual community to expand their own
boundaries. In an emotional sense, individuals who become
involved and interact within a group will earn a place in the group,
and as a result of this investment, membership will be more
valuable. Thus, membership fosters loyalty, trust, and citizenship
behavior in group settings [14,71] and explains why some people
seek to maintain committed relationships in the virtual community of a microblog.
The current study contends that as a message or piece of
information increases in personal relevance, it becomes more
important and applicable to the development of veridical opinions.
Therefore, people are more motivated to devote the cognitive effort
required to evaluate a member-relevant message or piece of
information when they have a strong sense of membership rather
than a weaker sense of membership. An important part of
maintaining a relationship with a group is to actively participate
in online social interactions [49]. Stated differently, a strong sense
of membership makes people feel like they belong; thus, they will
spend more time in the virtual community and share messages
with the group. Therefore, stickiness induced by a strong sense of
membership may mitigate the negative effect associated with
higher levels of perceived information accessibility. Conversely,
people in an unfamiliar relationship are relatively poor at
responding to messages and sharing messages with others in
the group. Hence, perceived information accessibility relies on the
level of membership in participating in a microblogging virtual
community.

837

H2. Membership positively moderates the inverted U-shaped relationship between perceived information accessibility and stickiness.
Shared emotional connection (SEC) is the second sub-factor of the
sense of community that is expected to moderate the nonlinear
relationship between perceived information accessibility and
stickiness. An SEC is partially based on mutual history. The
interactions of members in mutual and specic events may
develop or restrict the strength of ones relationship in a
community [70]. A shared emotional connection refers to the
bonds developed over time through positive interactions with
other community members. More interaction amongst the
members of a group increase the likelihood that members will
become close [48]. For example, the community can discuss a topic
on the microblog or hold a member activity on the site, such as
voting, competitions or games. If members experience such a
process positively, then their relationships may become stronger,
which facilitates cohesion. By contrast, if interactions are
ambiguous or argumentative, then group cohesiveness will be
restricted [26,44]. Furthermore, the more important the mutual
event is to those involved, the greater the community bond is [70].
This study argues that when members have a mutual history,
they are more able to expend the cognitive effort needed to process
messages or information. As previously noted, microbloggers share
thoughts and opinions and invite discussion, primarily based on
their daily routines or current activities. The greater the information availability as a function of such variables as message
repetition, the greater the ability of message recipients to
thoughtfully consider issue-relevant information and become
more deeply committed to the community. Therefore, mutual
history is likely to provide members with a greater ability to absorb
messages or information that is repeated regularly. An important
part of sustaining this relationship with a group is investment in
online interactions. A deeply shared emotional connection
generated by mutual history is likely to provide members with
more incentive and capacity to remain in the community.
Therefore, stickiness from shared events may mitigate the negative
effects associated with higher levels of perceived information
accessibility. By contrast, people interacting in ambiguous or
argumentative events may become increasingly reluctant to
respond to messages or to share messages with others, and they
may even abandon a community for this reason.
H3. Shared emotional connection positively moderates the
inverted U-shaped relationship between perceived information
accessibility and stickiness.
4. Research methodology
4.1. Data collection and sampling plan
The data used in this research were collected via an online
sampling survey hosted at my3q.com (http://www.my3q.com).
The respondents were Taiwanese users who had followed or
become fans of the microblog webpage of a corporation (e.g., Plurk,
Twitter, Facebook). To encourage participation, the respondents
were offered the opportunity to win a lottery-based prize (7Eleven icash). The respondents were asked to evaluate the items in
the questionnaire based on their usage behavior on the microblog
that they frequented most. Thus, the rst question asked the
respondents to indicate which microblog they tend to use the
most. All items were measured on a 7-point Likert scale anchored
by 7 = strongly agree and 1 = strongly disagree. A total of 562
respondents completed the questionnaire. Of these responses, 26
were considered invalid (too many answers were missing, or the

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respondent chose the same option too frequently). After discarding

the invalid responses, 536 questionnaires were used for our
analysis. The valid response rate was 95.37%.
4.2. Measurements
To examine our hypotheses, we specied the denition and
measurements of each variable. Perceived information accessibility was dened as the type and amount of information organized in
such a way that was accessible to participants [91]. We measured
perceived information accessibility with ve items that, for
example, asked the respondents to evaluate the amount of
information and the available channels of the microblog. The
denition of a sense of community is the feeling of belonging
sensed by group members, along with a shared emotional
connection with other members. We measured sense of community with eight items in total: three items for membership and ve
for shared emotional connection (SEC). The current study denes
membership as one of the main aspects of individuals identication with a group in the sense that people come to view themselves
as members of a community. This feeling of belongingof being a
part of somethingand shared emotional connection refer to the
bonds developed over time through positive interactions with
other community members. As an example, one membership item
asked the respondents to evaluate their sense of belonging in
relation to the microblog. An example of a shared emotional
connection item is a question asking the respondents to evaluate
their connection with other members of the microblog. We
measured stickiness, which is the ability of a website to attract and
retain visitors [62], using four items, including one item that asked
the respondents to evaluate the cost of switching to another
microblog.
4.3. Descriptive statistics
4.3.1. Descriptive statistics of the respondents
The descriptive information included participant characteristics, such as gender, age, educational background, and job. This
information also included behaviors related to the use of
microblog website functions, such as the time spent on the
Internet, the preferred microblog service provider, the time spent
using microblogging services, and the frequency of posting
messages and reading other bloggers messages. There were
103 male respondents and 433 female respondents. Approximately 94% of the respondents were 1930 years old. Approximately 96% of the respondents had earned more than a bachelors
degree. A large majority of the respondents (76%) used the
Internet 79 h a day and 56% spent 79 h on microblog websites in
particular (Table 1).
4.3.2. Descriptive statistics of the questionnaire responses
Descriptive statistics regarding the completed questionnaires
are shown in Appendix. There are ve items regarding perceived
information accessibility, eight items regarding sense of community, and ve items regarding stickiness.
4.3.3. Data analysis procedure and methods
After the online questionnaire, a conrmatory factor analysis
(CFA) of four latent variables was used to assess the dimensionality, reliability and validity of the scales. The t indices are presented
in Appendix. The CFA model showed a reasonable t to the data,
with NFI, NNFI, CFI, and IFI all exceeding 0.90 (x2 = 341.07;
d.f. = 129) [5]. Composite reliability (CR) was calculated for each
construct using the procedures suggested by Fornell and Larcker
[38]. The CR for the four latent constructs ranged from 0.84 to 0.90,
all exceeding the acceptable CR level (0.70) suggested by Bagozzi

Table 1
The characteristics of the respondents.
Characteristic

Sample

Percentage (%)

Gender
Male
Female

103
433

19
81

Age
Under 19
1925 years old
2630 years old
3135 years old
More than 35 years old

15
373
101
13
0

3
69
25
3
0

Education
Master
Bachelor
Senior high school
Junior high school
Elementary

140
376
19
1
0

26
70
4
0
0

Mean hours of microblog usage per day

Less than 1 h
42
64
13 h
46 h
102
281
79 h
1012 h
13

8
12
19
56
5

Mean hours of internet usage per day

Less than 1 h
13 h
46 h
79 h
1012 h

1
2
18
76
3

8
12
92
386
4

and Yi [8]. All item loadings were signicant at the 1% level,

indicating convergent validity [9].
The discriminant validity of all scales was assessed using two
different techniques. First, we analyzed all pairs of constructs in
two-factor CFA models [5]. Each model was run twice: once to
constrain the correlation between the constructs to unity and once
to free the parameter. A chi-squared test of the nested models
assessed whether the chi-squares were signicantly lower for the
unconstrained models. Most of the combinations resulted in a
higher critical value (Dx2(1) = 3.84 at the 5% signicance level),
indicating acceptable discriminant validity for each scale. Second,
we examined discriminant validity to determine whether the
condence interval (two standard errors) around the correlation
estimate between the two factors included a value of 1.0 [5]. The
result showed that none of the condence intervals for any of the
factor pairs had a value of 1.0. Thus, we concluded that our measures
were valid and reliable. Table 2 shows the standard deviations of the
means and the correlations of the constructs used in the following
analyses.
We used a hierarchical regression analysis to test our
hypotheses because this technique allows the examination of
associations for evidence of nonlinearity. To eliminate the bias
resulting from multicollinearity, we followed a straightforward
procedure suggested by Friedrich [40]. The criterion (perceived
Table 2
Means, standard deviations, correlations.
Variable

Perceived information
accessibility

1
2
3
4
Mean
SD

1.00
0.68
0.59
0.35
5.08
0.81

Note: SEC, shared emotional connection.

Membership

SEC

Stickiness

1.00
0.84
0.48
4.89
0.99

1.00
0.43
4.75
0.91

1.00
4.57
1.04

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839

Table 3
Results of regression analyses for stickiness (moderator: sense of community).
Variable
PIA
M
SEC
PIA  M
PIA  SEC
PIA2
PIA2  M
PIA2  SEC
R2
Adj2
F-change

Model 1
0.02 (0.48)
0.35 (5.02)***
0.12 (1.91)*

0.21
0.21
46.58***

Model 2
0.01
0.34
0.02
0.13
0.15

(0.08)
(5.07)***
(0.30)
(2.07)*
(2.26)*

0.30
0.30
30.45***

Model 3
0.02
0.36
0.01
0.18
0.16
0.08

Model 4

( 0.33)
(5.32)***
(0.20)
(2.74)**
(2.35)**
( 2.28)*

0.31
0.30
5.18*

0.13
0.24
0.02
0.25
0.06
0.11
0.12

Model 5
*

( 2.04)
(3.03)**
( 2.59)*
(2.71)**
( 0.75)
( 3.21)***
(3.72)***

0.35
0.34
29.31***

0.16
0.33
0.11
0.26
0.01
0.13

VIF
***

( 3.15)
(5.09)***
( 1.70)*
(4.00)***
( 0.21)
( 3.88)*

0.18 (6.69)***
0.37
0.36
44.79***

2.08
3.62
2.80
4.68
4.60
1.75
2.52
3.11

Note: PIA, perceived information accessibility; M, membership; SEC, shared emotional connection.
*
p < 0.05.
**
p < 0.01.
***
p < 0.001.

information accessibility) and the regressors (membership and

shared emotional connection) were rst standardized, and the
cross-product terms and quadratic terms were then formed. The
variance ination factors (VIFs) for all coefcient estimates were
below the cutoff value of 5 [43], thus indicating that multicollinearity did not contaminate the results. Entering the
independent variables and interaction variables in one block
and the squared variables in a second block enabled the
determination of the signicance of the curvilinear relationships
over and above any linear relationships. In regression models, a
curvilinear relationship is evident if the addition of the nonlinear
relationship is evident and if the addition of the nonlinear
predictor results in signicant incremental variance after the
linear relationships have been considered [3]. A multiple
hierarchical regression analysis is widely used to assess curvilinear
relationships in management and marketing research.
4.4. Regression analysis
Table 3 shows the results of the regression analysis. Each
construct is composed of a summated index of the items that
constitute the construct. We entered the perceived information
accessibility and moderator variables (membership and shared
emotional connection) in Model 1 and then added the interaction
between perceived information accessibility and the moderator
variables in Model 2. To test for a curvilinear relationship, we
added the quadratic terms to the regression equation in Model 3
and added the interaction terms between the squared perceived
information accessibility variable and moderator variables in
Models 4 and 5 [3]. Note that the signs of the regression coefcients
for the squared terms represent the direction of curvature
produced by the effects of perceived information accessibility on
stickiness. In other words, the regression-coefcient estimate of
the quadratic terms for perceived information accessibility
determines whether the U-shaped relationship is normally
oriented or inverted. The coefcients of the interaction terms
associated with the coefcients of the squared terms depict how
the nonlinear relationships between perceived information
accessibility and stickiness are moderated by the sense of
community variables.
As shown in Model 3, the squared term was negative and
signicant (b = 0.08, p < 0.05). A one-tailed test was used for the
hypotheses because directional predictions were offered. The
change in R2 was also signicant; the addition of the perceived
information accessibility quadratic term (Model 3) to the main
effect model (Model 2) increased the R2 by approximately 1%, thus
supporting the salience of the curvilinear effect. Consequently,
Hypothesis 1 was supported. Fig. 2 shows the plot of the

relationship between perceived information accessibility and

stickiness.
Model 4 shows the moderating effect of membership on the link
between perceived information accessibility squared and stickiness. The addition of the interaction term (Model 4) to the squared
terms model (Model 3) increased the R2 by approximately 4%. The
F-value for the incremental R2 value achieved statistical signicance at the 5% level. A positive and signicant coefcient estimate
was observed (b = 0.12, p < 0.05), indicating that the curvilinear
relationship between the perceived information accessibility
squared term and stickiness depends on membership. As predicted
in Hypothesis 2, these results suggested that a strong sense of
membership mitigates the inverted U-shaped relationship between perceived information accessibility and stickiness.
To aid in interpretation, the nature of this interaction was
examined using procedure tests for the signicance of regression-coefcient estimates for the perceived information accessibility squared variable at a distance of one standard deviation
away from the means of the membership moderator [3]. A
signicant negative relationship between perceived information
accessibility squared and stickiness was found (b = 0.23,
p < 0.05) for a low level of membership. For a high level of
membership, the relationship between perceived information
accessibility squared and stickiness was positive but not
signicant (b = 0.01, p > 0.05) (see Fig. 3).
Model 5 displays the extent to which a shared emotional
connection moderates the effects of the squared term for perceived
information accessibility on stickiness. After considering the
shared emotional connection effect, we observed that the
coefcient estimate for the interaction term between the perceived
information accessibility squared term and its inuence is
positively signicant (b = 0.18, p < 0.05), supporting Hypothesis
3. This result suggests that a high level of shared emotional
connection mitigates the inverted U-shaped relationship between
perceived information accessibility squared and stickiness. The
nature of this interaction was examined using Aiken and Wests [3]
procedure. We plotted the interactions and conducted simple
slope tests. The simple slope test involved dividing the moderator
into a high group (one standard deviation greater than the mean)
and a low group (one standard deviation less than the mean) and
re-estimating the relationship between perceived information
accessibility and stickiness. At a high level of shared emotional
connection, the relationship between perceived information
accessibility squared and stickiness was positive but not signicant (b = 0.05, p > 0.05). At a low level of shared emotional
connection, the relationship between perceived information
accessibility squared and stickiness was negative and signicant
(b = 0.31, p < 0.05) (see Fig. 4).

C.-L. Hsu, Y.-C. Liao / Information & Management 51 (2014) 833844

840

Fig. 2. The curvilinear relationship between information accessibility and stickiness.

Fig. 3. Moderating effect of membership on the curvilinear relationship between information accessibility and stickiness.

5. Discussion and implications

6. Theoretical contributions

This empirical survey-based study was conducted across a

variety of different microblogs and found overall support for the
proposed hypotheses. The purpose of this study was to verify the
inverted U-shaped relationship between perceived information
accessibility and the stickiness of microblogs. This study also
proposed information processing strategies to mitigate the effects
of the information overload problem. That is, this study applied
sense of community as a moderating factor to weaken the
curvilinear relationship between perceived information accessibility and stickiness. As the results show, the hypotheses of this
study received support and raised several interesting issues that
are discussed below.

Academically, this study builds on a growing body of work that

examines the inverted U-shaped relationship between perceived
information accessibility and microblog stickiness [50,64,86].
Specically, this study suggests that useful information has
positive effects on individuals, inducing them to spend more time
on a website; however, beyond a certain level, even useful
information becomes detrimental to the stickiness of the site.
Previous theories have suggested that excessive information may
be harmful (regardless of whether such messages are useful)
because of the limited processing capacity of individual [35,64,65].
This nding supports anecdotal reports that users often leave a
microblog when they perceive a decline in the amount of

C.-L. Hsu, Y.-C. Liao / Information & Management 51 (2014) 833844

841

Fig. 4. Moderating effect of SEC on the curvilinear relationship between information accessibility and stickiness.

information. Conversely, if users feel that there is too much

information on a microblog, then they may not nd what they
want or may have insufcient time and ability to manage the
overload. Thus, microblog service providers should pay careful
attention to the amount of information that is provided: this
amount should be adequate but not overwhelming.
This study adopts a sense of community factor consisting of
membership and shared emotional connection in effectively
moderating the curvilinear relationship between perceived
information accessibility and microblog stickiness. The analysis
results show that both subfactors have signicant effects in
weakening the curvilinear relationship between perceived information accessibility and microblog stickiness. With regard to
membership, we nd a positive relationship between perceived
information accessibility and stickiness. Particularly, with a strong
sense of membership, the relationship between perceived
information accessibility and stickiness becomes linear. The results
indicate that participants who feel an intense sense of belonging
are more motivated to engage in the cognitive effort required to
evaluate member-relevant messages or information [49]. Furthermore, members use shared language and symbols that enhance
their capacity to process information without surpassing their
limited cognitive ability. Therefore, users will spend more time on
a site and even deepen their commitment to such communities or
sites. By contrast, an inverted U-shaped relationship exists under
conditions in which the sense of membership is weak, which
indicates that perceived information accessibility becomes detrimental to stickiness beyond a certain level. If users experience a
weak sense of membership, then they are less motivated to
participate in online social interactions. Furthermore, under such
conditions, the lack of common language and symbols increases
the difculty of absorbing the constantly emerging messages or
information. Therefore, as messages or information increases,
users can easily perceive information overload because of the
bounded rationality, thus decreasing their willingness to attend

[65]. Such individuals become less attentive and signicantly

reduce their activities on these sites [35].
The results show that a shared emotional connection (SEC) also
plays a moderating role in the curvilinear relationship between
perceived information accessibility and stickiness. With a strong
SEC, the relationship between perceived information accessibility
and stickiness becomes linear. This nding indicates that users
who have a closer relationship and shared history with others in
an online community will build the capability to absorb larger
amounts of messages and information that are regularly repeated
[25]. Microblogs provide a platform that allows individuals to
share opinions and exchange information and permits articulation to achieve effective communication. This capability results in
shared understanding and cohesion, and participants are therefore willing to expend cognitive effort to process messages. The
more messages or information that emerge on such sites, the
higher the likelihood that a participant will remain in the
community. Conversely, with a weaker SEC, a negative relationship between perceived information accessibility squared and
stickiness is observed. That is, there are positive incentives for
users to process information, but once a certain threshold is
exceeded, the accumulated noise becomes detrimental to
stickiness. These results conrm our expectation that when
increasing the quantity of messages or information in a
community with a weak shared emotional connection, users will
eventually deem such messages unnecessary, which may cause
them to become stressed and distracted to the point that they
actually leave the community.

7. Managerial implications
Our empirical nding regarding the relationship of perceptions
of information accessibility to microblog stickiness has strategic
implications for both microblog service providers and companies.

842

C.-L. Hsu, Y.-C. Liao / Information & Management 51 (2014) 833844

Specically, our study suggests that once users sense that a

microblog contains insufcient information, they may intend to
leave, whereas users who perceive an excess amount of information on a microblog may feel uncomfortable and decrease their
attachment to the microblog. Thus, microblog service providers
should make an effort to carefully adjust the amount of accessible
information.
For example, Plurk uses a Karma point system that averts the
problem of too few or too many messages. The Karma value is a
mechanism used to evaluate user involvement. According to
Plurk.com, some tips on gaining more Karma include inviting real
friends, engaging in quality plurking each day, receiving
responses from other plurkers, and updating ones own prole.
However, Plurk will lower the Karma value of a user who spams
other users, posts too much information at one time, is inactive for
a long period of time, requests friendships and is rejected too often,
and is unfollowed by friends. Therefore, a higher Karma value
indicates that a user has higher value to the community and
greater inuence with Plurk.
We also offer some clear implications for organizations
regarding the building of continuous conversation channels with
users. Currently, many companies are directing their efforts
toward microblog marketing, aiming to provide crucial information to communicate with customers. Organizations should
consider that too little information might fail to give customers
the information that they want, while excessive information might
cause customers to experience cognition overload and induce
them to sever their relationship with the organization. Therefore,
we recommend enhancing a company websites sense of
community to reduce the negative effect of perceived information
accessibility on stickiness.
To mitigate the curvilinear relationship between perceived
information accessibility and the stickiness of microblogs, we
suggest that microblog service providers and corporations adopt
strategies that increase users sense of community (including their
sense of membership and shared emotional connections). For
instance, Plurk allows users to group their friends into cliques,
which streamlines the process of sending plurks to a specic group
of members. Users in a clique are interested in the same topic or
share something in common [14,71]. They may build boundaries
and distinguish between people who belong and those who do not.
Under such situations, even when users sense an increasing
amount of information, they may not feel as pressured and may be
more willing to manage what would otherwise appear to be an
excessive information load. Furthermore, taking Facebook as an
example, participants can share emotional connections by building
their relationships with friends or fans. On a fan or group page,
users can share histories and events, interact positively, and
identify with one another. Under such conditions, users may nd it
easier to handle the amount of information [50]. Moreover, the
more the user interacts in such a microblog, the more likely they
are to continue using Facebook, as they perceive that they have
close relationships there. The microblog has become an important
marketing tool, a great platform on which companies can promote
their products and services, broaden their business network and
build their brand image. Businesses should not only post
information but also foster more customer interactions on their
microblog pages to strength their connection with customers. For
example, companies can propose certain topics for customers to
discuss or go directly online to improve interactions on the

webpages of their microblogs. The spirit of microblogging is to

communicate and interact; communication is no longer simply a
one-way interaction. To conduct marketing through microblogging, it is necessary to make friends and build an atmosphere of one
large family on such websites.
8. Limitations and future research
The results of this study have certain limitations and points that
require further research. First, this study applied the sense of
community as the moderating factor to reduce the curvilinear
relationship between perceived information accessibility and
stickiness. Future studies can use different treatment conditions
to identify different effects. In fact, because the moderators are
continuous variables, we followed the procedures of Aiken and
West [3] and Cohen and Cohen [25] that suggest choosing only
high and low values. The high level corresponds to one standard
deviation above the mean of the moderator, whereas the low level
corresponds to one standard deviation below the mean of the
moderator. However, consistent with Aiken and West [3], various
other theories, measurement considerations, or previous research
may suggest interesting moderator values that should be explored
rather than an arbitrary statistical value.
Second, the sense of community is not the only factor that
moderates the relationship. This study recommends further
research to explore additional factors that trigger motivation
and ability, such as various interests, professional elds, and user
personality types.
Third, because the sampling was conducted on the Internet, the
sample collection itself is a limitation of this study. The sample was
not very general. The respondents were primarily students
between the ages of 20 and 30. Future studies could thus conduct
surveys in different elds. Moreover, the research subjects were all
microblog users in Taiwan. Culture and lifestyles may differ from
country to country.
Finally, because microblogging has become prevalent and
because consumers often create and share informationthus
generating a signicant amount of collective powera microblog
can both help users obtain the latest information and act as a new
tool for business marketing. The question of how positive value can
be provided to customers when corporations use a microblog as a
marketing tool is worthy of future research and discussion.
9. Conclusion
This paper has presented seminal research on the nonlinear
relationship between perceived information accessibility and the
stickiness of microblogs. This study further examined the
contingent effects of the sense of community on the inverted Ushaped relationship between perceived information accessibility
and microblog stickiness. The results showed a curvilinear
relationship that can be moderated by a sense of community.
Furthermore, when a strong sense of membership or emotional
shared connection is felt, the relationship between information
accessibility and stickiness becomes linear. However, when such
conditions are weaker, an inverted U-shaped relationship exists.
The ndings of the current study offer an interesting contribution
to the marketing and management literature, and the hypothesized relationship in this study is worthy of further examination
using other constructs.

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843

Appendix A
Measure and source

Operational measures of construct

SFLa

t-Value

0.88
0.88
0.64
0.58
0.55
0.85
0.90
0.87
0.83
0.84
0.80
0.77
0.75
0.62
0.77
0.86

22.16
24.11
15.40
13.71
12.92
23.33
25.44
24.12
22.27
22.62
20.97
20.07
19.19
14.88
14.91
23.21

0.83
0.66

22.07
16.10

Model t indices: NFI = 0.91, NNFI = 0.93, CFI = 0.94, IFI = 0.94
Information accessibility
Cronbachs a = 0.84
CR = 0.84 [91]

Sense of community: membership

Cronbachs a = 0.90
CR = 0.90 [70]
Sense of community: SEC
Cronbachs a = 0.89
CR = 0.90 [70]

Stickiness
Cronbachs a = 0.86
CR = 0.87 [62]

The information retrieved from this micro-blog is correct.

I believe the information provided by this micro-blog.
I can obtain complete information I want in this micro-blog.
I can easily access this micro-blog website.
I can easily browse this micro-blog website.
I have a very strong sense of belonging to this micro-blog.
I consider the members of this micro-blog my good friends.
I like the members of this micro-blog.
I believe the time spent on this micro-blog is worthwhile.
I can get what I want from this website.
What I want is similar to what other members of this website want.
The members of this micro-blogging website solve problems together.
The members of this micro-blogging website get alone very well.
I think it takes a lot of time and efforts to create a new account in other similar websites.
The cost of time, money, and efforts is high for me to change the micro-blogging website I am using.
I dont want to move to a similar micro-blogging website because I am already familiar with the
system of this website.
Its not worthy to take the risk moving to another micro-blogging website.
If I cannot use this micro-blogging website anymore, itd be a big pity.

Standardized factor loading.

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