Psychology and Behavioral Sciences

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Self-Disclosure, Interpersonal Relationships, and Stickiness of Online Communities

Received: 25 February 2015    Accepted: 09 March 2015    Published: 17 March 2015
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Abstract

Online communities change the way people interact. Due to the high diversity of online communities, how to maintain and increase user participation is an important issue for the administrators of those sites. This study first examines propensity to trust, need for affiliation, and exhibitionism as antecedents to self-disclosure and relationship maintenance and further explores the effects of self-disclosure and relationship maintenance on intimacy as well as the relation of intimacy to stickiness. By convenience and snowball sampling, 503 valid responses to an online questionnaire were collected. Data was analyzed using SPSS 20.0 and AMOS 7.0. Results indicate that need for affiliation and exhibitionism have positive effects on self-disclosure, that propensity to trust and need for affiliation are antecedents to relationship maintenance, that self-disclosure and relationship maintenance contribute to intimacy, and that intimacy reinforces stickiness to online communities.

DOI 10.11648/j.pbs.20150402.16
Published in Psychology and Behavioral Sciences (Volume 4, Issue 2, April 2015)
Page(s) 71-78
Creative Commons

This is an Open Access article, distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), which permits unrestricted use, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, provided the original work is properly cited.

Copyright

Copyright © The Author(s), 2024. Published by Science Publishing Group

Keywords

Propensity to Trust, Need for Affiliation, Exhibitionism, Self-Disclosure, Relationship Maintenance, Intimacy, Stickiness

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Author Information
  • Department of Information Management, National Changhua University of Education, Changhua, Taiwan

  • Graduate Institute of Technology Management, National Chung Hsing University, Taichung City, Taiwan

  • Department of Information Management, Da-Yeh University, Dacun, Changhua, Taiwan

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  • APA Style

    Ying-Wei Shih, Meng-Hsu Hsu, De-Chih Lee. (2015). Self-Disclosure, Interpersonal Relationships, and Stickiness of Online Communities. Psychology and Behavioral Sciences, 4(2), 71-78. https://doi.org/10.11648/j.pbs.20150402.16

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    ACS Style

    Ying-Wei Shih; Meng-Hsu Hsu; De-Chih Lee. Self-Disclosure, Interpersonal Relationships, and Stickiness of Online Communities. Psychol. Behav. Sci. 2015, 4(2), 71-78. doi: 10.11648/j.pbs.20150402.16

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    AMA Style

    Ying-Wei Shih, Meng-Hsu Hsu, De-Chih Lee. Self-Disclosure, Interpersonal Relationships, and Stickiness of Online Communities. Psychol Behav Sci. 2015;4(2):71-78. doi: 10.11648/j.pbs.20150402.16

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  • @article{10.11648/j.pbs.20150402.16,
      author = {Ying-Wei Shih and Meng-Hsu Hsu and De-Chih Lee},
      title = {Self-Disclosure, Interpersonal Relationships, and Stickiness of Online Communities},
      journal = {Psychology and Behavioral Sciences},
      volume = {4},
      number = {2},
      pages = {71-78},
      doi = {10.11648/j.pbs.20150402.16},
      url = {https://doi.org/10.11648/j.pbs.20150402.16},
      eprint = {https://download.sciencepg.com/pdf/10.11648.j.pbs.20150402.16},
      abstract = {Online communities change the way people interact. Due to the high diversity of online communities, how to maintain and increase user participation is an important issue for the administrators of those sites. This study first examines propensity to trust, need for affiliation, and exhibitionism as antecedents to self-disclosure and relationship maintenance and further explores the effects of self-disclosure and relationship maintenance on intimacy as well as the relation of intimacy to stickiness. By convenience and snowball sampling, 503 valid responses to an online questionnaire were collected. Data was analyzed using SPSS 20.0 and AMOS 7.0. Results indicate that need for affiliation and exhibitionism have positive effects on self-disclosure, that propensity to trust and need for affiliation are antecedents to relationship maintenance, that self-disclosure and relationship maintenance contribute to intimacy, and that intimacy reinforces stickiness to online communities.},
     year = {2015}
    }
    

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    T1  - Self-Disclosure, Interpersonal Relationships, and Stickiness of Online Communities
    AU  - Ying-Wei Shih
    AU  - Meng-Hsu Hsu
    AU  - De-Chih Lee
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    PB  - Science Publishing Group
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    UR  - https://doi.org/10.11648/j.pbs.20150402.16
    AB  - Online communities change the way people interact. Due to the high diversity of online communities, how to maintain and increase user participation is an important issue for the administrators of those sites. This study first examines propensity to trust, need for affiliation, and exhibitionism as antecedents to self-disclosure and relationship maintenance and further explores the effects of self-disclosure and relationship maintenance on intimacy as well as the relation of intimacy to stickiness. By convenience and snowball sampling, 503 valid responses to an online questionnaire were collected. Data was analyzed using SPSS 20.0 and AMOS 7.0. Results indicate that need for affiliation and exhibitionism have positive effects on self-disclosure, that propensity to trust and need for affiliation are antecedents to relationship maintenance, that self-disclosure and relationship maintenance contribute to intimacy, and that intimacy reinforces stickiness to online communities.
    VL  - 4
    IS  - 2
    ER  - 

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