Exploring the Factors Influencing Consumers to Voluntarily Reward Free Health Service Contributors in Online Health Communities: Empirical Study

Abstract

Background Rewarding health knowledge and health service contributors with money is one possible approach for the sustainable provision of health knowledge and health services in online health communities (OHCs); however, the reasons why consumers voluntarily reward free health knowledge and health service contributors are still underinvestigated. Objective This study aimed to address the abovementioned gap by exploring the factors influencing consumers’ voluntary rewarding behaviors (VRBs) toward contributors of free health services in OHCs. Methods On the basis of prior studies and the cognitive-experiential self-theory (CEST), we incorporated two health service content–related variables (ie, informational support and emotional support) and two interpersonal factors (ie, social norm compliance and social interaction) and built a proposed model. We crawled a dataset from a Chinese OHC for mental health, coded it, extracted nine variables, and tested the model with a negative binomial model. Results The data sample included 2148 health-related questions and 12,133 answers. The empirical results indicated that the effects of informational support (β=.168; P<.001), emotional support (β=.463; P<.001), social norm compliance (β=.510; P<.001), and social interaction (β=.281; P<.001) were significant. The moderating effects of social interaction on informational support (β=.032; P=.02) and emotional support (β=−.086; P<.001) were significant. The moderating effect of social interaction on social norm compliance (β=.014; P=.38) was insignificant. Conclusions Informational support, emotional support, social norm compliance, and social interaction positively influence consumers to voluntarily reward free online health service contributors. Social interaction enhances the effect of informational support but weakens the effect of emotional support. This study contributes to the literature on knowledge sharing in OHCs by exploring the factors influencing consumers’ VRBs toward free online health service contributors and contributes to the CEST literature by verifying that the effects of experiential and rational systems on individual behaviors can vary while external factors change.

Seeking or contributing? Evidence of knowledge sharing behaviours in promoting patients’ perceived value of online health communities

“…Second, we built a concise model that includes three antecedents (ie health knowledge seeking, health knowledge contributing and structural social capital). We did not include the factors such as types of health knowledge, 32 characteristics of health care, 26 type of patients’ illnesses and characteristics of OHCs that might influence patients’ perceived value of OHCs. Including these variables, especially the characteristics of health care and OHCs, could capture the impacts of contextual factors and therefore might have interesting findings.…”

“…57 OHCs are online health-related social networks in which users with common interests, goals or practices interact to contribute and seek health knowledge and engage in social interactions. 1,26,47 It is the nature of social interactions and the resources embedded in social interaction networks that sustain the OHCs. 26,47 Therefore, in addition to health knowledge resources, users' structural social capital developed from social interactions.…”

“…1,26,47 It is the nature of social interactions and the resources embedded in social interaction networks that sustain the OHCs. 26,47 Therefore, in addition to health knowledge resources, users' structural social capital developed from social interactions. This is crucial and most relevant within OHCs.…”

“…Social capital can be divided into three dimensions: structural social capital, relational social capital and cognitive social capital 57 . OHCs are online health‐related social networks in which users with common interests, goals or practices interact to contribute and seek health knowledge and engage in social interactions 1,26,47 . It is the nature of social interactions and the resources embedded in social interaction networks that sustain the OHCs 26,47 .…”

“…20,23 Patients can disclose their personal health conditions, make new social ties, and seek or contribute health knowledge. 1,6,24,25 Using OHCs can help health professionals build their reputations and earn material rewards 12,13,19,26 and help patients improve their health outcomes, such as their e-health literacy and feeling of well-being. [27][28][29] These advantages make OHCs an effective way to alleviate the pressures on medical resources.…”