Start Date
11-12-2016 12:00 AM
Description
We examine why user innovations persist in online communities when they are deemed empirically ineffectual in attaining the intended goal. Specifically, we investigate tweaking, an ineffectual yet popular user innovation on babycenter.com. Though the tweaked results are not considered valid by the scientific community, the tweaking community continues to persist and grow. We use qualitative methods to identify the salient constructs, understand the relationships between the constructs to develop a theory of why ineffectual user innovations persist in online communities. We posit that psychological safety, anxiety, desirability bias, source credibility and social proof are the important factors that keep ineffectual user innovations from getting rejected.
Recommended Citation
Haran, Vidya V. and Kim, Sung Won, "Persistence of Ineffectual User Innovation: Tweaking on Babycenter.com" (2016). ICIS 2016 Proceedings. 21.
https://aisel.aisnet.org/icis2016/SocialMedia/Presentations/21
Persistence of Ineffectual User Innovation: Tweaking on Babycenter.com
We examine why user innovations persist in online communities when they are deemed empirically ineffectual in attaining the intended goal. Specifically, we investigate tweaking, an ineffectual yet popular user innovation on babycenter.com. Though the tweaked results are not considered valid by the scientific community, the tweaking community continues to persist and grow. We use qualitative methods to identify the salient constructs, understand the relationships between the constructs to develop a theory of why ineffectual user innovations persist in online communities. We posit that psychological safety, anxiety, desirability bias, source credibility and social proof are the important factors that keep ineffectual user innovations from getting rejected.