Lin Hsiu-Fen
Department of Shipping and Transportation Management, National Taiwan Ocean University, Keelung, Taiwan.
Cyberpsychol Behav. 2006 Oct;9(5):540-7. doi: 10.1089/cpb.2006.9.540.
Virtual communities are formed on the Internet and are expected to serve the needs of members for communication, information, and entertainment. Online businesses should consider virtual communities as a new market place since their members are current or future customers. Thus, there is a need to understand the determinants of member intentions to participate in virtual communities. Based on the extended theory of planned behavior (TPB), this study develop a research model to identify the attitudinal, social, and perceived behavioral control factors that would influence members intentions to participate in virtual communities. Specifically, the research model decomposes the attitude component into perceived usefulness, perceived ease of use and perceived trust, and the perceived behavioral control component into Internet self-efficacy and facilitating conditions. Based on a survey of 165 community members, this study uses structural equation modeling (SEM) approach to investigate the research model. The results indicate that attitude and perceived behavioral control significantly influence member behavioral intentions, while subjective norms do not. Finally, this study discusses the implications of these findings and offer directions for future research.
虚拟社区在互联网上形成，旨在满足成员在沟通、信息和娱乐方面的需求。在线企业应将虚拟社区视为一个新的市场，因为其成员是当前或未来的客户。因此，有必要了解成员参与虚拟社区意图的决定因素。基于计划行为理论（TPB）的扩展理论，本研究构建了一个研究模型，以识别影响成员参与虚拟社区意图的态度、社会和感知行为控制因素。具体而言，该研究模型将态度成分分解为感知有用性、感知易用性和感知信任，将感知行为控制成分分解为互联网自我效能感和促进条件。基于对165名社区成员的调查，本研究采用结构方程模型（SEM）方法来研究该研究模型。结果表明，态度和感知行为控制显著影响成员的行为意图，而主观规范则不然。最后，本研究讨论了这些发现的意义，并为未来的研究提供了方向。
