Ramirez Artemio, Sumner Erin M, Hayes Jameson
1 Zimmerman School of Advertising and Mass Communications, University of South Florida , Tampa, Florida.
2 Department of Human Communication and Theatre, Trinity University , San Antonio, Texas.
Cyberpsychol Behav Soc Netw. 2016 Aug;19(8):494-501. doi: 10.1089/cyber.2015.0630. Epub 2016 Jul 22.
Social network sites (SNSs) such as Facebook function as both venues for reconnecting with associates from a user's past and sources of social information about them. Yet, little is known about what factors influence the initial decision to reconnect with a past associate. This oversight is significant given that SNSs and other platforms provide an abundance of social information that may be utilized for reaching such decisions. The present study investigated the links among relational reconnection, information seeking (IS) behavior, and individual- and relationship-level factors in user decisions to reconnect on Facebook. A national survey of 244 Facebook users reported on their most recent experience of receiving a friend request from someone with whom they had been out of contact for an extended period. Results indicated that uncertainty about the potential reconnection partner and forecast about the reconnection's potential reward level significantly predicted IS behavior (passive on both target and mutual friends' SNS pages as well as active). However, the emergence of their two-way interaction revealed that the forecasts moderated the IS-uncertainty link on three of the strategies (extractive, both passive approaches). Moreover, social anxiety, sociability, uncertainty about the partner, the forecast about the reconnection's reward level, and extractive and passive (target SNS pages) strategies significantly predicted user decisions to reconnect. Future directions for research on relational reconnection on SNSs are offered.
诸如脸书这样的社交网站既是用户与过去相识之人重新建立联系的场所，也是获取有关他们社交信息的来源。然而，对于哪些因素会影响与过去相识之人重新建立联系的最初决定，我们却知之甚少。鉴于社交网站和其他平台提供了大量可用于做出此类决定的社交信息，这种忽视是很严重的。本研究调查了在脸书上重新建立联系、信息搜索行为以及个体和关系层面因素之间的联系，这些因素影响着用户重新建立联系的决定。一项针对244名脸书用户的全国性调查，报告了他们最近收到一位与他们长期失去联系的人发来的好友请求的经历。结果表明，对潜在重新联系对象的不确定性以及对重新联系潜在回报水平的预测，显著预测了信息搜索行为（在目标和共同好友的社交网站页面上的被动搜索以及主动搜索）。然而，他们双向互动的出现表明，在三种策略（提取式，两种被动方式）中，这些预测调节了信息搜索不确定性之间的联系。此外，社交焦虑、社交性、对对方的不确定性、对重新联系回报水平的预测，以及提取式和被动式（目标社交网站页面）策略，显著预测了用户重新建立联系的决定。本文还提供了社交网站上关系重新建立研究的未来方向。
