Group influence on blogs design behaviour

Issues of national culture influence on web design behaviour have been rampant and stimulating on static web pages across the globe. The emergence of a new breed of publication-type web page brought about by the advancement of web technology however, saw a different species of online communication groups. Bloggers as these groups are called; used blogs as their communication and publication tool to distinguish themselves from other websites and online social media users. Since bloggers are groups that are recognised and credited to cultivate their own culture, the idea that national culture has an influence on blogs design behaviour and preferences may have been weakened. Bloggers groups themselves would be the influential factor that determines design preferences of bloggers in a network of blogs. To address the issue, this paper has conducted an assessment on blogs from six countries using content analysis method, national culture traits and SIDE model to ascertain design features characteristics and behaviour. Results from both the global and local blogs in each country showed that blogs design preferences in one country differ between both the global and local bloggers. Furthermore, global bloggers design preferences in countries under observation are found to be similar to one another

Development and Maintenance of Self-Disclosure on Facebook: The Role of Personality Traits

This study explored the relationships between Facebook self-disclosure and personality traits in a sample of Italian users. The aim was to analyze the predictive role of Big Five personality traits on different parameters of breadth and depth of selfdisclosed behaviors online. Facebook users, aged between 18 and 64 years of age (Mage = 25.3 years, SD = 6.8; N = 958), of which 51% were female, voluntarily completed an online survey assessing personality traits and Facebook self-disclosure. Results at a series of hierarchical regression analyses significantly corroborated the hypotheses that high extroverted and openness people tend to disclose on Facebook a significant amount of personal information, whereas high consciousness and agreeableness users are less inclined to do it. Furthermore, more extroverts and agreeableness people develop less intimacy on Facebook, differently from those with high levels of openness. Results also corroborated the hypothesis of a full mediation of time usage in the relationship between personality factors such as extroversion and conscientiousness with breadth of Facebook self-disclosure. Overall, according to the findings of the current study, personality traits and Facebook self-disclosure become central both as predictive variables for depicting the different profiles of potential addicted and as variables to help educators, teachers, and clinicians to develop training or therapeutic programs aimed at preventing the risk of Internet addiction. Limitations of the study are discussed, and directions for future research are suggested

A LITERATURE ANALYSIS ABOUT SOCIAL INFORMATION CONTRIBUTION AND CONSUMPTION ON SOCIAL NETWORKING SITES

Social networking sites (SNSs) have emerged as a center for daily social interactions. Every day, millions of users contribute information about themselves, and consume information about others on SNSs. In recent years, we have witnessed a growing number of studies on the issue of social information contribution and consumption behaviors on SNSs. This paper aims to provide a systematic literature review on this topic across different disciplines to understand the current research state and shed light on controversial findings of SNS usage regarding users’ well-being. We identified 126 relevant articles published between 2008 and 2014, and provide an overview of their antecedents and associated outcomes. Our analysis reveals that a majority of existing work focused primarily on social information contribution, its antecedents and favorable outcomes. Only few studies have dealt with contribution behavior and the dark sides of SNS use. Nevertheless, we could identify different characteristics of social information determining the favorability of contribution behavior. Further, we categorized the scarce papers of consumption behavior regarding the social information characteristics and identified different underlying processes: social comparison, monitoring and browsing. These findings contribute to the Information Systems (IS) discipline by consolidating previous knowledge about SNS usage patterns and individual well-being

Understanding Self-Disclosure on Social Networking Sites - A Literature Review

User-generated content is the backbone of any social networking site (SNS) and an important pillar of many business models online. While there is a growing body of research on self-disclosure on SNSs, existing insights remain scattered. To fill this gap, we undertake a systematic literature review by examining 50 studies to identify the factors behind self-disclosure on SNSs. We find that social exchange theory and its extension ‘privacy calculus’ represent a dominant theoretical perspective. Hence, we focus on perceived benefits and costs, as well as cost-mitigating factors as main areas of our investigation. Since personality traits are commonly controlled for or studied within the context of SNS disclosure, we additionally include an exploration of this factor group into our review

Vulnerability to social engineering in social networks : a proposed user-centric framework

Social networking sites have billions of users who communicate and share their personal information every day. Social engineering is considered one of the biggest threats to information security nowadays. Social engineering is an attacker technique to manipulate and deceive users in order to access or gain privileged information. Such attacks are continuously developed to deceive a high number of potential victims. The number of social engineering attacks has risen dramatically in the past few years, causing unpleasant damage both to organizations and individuals. Yet little research has discussed social engineering in the virtual environments of social networks. One approach to counter these exploits is through research that aims to understand why people fall victim to such attacks. Previous social engineering and deception research have not satisfactory identified the factors that influence the users' ability to detect attacks Characteristics that influence users' vulnerability must be investigated to address this issue and help to build a profile for vulnerable users in order to focus on increasing the training programs and education for those users. In this context, the present study proposes a user-centric framework to understand the user's susceptibility, relevant factors and dimensions

Culture or social interaction? A study of influential factors on weblog design

The importance of blogs and social networking as medium of interactions had gain substantial popularity in mainstream media. Such popularity is due to blogs timely publication, ease of use and wide availability. Blogs hypertext and hyperlinks spread information and influence through an underlying social network. Taking into consideration that past studies on web design have focused on cultural traits on design elements, this paper aims to analyse the patterns on blog design from the perspectives of social influence and interactions. Examining design patterns from five networks of blogs using content analysis method, the results show that design of blogs in an online network shares similar elements and the pattern is different from one network to the other

Capturing personality from Facebook photos and photo-related activities: How much exposure do you need?

Photo-related activities are noticeably prevalent among social media users. On Facebook, users predominantly communicate visually and manage their self-presentation. Such online behaviours tend to mimic what would be expected of individuals’ offline personalities. This study sought to address the link between Facebook users’ photo-related activities and the Big Five personality traits by encoding basic Facebook visual features. Content analysis on the actual profiles (n = 115) and multiple regression analyses revealed many associations as a manifestation of users’ characteristics. For instance, Neuroticism and Extraversion predicted more photo uploads. Conscientiousness was predictive of more self-generated albums and video uploads and Agreeableness predicted the average number of received ‘likes’ and ‘comments’ on profile pictures. Additionally, the Facebook experience in interaction with the personality factors was found to be influential on the type of photo-related activity and the level of photo participation of users. The findings provide evidence that Facebook users with various personality traits set up albums and upload photos differently. Given the uses and gratification model, users adapt the construction of their profiles and manage their interactions to gratify their psychological needs on Facebook

Do men post and women view? The role of gender, personality and emotions in online social activity

According to Nadkarni and Hofmann’s model (2012), a major motivator of social networking sites (SNS) use is the need to belong, i.e., the basic drive to form and maintain relationships. This need can be fulfilled through two kinds of belongingness-related behaviours: information-seeking (using SNS to learn about others) and communication (using SNS to communicate with others). The present study aimed at examining the role of gender, personality traits and emotional competence on each of these two belongingness-related behaviours. A total of 995 self-selected Italian Internet users (67.1% women; age range: 18-56) participated in the study. Results showed that the two online behaviours are influenced by different variables. Among them, the most relevant appear to be emotional competences, as managing emotions reduces both behaviours, using emotions fosters communication, and understanding emotions decreases information-seeking. Extraversion plays a key role as well, promoting both behaviours in women and information-seeking in men, whereas openness to experiences is positively linked to viewing others’ profiles. Finally, men use social networking sites to communicate and express their opinions more often than women. Implications are discussed