TY - JOUR
T1 - Understanding the motivators affecting doctors’ contributions in online healthcare communities
T2 - professional status as a moderator
AU - Yang, Hualong
AU - Du, Helen S.
AU - He, Wei
AU - Qiao, Han
N1 - Funding Information:
This study was partially funded by the China Postdoctoral Science Foundation Grant [grant number 2017M622647] and the National Natural Science Foundation of China Grant [grant numbers 71901073; 71572050; 71872171]. The authors greatly appreciate the work of the editors and anonymous reviewers and are grateful for their insightful comments and suggestions.
Publisher Copyright:
© 2019 Informa UK Limited, trading as Taylor & Francis Group.
PY - 2021
Y1 - 2021
N2 - With the development of e-health, the number of doctors providing consultation services in online healthcare communities (OHCs) is growing. Their aim is to help patients obtain healthcare information and treatment. Since the doctors’ contributions are essential to a sustainable development of OHCs, understanding why doctors contribute to OHCs is crucial. However, the related literature that investigate motivators of doctors’ contribution behaviours in OHCs is scant. OHCs are a type of novel online community through which doctors not only obtain personal compensation but also interact with patients to build their relationship network. Hence, both personal and social motivators may affect doctors’ contributions to OHCs. Based on the theories of self-determination and Maslow’s hierarchy of needs, we established an empirical model to explore the effects of reputation, monetary rewards, doctor–patient interaction and professional status. The empirical results show that both personal and social motivators have positive effects on doctors’ contributions to OHCs, and that doctors’ professional status has a moderating effect. These findings help us understand the motivational mechanisms of doctors’ contributions to OHCs.
AB - With the development of e-health, the number of doctors providing consultation services in online healthcare communities (OHCs) is growing. Their aim is to help patients obtain healthcare information and treatment. Since the doctors’ contributions are essential to a sustainable development of OHCs, understanding why doctors contribute to OHCs is crucial. However, the related literature that investigate motivators of doctors’ contribution behaviours in OHCs is scant. OHCs are a type of novel online community through which doctors not only obtain personal compensation but also interact with patients to build their relationship network. Hence, both personal and social motivators may affect doctors’ contributions to OHCs. Based on the theories of self-determination and Maslow’s hierarchy of needs, we established an empirical model to explore the effects of reputation, monetary rewards, doctor–patient interaction and professional status. The empirical results show that both personal and social motivators have positive effects on doctors’ contributions to OHCs, and that doctors’ professional status has a moderating effect. These findings help us understand the motivational mechanisms of doctors’ contributions to OHCs.
KW - Online healthcare community
KW - doctors’ contributions
KW - doctor–patient interaction
KW - monetary reward
KW - professional status
KW - reputation
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85074535277&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1080/0144929X.2019.1679887
DO - 10.1080/0144929X.2019.1679887
M3 - Article
AN - SCOPUS:85074535277
VL - 40
SP - 146
EP - 160
JO - Behaviour and Information Technology
JF - Behaviour and Information Technology
SN - 0144-929X
IS - 2
ER -