Exploring askers’ switching from free to paid social Q&A services: A perspective on the push-pull-mooring framework

Consumer brand and category switching behaviors after food safety incidents: Factors and mechanisms

The excessive mold found in Three Squirrels' nuts and the clenbuterol abuse of Shuanghui are two infamous food safety incidents in China. We adopted push-pull-mooring theory to conduct a model and examined the factors influencing consumer short-term or long-term brand-switching or category-switching behaviors following the two food safety incidents. We employed multinomial logistic regression and structural equation modeling as tools to analyze 1027 valid questionnaires. The results, for the first time, revealed that perceived risk, alternative selectivity, alternative attractiveness, controllability attribution, and habits were key push, pull and mooring factors influencing Chinese consumers' brand and category switching from food brands under food safety crisis, and most importantly, that their influential paths differed greatly under the two food safety incidents, suggesting a different influential mechanism across two product categories (i.e., utilitarian food and hedonic food). These findings throw light on the predictors and mechanisms that affect consumer brand and category switching from food brands under food safety crisis and help associated food businesses develop more targeted and powerful crisis management and public relations strategies.

The impact of paid social Q&A on panic buying and digital hoarding at the stage of coexistence with COVID-19: The moderating role of sensitivity to pain of payment

The worldwide disaster caused by COVID-19 and its variants has changed the behavior and psychology of consumers. Panic buying and hoarding of various commodities continue to emerge in our daily life. Meanwhile, many scholars have focused on the causes of panic buying and hoarding of physical products like daily necessities and food during the outbreak of COVID-19. In fact, the phenomenon of panic buying and digital hoarding of paid social Q&A and other digital content products is very prominent, both in the outbreak period of COVID-19 epidemic and the current coexistence stage. However, the existing literature lacks empirical research to explore this phenomenon, and the psychological mechanism behind it has not been clearly revealed. Therefore, at the current stage of coexistence with COVID-19, based on the SOBC framework, we developed a theoretical model and explored the causes of panic buying and digital hoarding in paid social Q&A. The data collected from 863 paid social Q&A users in China are empirically tested. The results show that the characteristics of paid social Q&A (usefulness, ease of use, professionalism and value) can cause emotional contagion among platform users, activate their willingness to pay, and finally lead to digital hoarding and panic buying behavior of COVID-19 co-existence stage. In addition, the sensitivity to pain of payment moderates the relationship between emotional contagion and willingness to pay. Compared with the spendthrifts, the tightwads are more willing to pay. The conclusions will have positive significance for improving the retail service of digital content platform and promoting the consumption of digital content.

Information Adoption Patterns and Online Knowledge Payment Behavior: The Moderating Role of Product Type

The development of online knowledge payment platforms in recent years has increased their respective market value by nurturing content resources and improving content ecology. Yet, the underlying factors of knowledge seekers’ payment behaviors and their information adoption mechanisms are poorly understood. Based on the information adoption model, this study develops a research model to examine the relationship between information adoption patterns and knowledge seekers’ payment behavior, and explore the moderating effect of product type on this relationship. To test the research model and hypotheses, we used a multi-analytic approach combining text and regression analysis on a sample of 4366 social Q&A data collected from Quora+ between August 2021 and August 2022. We further classified the product types into utilitarian and hedonic, and compared the differences in influence paths between product types. The results show that the completeness, vividness, and relevance of the product description have a significant positive impact on knowledge payment behavior. The reputation, experience, and integrity of the knowledge provider have a positive impact on knowledge payment behavior. Compared to utilitarian knowledge products, the payment behavior for hedonic products is more related to the reputation and experience of the knowledge provider. This study provides insights into the factors that influence online knowledge payment behavior and practical guidance for the development of online knowledge payment services and platforms.