The Impact of Subscription Reciprocity on Charitable Content Creation and Sharing: Evidence from Twitter on Giving Tuesday

Management Information Systems Quarterly, Forthcoming

40 Pages Posted: 16 Oct 2016 Last revised: 26 Jan 2020

See all articles by Xue (Jane) Tan

Xue (Jane) Tan

Cox School of Business

Yingda Lu

Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute (RPI)

Yong Tan

University of Washington - Michael G. Foster School of Business

Date Written: November 19, 2019

Abstract

Social broadcasting sites have grown from an information diffusion channel to a public medium that fuels social movements such as charitable fundraising. Two mechanisms facilitate user participation in charitable social movements: content creation and content sharing. Users can create original content to express their attitude of giving and promote their most valued nonprofit organizations, enriching the depth of the conversation. They can also share others’ content to expedite the diffusion of high-quality content, expanding the breadth of the discussion. This paper investigates the impact of reciprocal and non-reciprocal followees (i.e., a followee is an account other users subscribe to) on followers’ decisions to create and share content. Analyzing the charitable movement of Giving Tuesday on Twitter, we find that original charitable content creation is prompted by reciprocal followees’ participation but not non-reciprocal followees’ participation in this movement. We also find that charitable content sharing is envoked by both reciprocal and non-reciprocal followees, with non-reciprocal having a greater impact. We discuss the theoretical and practical implications of these findings.

Keywords: Twitter, Reciprocity, Charitable Movements, Content Creation, Content Sharing

JEL Classification: A13

Suggested Citation

Tan, Xue and Lu, Yingda and Tan, Yong, The Impact of Subscription Reciprocity on Charitable Content Creation and Sharing: Evidence from Twitter on Giving Tuesday (November 19, 2019). Management Information Systems Quarterly, Forthcoming, Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=2850301 or http://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.2850301

Xue Tan (Contact Author)

Cox School of Business ( email )

P.O. Box 750333
Dallas, TX 75275-0333
United States

Yingda Lu

Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute (RPI) ( email )

Troy, NY 12180
United States

Yong Tan

University of Washington - Michael G. Foster School of Business ( email )

Box 353226
Seattle, WA 98195-3226
United States

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