Sustainability of Government Social Media: A Multi-Analytic Approach to Predict Citizens’ Mobile Government Microblog Continuance

Shuiqing Yang,Xianwu Zeng

doi:10.3390/su10124849

Abstract

Attracting citizens and facilitating their continued usage is critical for the sustainable development of mobile government microblog services. Drawing on the stimulus–organism–response (SOR) framework and the literature related to perceived value, this study investigates the factors that affect citizens’ continuance intention vis-a-vis mobile government microblogs from a value-based perspective. A structural equation modeling (SEM)-neural network combined method was used to test the proposed model by using data collected from 301 mobile government microblog users in China. The SEM analysis shows that social influence, perceived interactivity, and perceived mobility positively affect citizens’ utilitarian value and hedonic value, which further affects their continuance intention. The significant factors obtained from the SEM are used as input for a neural network analysis to calculate their relative impacts. The results of the neural network analysis showed that perceived mobility is the most important factor influencing utilitarian value, while social influence is the most significant factor affecting hedonic value. The normalized importance of utilitarian value on continuance behaviors is larger than that of hedonic value.

Highlights

Microblogs, with the functionalities of information broadcast, social interaction, and relationship building, have been embraced by government agencies and officials worldwide [1]
Three items on hedonic value were adapted from Kim and Han [45] to measure the happiness of mobile government microblog users, and two items on utilitarian value were adapted from Kim and Han [45] to measure the benefits of mobile government microblog users
We employed the two-step structural equation modeling analysis method recommended by Anderson and Gerbing [46] to examine the measurement and structural model

Summary

Introduction

Microblogs, with the functionalities of information broadcast, social interaction, and relationship building, have been embraced by government agencies and officials worldwide [1]. With the recent advancement of wireless communication technologies, mobile government microblogs have become an important communication platform to facilitate two-way interactions between government agencies and citizens [4]. As the largest social media platform in China, Sina Weibo has invited a large number of government offices and departments to open microblog accounts [2]. In the political or government domain, the development of Internet-based communication technologies such as mobile social media is one of the most important metrics and indices for building sustainable and green e-government organizations [20]. Government agencies at all levels have launched their own official microblogs (e.g., Beijing release, Shanghai release), which are intended to meet the sustainable development needs of e-government

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Conclusion