Title: Social networking information and job applicants' background check: mediating and moderating effects of employers' behavioural intention and legal consideration

Authors: Md. Sajjad Hosain; Mohitul Ameen Ahmed Mustafi

Addresses: Business School, Sichuan University, Chengdu, China ' Business School, Khawja Yunus Ali University, Bangladesh

Abstract: This paper aims to reveal the relationship between social networking information (SNI) and job applicants' background checking (ABC) process in Bangladesh with mediating and moderating effects of employers' behavioural intention (EBI) and legal consideration (LC). We segregated SNI into further three components: perceived availability of information (PAI), perceived relevance of information (PRI) and perceived usability of information (PUI). Based on 436 valid responses, we utilised SPSS 24 for descriptive statistics and structural equation modelling (with AMOS 24) for testing the hypothesised relationships. We found that PAI has significant positive relationship with ABC while PRI has significant negative and PUI has insignificant positive relationships with ABC. Further, we revealed that both the mediators: LC and EBI mediate the relationships between PAI and ABC; and PRI and ABC but do not mediate the relationship between PUI and ABC. Lastly, we identified that two moderators can moderate all the three direct relationships. We also discussed the implications and limitations.

Keywords: social networking sites; SNSs; social networking information; SNI; job applicants; employers; background check.

DOI: 10.1504/MEJM.2023.133122

Middle East Journal of Management, 2023 Vol.10 No.5, pp.467 - 498

Received: 21 Feb 2022
Accepted: 20 Mar 2022
Published online: 01 Sep 2023 *

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