Title: Exchange Ideology as a moderator of Knowledge Sharing in virtual teams: a social exchange theory perspective

Authors: Xi Zhang, Zhenjiao Chen, Doug Vogel, Chuanjie Guo

Addresses: USTC-CityU Joint Research Center, USTC Suzhou Institute for Advanced Study, Suzhou, PR China. ' USTC-CityU Joint Research Center, USTC Suzhou Institute for Advanced Study, Suzhou, PR China. ' Department of Information Systems, City University of Hong Kong, Kowloon, Hong Kong. ' University of Science and Technology of China, Hefei, PR China

Abstract: The objective of this study is to examine how individual Exchange Ideology (EI) influences the relationship between perceived economic and social benefits and Knowledge Sharing (KS) behaviour in the context of virtual teams. It draws on social exchange theory to test whether EI would positively moderate the relationship between three perceived benefits (i.e., extrinsic rewards, reciprocity, and reputation) and virtual team members| KS behaviour. Contrary to the theory of team-member social exchange, the findings suggest that in virtual KS contexts, EI negatively moderates the relationships between extrinsic rewards, reciprocity and KS, but has no effect on reputation and KS.

Keywords: knowledge sharing; virtual teams; teamwork; exchange ideology; social exchange; internet; extrinsic rewards; reciprocity; reputation.

DOI: 10.1504/IJIEM.2009.023927

International Journal of Internet and Enterprise Management, 2009 Vol.6 No.2, pp.143 - 163

Published online: 20 Mar 2009 *

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