Knowledge trust in online programming communities

Abstract

The proliferation and popularity of online programming forums raises the question of what affects and how do those factors affect the users' level of trust towards the knowledge that is contained within online programming forums. This study uses elements of existing studies that examine trust in online communities, using “community dimensions” of shared consciousness, shared tradition, and obligation to society as latent variables. The indicator variables are the “value dimensions” of social networking, community engagement, knowledge use, and impression management. The factor that affects knowledge trust the most is knowledge use, with a path coefficient of 0.57. The hypotheses regarding shared consciousness is rejected, and individual factors seem to affect knowledge use more than community factors.