How does social media use affect thriving at work? The roles of knowledge sharing and locus of control

Abstract

Employees' social media use in the workplace has become a common phenomenon. Thriving at work is a positive psychological state, and conventional wisdom and preliminary research on thriving at work indicate the benefits of thriving for both employees and organizations. However, few studies have linked social media use and employees' sense of thriving. Based on the socially embedded model of thriving at work, this paper explores the relationship between social media use and thriving at work, as well as the mediating role of knowledge sharing and the moderating role of locus of control. Mplus is used to analyze the data of 397 Chinese employees collected at two time points; the results show a significant positive impact of social-related social media use on thriving at work. However, work-related social media use was found to have no effect on thriving at work, though knowledge sharing mediates the relationship between social media use and thriving at work. In addition, locus of control moderates the relationship between work-related social media use and thriving at work.