Research On Users’ Academic Information-seeking Behaviour In Social Media Contexts

With the rapid development of social media,it has become a new channel and information space for scholars to interconnect and share knowledge with the advantages of wide content coverage,rich user types,rapid update of service models and convenient information exchange.It has changed the way academic information flows based on traditional database resources.However,while it is convenient,social media’s existing deficiencies such as poorly regulated information sources,inadequate information supervision and management mechanisms,and crude information filtering functions have also brought about problems such as information overload,information redundancy and lack of information quality assurance.Users seeking academic information in social media also face different challenges from previous academic searches based on traditional research resources,as evidenced by differences in behavioural patterns and emotional states.As social media is becoming the norm for academic users to seek academic information,it is of great theoretical significance and practical value to study the mechanism of academic information seeking behaviour in the social media context,to analyse the factors that trigger academic information seeking behaviour,and to explore the influence of external stimuli and emotions on academic information seeking.There is a lack of research on the characteristics of users’ academic information-seeking behaviour and the systematic exploration of behavioural mechanisms in social media contexts.Few studies have also explored the impact of negative emotions on academic information-seeking behaviour on social media in terms of fine-grained negative emotions.In particular,previous research has rarely divided anxiety into two dimensions,information-seeking anxiety and fear of missing out,to explore its relationship with academic information-seeking behaviour.Therefore,this study uses grounded theory and structural equation modelling as the main research methods,and social cognitive theory and SOR theory as the main theoretical guides.Separately,a context-specific and behaviour-generalised model of users’ academic information-seeking behaviour in social media contexts and a model of factors influencing academic information-seeking behaviour based on negative emotions were constructed to explore the characteristic patterns,internal logic,influencing factors and influencing mechanisms of academic information-seeking behaviour.The main research content of this paper is as follows:(1)From the perspective of the overall behaviour of academic information seeking,the data from 21 interviews with academic users were collected through a semi-structured interview method,and the original data obtained were systematically coded and analysed based on grounded theory.Nine main categories have been summarised: personal factors,objective factors,task context,information needs,platform selection,information-seeking behaviour,information-seeking methods,information filters and evaluation,and information-seeking results and use.By uncovering the relationship between the main categories and the academic informationseeking behaviour,a context-specific and overall behavioural process model of users’ academic information-seeking behaviour is constructed.The model describes generically the structure of the behavioural process from the user’s immersion in the academic task to the end of the search,reveals the behavioural mechanisms and internal logic involved,and identifies the factors that influence each aspect.These include personal factors such as information literacy,negative affect,positive affect and cognitive factors,and objective factors such as spatio-temporal factors,peer pressure,uncertainty,information quality and the platform information environment.(2)Based on grounded theory research,the factors influencing social media academic information-seeking behaviour and its mechanisms are studied from a negative affective perspective based on SOR theory.Using uncertainty,peer pressure and information quality as external stimuli and information-seeking anxiety and fear of missing out as organismic factors,the study investigates how the three external stimuli affect information-seeking anxiety and fear of missing out thereby further influence users’ academic information-seeking behaviour.A questionnaire survey was conducted to collect 360 valid data,and structural equation modelling was used to analyse the questionnaire data,test the hypotheses and construct a model of factors influencing users’ academic information-seeking behaviour in a social media context.The study found that uncertainty and peer pressure had a significant positive effect on information-seeking anxiety and fear of missing out;information quality had a significant negative effect on both anxieties;and both anxieties were positively associated with academic information-seeking behaviour and mediated the relationship between external stimuli and seeking behaviour.(3)Based on the findings of this study,suggestions for optimizing academic information-seeking behavior in social media contexts are presented for both social media and users.Provide practical advice to promote efficiency and enhance the experience of seeking academic information.