The Enjoyment of Social Q&A Websites Usage

Abstract

Drawing on recent developments in media entertainment research, this study examined the relationship between social question and answer (Q&A) websites use and users’ perceived enjoyment with the goal of expanding the line of research on the enjoyment of new and interactive forms of media entertainment. Special attention was paid to meaningfulness, self-presentation, and social presence, which were introduced as mediators. An online survey of users of a social Q&A website was carried out (N = 150). Results indicated an indirect effect of social Q&A websites usage on enjoyment through users’ meaningfulness, self-presentation success, and social presence. Theoretical implications and further directions were discussed in detail.

Keywords

social Q&A websites enjoyment self-presentation social presence meaningfulness

From mundane questions like “How to nail an job interview?” to unusual yet informative questions like “How much water would it take to put out the sun?” social question-and-answer (Q&A) websites such as Quora.com have made great progress in the past few years, both in the amount of users and the number of questions and answers being posted. For instance, as of 2014, there were 500,000 topics, millions of questions and answers, and hundreds of millions of views per month on the U.S.-based social Q&A website Quora (Macmillan, 2014). In other countries such as China, Zhihu.com (知乎) aggraded more than 17 million registered users, making it the largest social Q&A website in the non-English world (Zhou, 2015). Such a dramatic rise in user rates over the past few years also stimulated a number of academic research on the uses and effects of social Q&A websites, particularly in the area of information studies and social computing (e.g., Jin, Li, Zhong, & Zhai, 2015; Morris, Teevan, & Panovich, 2010; Yang, Morris, Teevan, Adamic, & Ackerman, 2011).

In the field of media entertainment research, there has been an impressive body of research on the mechanisms of how an audience enjoys traditional entertainment media such as TV or films (Raney, 2003; Zillmann & Vorderer, 2000). More recently, scholars have called for attention to the underlying processes that guide the enjoyment of interactive media, particularly online and social media, which allow users to create their own user-generated content, interact with others, and create virtual communities (e.g., Reinecke, Vorderer, & Knop, 2014; Vorderer & Bryant, 2006). In an attempt to theoretically explicate entertainment experience in online and social media and clarify the underlying mechanisms, Reinecke et al. (2014) conducted a quantitative survey of Facebook users and revealed that the enjoyment of Facebook use is driven by the intrinsic needs of satisfaction (i.e., competency, relatedness, and autonomy) as well as extrinsic motivation (i.e., social pressure). However, Reinecke et al. (2014) pointed out that other online media also provide a wide range of functionalities for consumption, participation, and content production. Thus, it would be inappropriate to assume that users would enjoy other types of online media in the same manner as they do Facebook.

In order to fill this theoretical gap, this study was situated in the context of social Q&A websites—an online service that is distinct from social network sites—and examined the enjoyment of social Q&A websites use. In particular, this research aims to investigate the extent to which social Q&A websites can foster the entertainment appraisal of using these websites, and to explore potential psychological factors that may explain such an influence. To these ends, a survey was carried out on the users of Zhihu.com.

Social Q&A Websites

According to Shah, Oh, and Oh (2009), social Q&A websites refer to web services that provide virtual spaces where users can propose questions, seek information, and build communities around participation. Essentially, this definition indicates three basic functions of a social Q&A website: First, it provides an interface for users to post their questions and answers. Second, it provides a search engine that helps people find related questions in the online community. Third, users can participate in discussions in its online community. Notably, Shah, Oh, and Oh (2008, 2009) distinguished social Q&A websites from many information seeking services such as wikis, blogs, and other new media services such as YouTube and Flickr on the basis that in social Q&A sites, questions are directly generated and responses are dynamically updated by voluntary users.

Social Q&A websites share many common functionalities with social network sites such as Facebook and Twitter. For instance, users of both types of web services are allowed to create their own profiles, post questions and answers, leave comments, and communicate via private messages. However, it is important to notice that social network sites serve mainly for social support and social communication (Manago, Taylor, & Greenfield, 2012), whereas social Q&A websites are designed to support activities related to asking and answering questions (Shah et al., 2009). In that sense, social Q&A users are connected via questions or shared interests.

In the area of information science, a substantial body of research examined social Q&A sites from a wide range of perspectives, including user motivation and behavior, information quality and assessment, as well as design and technological factors that affect participation (Gazan, 2011; Shah et al., 2009). Of particular relevance to our current research are the studies that investigated users’ sociopsychological perceptions in the process of social Q&A sites use (Jin et al., 2015; Raban, 2007, 2009; Raban & Harper, 2008; Schroer & Hertel, 2009; Yang et al., 2011). Nevertheless, the entertainment aspect of social Q&A use are not explicitly explored.

Enjoyment of Media Entertainment

Over the past few decades, academic attention to understanding media enjoyment has grown rapidly among psychologists and communication scientists (Oliver & Bartsch, 2010). One important reason for this is that the explosive changes on the media landscape have provided new ways for people to spend their leisure time (Zillmann, 2000). As a result, researchers are interested in what factors constitute and enhance the entertainment experience and, in turn, what effects media enjoyment might have on users.

The traditional entertainment scholarship conceptualized media enjoyment as a pleasurable/hedonic experience that one perceives after exposure to and use of media (e.g., Raney, 2005; Zillmann, 2000). Over the past decade, however, scholars have expanded the definition of enjoyment to apply to more complex (i.e., not solely hedonistic) situations. For instance, scholars (Oliver & Bartsch, 2010, 2011; Oliver & Raney, 2011) have argued for understanding enjoyment as a form of appreciation—“an experiential state that is characterized by the perception of deeper meaning, the feeling of being moved, and the motivation to elaborate on thoughts and feelings inspired by the experience” (Oliver & Bartsch, 2010, p. 76). As Oliver and Raney (2011) pointed out, the notion of meaningfulness is central to the concept of appreciation. In essence, enjoyment as appreciation can be understood as the satisfaction of people’s needs of “truth-seeking” and/or “meaningfulness-seeking” (Oliver & Raney, 2011).

Approached from a slightly different perspective, Tamborini, Bowman, Eden, Grizzard, and Organ (2010) conceptualized media enjoyment through the lens of self-determination theory as the satisfaction of three intrinsic human needs: autonomy (a sense of control), competence (a sense of mastery), and relatedness (a sense of social connection). Furthermore, Tamborini et al. (2010) found that in the context of video game playing, the gratification of these three intrinsic needs explained 51% of the variance in predicting a user’s enjoyment. To date, these two entertainment appraisal theories have been tested and applied primarily in the context of classical entertainment media such as movies, television programs, and sometimes games (Reinecke et al., 2014).

In an attempt to broaden the understanding of enjoyment to the online and social media environment, Reinecke et al. (2014) proposed that online interactive media would elicit an entertainment experience through the consumption and production of online content as well as interacting with others. Furthermore, they argued that “these dimensions of online use provide opportunities for the satisfaction of social needs, perceived self-efficacy, positive self-presentation, and identity management that may foster the enjoyment of online use” (p. 421).

These entertainment appraisal frameworks provided intuitive guidance for our current investigation of social Q&A websites—a particular form of online media. More specifically, they provided a theoretical connection between social Q&A websites use and enjoyment, and also pointed out potential psychological factors (i.e., meaningfulness, intrinsic needs satisfaction, and self-presentation) that may help explain why social Q&A websites are a particular type of online media that can be enjoyable.

Enjoyment of Social Q&A Websites Use

Although there is no research that explicitly examined the relationship between social Q&A websites use and enjoyment, the connection has been implicitly addressed in the past literature. Specifically, for instance, Hanson and Haridakis (2008) found that when viewers watch specific types of videos on YouTube, the most important motive for viewing satire and other types of comedy is entertainment. Lim (2009) found that in addition to searching new information and learning something unfamiliar, an important motivation for participants of Wikipedia is having “exciting or playful experiences” (p. 2195). Moreover, Kim and Johnson (2012) demonstrated that entertainment is an important motivation for people to read blogs. These findings clarified that people might look for entertainment and relaxation by reading/viewing certain content in information seeking websites.

Theoretically, as discussed earlier, users of online media may perceive enjoyment by creating personal contents, presenting their social image, and building up social relationships with others by using online media (Trepte & Reinecke, 2010). These functionalities are embedded in most information seeking websites. Hence, the use of these web services is likely to be associated with enjoyment. For example, Schroer and Hertel (2009) found that the most important motivation for volunteers to create and edit contents on Wikipedia is “task enjoyment” (p. 122), which refers to the pleasure feeling that one perceives when producing content on Wikipedia. Similarly, Hanson and Haridakis (2008) found that interpersonal expression is the most important motivation for people to share videos on YouTube, and that users are likely to share their opinions with others and express themselves via video-sharing. This suggested that certain functionalities of information seeking websites are essentially enjoyable to use. Therefore, we hypothesized that

Hypothesis 1: Social Q&A websites use will be positively associated with users’ perceived enjoyment.

Meaningfulness

Recent developments in the area of media entertainment outlined meaningfulness as an important dimension of audience response to entertainment media (Oliver & Raney, 2011), and it has been empirically examined in the context of both traditional entertainment media use (i.e., films; Oliver & Bartsch, 2010) and interactive media use (i.e., video games; Oliver et al., 2015).

Previous studies have suggested that using social Q&A sites can gratify users’ needs of “truth-seeking” through the process of proposing and answering questions (Harper, Raban, Rafaeli, & Konstan, 2008; Raban & Harper, 2008; Shah et al., 2009). For instance, Choi, Kitzie, and Shah (2014) surveyed 75 users regarding their motivations, methods, and expectations relating to asking questions within Yahoo! Answers. Results indicated that the primary motivation for social Q&A website users asking questions was to fulfill cognitive needs—a particular need that is related to strengthening information, knowledge, and understanding. In terms of question answering, altruism (“I want to help my friends/colleagues”) and feeling good (“I enjoy being helpful”)—two factors that are often considered related to meaningfulness—were found to be prominent motivations (Yang et al., 2011). In short, there is enough evidence (at least practically) to connect the use of social Q&A sites and perceived meaningfulness.

Of course, just like playing fighting games and watching horror movies, reading and answering certain questions (e.g., “What’s the best joke you’ve ever heard?”) may not be considered an “up-lifting” experience that induces insights into the human condition. However, it does not cancel the positive experience brought by reading and answering questions that involves deep cognitive and affective reactions. Under that premise, we hypothesized that

Hypothesis 2: The relationship between the use of social Q&A websites and its perceived enjoyment is partially mediated through users’ perception of meaningfulness.

Social Presence

According to entertainment theories, intrinsic needs satisfaction of competency, relatedness, and autonomy also contribute to the entertainment reception (Tamborini et al., 2010). In the context of online entertainment, however, relatedness need satisfaction seems to be a relatively more important form of audience response than the needs satisfaction of competency and autonomy, because a considerable amount of literature links the use of online media and relatedness need satisfaction, whereas the relationship between online media use and the needs satisfaction of competency and autonomy are less obvious (see Reinecke et al., 2014, for a detailed discussion).

A concept that is similar to the relatedness need satisfaction is social presence. Social presence was originally defined as “the degree of salience of the other person in the interaction and the consequent salience of the interpersonal relationships” (Short, Williams, & Christie, 1976, p. 65). However, in the past few decades, many media scholars have also argued that social presence is not a media attribute but a psychological state (perception) wherein virtual social actors are perceived or simulated as authentic social actors (Biocca, 1997; K. M. Lee, 2004). In particular, Biocca, Harms, and Gregg (2001) defined mediated social presence as “the moment-by-moment awareness of the co-presence of another sentient being accompanied by a sense of engagement with the other” (p. 2). Built on this conceptualization, previous studies suggested that social presence can be perceived in both online computer-mediated communication and offline face-to-face communication (Cyr, Hassanein, Head, & Ivanov, 2007). In this study, we focused on users’ perceived social presence because it captured other dimensions, such as co-presence and emotional closeness in addition to relatedness (Bente, Rüggenberg, Krämer, & Eschenburg, 2008).

In terms of the relationship between social presence and enjoyment, past studies found that social presence is a precursor of enjoyment in the context of online gaming (Kallio, Mäyrä, & Kaipainen, 2011). More recently, Reinecke et al. (2014) found that relatedness need satisfaction positively associated with Facebook users’ perceived enjoyment. Based on the influence of online media use on social presence/relatedness, and the link between social presence and enjoyment, we therefore expect to find a significant indirect effect of social Q&A websites use on enjoyment that is mediated by social presence.

Hypothesis 3: The relationship between the use of social Q&A websites and the perceived enjoyment will be partially mediated through users’ perceived social presence.

Self-Presentation

As alluded earlier, another factor that potentially plays a role in the use of social Q&A websites is self-disclosure/self-presentation. Similar to the idea of impression management (Goffman, 1959), self-disclosure refers to the act in which individuals reveal personal information (sometimes strategically) to others (Derlega & Chaikin, 1977). In the context of social media use, previous studies have found that people often post positive and entertaining messages on their social network sites with the main goal of maintaining social relationships (Utz, 2011). Similarly, using social Q&A websites, particularly answering other people’s questions, can be understood as a way to tactically present objective information in an attempt to achieve positive self-presentation (Raban, 2009). This, in turn, might enhance one’s enjoyment of using online media (Reinecke et al., 2014). Along this logic, it is reasonable to predict that using social Q&A websites as a form of self-disclosure or self-presentation may enhance users’ entertainment experience. Note that the key to enhancing enjoyment is the perceived success of self-presentation and not the self-presentation per se. Because if a user sees that his/her social media usage is hurting his/her online image, the use of this particular media may not be perceived as enjoyable. Thus, we proposed that

Hypothesis 4: The relationship between the use of social Q&A websites and the perceived enjoyment is partially mediated through users’ perceived self-presentation success.

Method

Participants and Procedure

To test our hypotheses, an online survey was conducted via sojump.com, a Chinese online survey tool similar to Qualtrics. Due to the nature of the current project, we were only interested in the users of social Q&A websites. To avoid any potential influences from the diverse cultural background of social Q&A websites users, we recruited respondents from a panel of Zhihu.com users utilizing the paid service from the aforementioned survey company. Specifically, a survey request was sent to a pool of 3,482 Zhihu.com users hosted by sojump.com through e-mail or message. Users responded to the survey on the website and received credits that can be later redeemed for cash depending on the number of questions answered and the question difficulty. The survey link was valid for approximately 12 hours.

A total of 150 participants completed the survey, excluding 8 respondents who spent less than 5 minutes on the survey. Among the sample, 46% were female. The majority of participants were between the age of 18 and 25 years (35.3%), followed by those between 26 and 30 (30.0%), and finally between 31 and 40 (21.3%). In addition, our respondents’ education levels were unequally distributed (76.7% of respondents held a bachelor or college degree), which does not necessarily reflect a representative sample of the general social Q&A website population. However, the sample is still effective, as they do represent educated users who are likely to lead the trend of media use behaviors (Yang et al., 2011). Table 1 shows the sample characteristics by age, gender, and education.

Table 1.

Sample Characteristics (N = 150).

Sample profile	China
Age (years)
Less than 18	6.7%
18-25	35.3%
26-30	30.0%
31-40	21.3%
41-50	4.7%
51-60	2.0%
Gender
Male	43.3%
Female	46.0%
Not disclosed	10.7%
Education
Some high school	1.3%
High school graduate	6.7%
College/bachelor degree	76.6%
Master’s degree	14.7%
PhD degree	0.7%

Measures

Demographic characteristics of respondents included gender, education, and age. Individual’s education was measured by (1) junior high school degree, (2) high school or equivalent, (3) college degree or equivalent, (4) master’s degree, and (5) doctoral degree. Age was a categorical variable measured by (1) less than 18 years, (2) 18 to 25 years, (3) 26 to 30 years, (4) 31 to 40 years, and (5) 41 to 50 years.

Enjoyment was measured using four items adapted from Reinecke, Klatt, and Krämer (2011) (e.g., “I enjoy using social Q&A websites like Zhihu”; see appendix for specific items). These items were placed on a 7-point scale anchored by strongly disagree and strongly agree. The scale proved to be reliable (Cronbach’s α = .90; M = 5.80, SD = 0.91).

Social Q&A website use was assessed by four items asking, “When you visit social Q&A websites like Zhihu.com, how often do you engage in each of the following activities: (1) read questions/answer/comments other people posted, (2) post questions/answers/comments by yourself, (3) like/share/collect questions and answers, and (4) follow particular users, questions, or topics. Practically, these items encompassed the main activities in social Q&A websites. Theoretically, the measure captured both constructs of knowledge sharing: knowledge collection and knowledge donation (de Vries, van den Hoof, & de Ridder, 2006). All four items were rated on a 5-point scale anchored by never and all the time. Items were later combined and averaged for data analysis (Cronbach’s α = .72; M = 3.51, SD = 0.70).

Meaningfulness was measured by three items adapted from Oliver and Bartsch (2010) (e.g., “I found using social Q&A websites such as Zhihu.com to be very meaningful.”). The scale demonstrated adequate reliability (Cronbach’s α = .70; M = 5.80, SD = 0.92).

Social presence was measured by four items adapted from E. Lee (2013). Participants were asked to indicate their level of agreement with the following: “When I use social Q&A websites like Zhihu, I felt as if I were engaging in an actual conversation with other users,” “I felt like I was in the same room with other users,” and “I felt as if the other user was speaking directly to me.” These statements were asked on a Likert-type scale anchored by strongly disagree (1) to strongly agree (7). The scale indicated adequate reliability (Cronbach’s α = .86; M = 5.10, SD = 1.11).

Self-presentation success was measured based on the mean response to two 7-point scale items modified from Gibbs, Ellison, and Heino (2006), which included (1) “Social Q&A websites (e.g., Zhihu) allow me to present myself in a favorable way,” and (2) “I think I have made a good impression on others through the use of social Q&A websites (e.g., Zhihu.com).” Responses for both items were summed and averaged (M = 5.41, SD = 0.78). The reliability of the scale (r = .67) is similar to Gibbs et al.’s study (2006).

Results

Before testing our hypotheses, correlation tests were conducted among all variables. The results showed that all variables are significantly correlated (Table 2). In addition, t tests suggested that male and female users do not differ in terms of all interested variables.

Table 2.

Bivariate Correlations Among Variables.

	M (SE)	1	2	3	4	5
1. Social presence	5.10 (0.09)	1	.650**	.557**	.618**	.550**
2. Enjoyment	5.80 (0.07)	—	1	.735**	.640**	.530**
3. Meaningfulness	5.78 (0.06)	—	—	1	.505**	.416**
4. Self-presentation	5.41 (0.07)	—	—	—	1	.570**
5. Social Q&A sites use	3.51 (0.06)	—	—	—	—	1

Note. N = 150.

p < .001.

Based on our hypotheses, a multiple mediator model (e.g., Preacher, Rucker, & Hayes, 2007) was constructed using the SPSS INDRECT macro developed by Preacher and Hayes (2004). All regression weights are depicted in Figure 1.¹ As observed in Figure 1, social Q&A websites use had a significant effect on enjoyment (i.e., the total effect of social Q&A websites use on enjoyment). Therefore, Hypothesis 1 was supported. Furthermore, the direct effect (c′ = .13) between the social Q&A websites use and enjoyment was less than the total effect (c = .70); thus, there is at least a partial mediation effect (Baron & Kenny, 1986). However, Hayes (2009) noted that indirect effects should be quantified to detect the mediated effect. Using bootstrap estimation (1,000 samples) the analysis revealed a positive indirect effect of social Q&A websites use on enjoyment through social presence, meaningfulness, and perceived self-presentation success (0 was not within the 95% confidence intervals; see Table 3). Thus, Hypotheses 2, 3, and 4 were supported. Pairwise contrasts of the indirect effects revealed no significant difference between the indirect effect of meaningfulness and (1) self-presentation success (z = .09; BC 95% confidence interval [CI; −.089, .23]), (2) social presence (BC 95% CI [−.368,.070]), nor did the indirect effects between self-presentation success and social presence (BC 95% CI[−.290, .181]). In other words, all three mediators did not differ significantly from each other.

Figure 1.

Results of the multiple mediators model.

Table 3.

Indirect Effects of Social Q&A Websites Use on Enjoyment: Bootstrapping Mediation Analysis.

Mediators	Bootstrap estimates (SE)
Meaningfulness	.26 (.06)
Self-presentation	.17 (.06)
Social presence	.14 (.08)

Discussion

Drawing on the recent development of media entertainment research (Reinecke et al., 2014; Trepte & Reinecke, 2010), this study examined the relationship between social Q&A websites use and users’ perceived enjoyment with the goal of expanding the line of research on the enjoyment of new and interactive forms of media. Consistent with our predictions, the use of social Q&A websites was found to be associated with users’ enjoyment perception. This finding confirms that the use of interactive media is essentially enjoyable, which is an important factor that stimulates continuous online and social media usage. Moreover, since social Q&A websites are also information platforms where people can go and learn new knowledge, the result can be used to shed light on the growing area of entertainment-education (Moyer-Gusé, 2008).

Having established the link between social Q&A websites use and enjoyment, we shifted to examining the underlying psychological factors that may explain the entertainment reception of social Q&A websites. Three mediators—meaningfulness, social presence, and self-presentation success—were identified based on the past theoretical frameworks of media entertainment (Oliver & Raney, 2011; Reinecke et al., 2014; Tamborini et al., 2010). Our data analyses revealed the indirect effect of social Q&A websites use on enjoyment through meaningfulness, indicating that the higher the level of social Q&A websites use, the greater the perception of meaningfulness, and in turn, the greater the experience of enjoyment. Given that social Q&A websites mainly serve knowledge sharing and distribution, it makes sense that users’ need for truth-seeking would be gratify through the use of this type of media. In addition, as meaningfulness is conceptualized as gratifications related contemplations regarding life purposes, questions of virtue/moral concerns, and the human condition (Oliver & Bartsch, 2010), it was expected that meaningfulness to be associated with enjoyment in our research context. However, it should be noted that meaningfulness (appreciation) and enjoyment are not always correlated (e.g., viewing a fun but somewhat shallow film; Oliver & Bartsch, 2011). In that sense, one might argue that using social Q&A websites will not always be enjoyable and meaningful. Indeed, not all information on social Q&A websites is serious information (i.e., information that is based on facts and logical reasoning). Questions such as “What is the funniest joke you’ve ever heard or read?” are arguably funnier/easier to read and respond to than a question like “What are the benefits and disadvantages of each CS programming language?” Therefore, what types of content users are reading/responding to while using social Q&A websites should be considered in future studies. Nevertheless, we contend that the association between meaningfulness and enjoyment uncovered in our study is reasonable considering that most social Q&A website users are mainly motived by learning and seeking information, and we were interested in the general perception of social Q&A website use.

Our results also revealed the indirect effect of social Q&A website use on enjoyment through successful self-presentation. Such a finding is consistent with Reinecke et al.’s (2014) argument that positive self-disclosure and impression management are unique to the enjoyment of online and social media compared with the enjoyment of traditional entertainment media. Moreover, as we discussed in the theoretical frameworks, three dimensions of social/online media use may elicit an entertainment experience: the consumption of content, its participation, and its production (Reinecke et al., 2014). In the context of social Q&A website use, these dimensions are reflected in our measure as reading others’ posts, responding to others’ questions, sharing/liking others’ posts, and following particular users. Further correlation analyses indicated that all these dimensions are significantly correlated with the enjoyment of social Q&A websites (r_reading = .61; r_responding = .42; r_sharing = .34; r_following = .33). Since self-presentation plays such an important role in the enjoyment of online and social media, future studies should explore what and how specific factors contribute to self-presentation success in the use of online interactive media, particularly for social Q&A websites.

Social presence was found to be another mediator between the effects of social Q&A website use on enjoyment. That is, as the frequency of social Q&A website use increases, users’ perception of social presence increases too, which fosters an appraisal of enjoyment. Additionally, as social presence has been identified as a key variable in the e-learning environment that affects learning outcomes (Kim, Kwon, & Cho, 2011), we argue that social Q&A websites can be used as an effective e-learning tool for the new generation.

Several limitations of the study deserve to be addressed. First, this survey research is administered among users of a major Chinese social Q&A website, namely Zhihu.com. Thus, certain cultural factors may limit the generalizability of the results to the Western population. Particularly, for instance, Kim, Seo, Yu, and Neuendorf (2014) found that Korean and American college students have different preferences on entertainment messages. In that sense, we believe that there is a need to replicate this result in a Western setting. Similarly, there is a need to incorporate users of other social Q&A websites to overcome the potential effect of platform differences. Finally, the current study only examined a limited number of mediators; other variables may help explain the enjoyment of social Q&A websites use as well. For instance, previous studies have demonstrated strong connections between the satisfaction of intrinsic needs and the enjoyment of both Facebook (Reinecke et al., 2014) and video games (Tamborini et al., 2010). Future studies may also consider examining the potential mediating effects of intrinsic needs in the enjoyment of social Q&A website use.

Despite the limitations, the present study provides theoretically plausible and conceptually sound insights into the entertainment aspect of social Q&A website use. Data analyses based on a cross-sectional survey on users of a major social Q&A website demonstrated that meaningfulness, self-presentation success, and social presence mediated the relationship between social Q&A websites use and enjoyment. Overall, the present study offers a better understanding of the use of social Q&A websites, and we hope that the current research adds to the growing efforts in broadening the scope of media entertainment literature.

Footnotes

Appendix

Selected Survey Items.

Variable	Item
Enjoyment	Using Zhihu.com is fun.
	I like using Zhihu.com.
	Using Zhihu.com is enjoyable.
	I enjoyed using Zhihu.com.
Social Presence	I felt as if I were engaging in an actual conversation with other users.
	I felt like I was in the same room with other users.
	I feel as if other users were speaking directly to me.
Meaningfulness	I found social Q&A websites (e.g., Zhihu.com) to be very meaningful.
	I was moved by some contents on Zhihu.com.
	Using Zhihu.com was thought provoking.
Self-presentation	Using Zhihu.com allow me to present myself in a favorable way.
	I think I have made a good impression on others through Zhihu.com.
	I enjoyed using Zhihu.com.
Social Q&A websites use	When you visit Zhihu.com, how often do you engage in each of the following activities:
	Read questions/answer/comments other people posted.
	Write questions/answers/comments by yourself.
	Share/collect/like questions or answers.
	Click “pay attention” to specific questions/users.

Note. Items for each variable were added and averaged for data analyses. All items were translated (following the procedure of back-translation) into Chinese in the online questionnaire.

Declaration of Conflicting Interests

The author(s) declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.

Funding

The author(s) received no financial support for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.

Notes

Author Biographies

Qihao Ji (PhD, Florida State University) is a postdoctoral research fellow at the School of Communication, Florida State University. His main research interests are media effects and media psychology.

Di Cui (MA, Florida State University) is a doctoral candidate of communication at the Florida State University.

References

Baron

R. M.

Kenny

D. A.

(1986). The moderator-mediator variable distinction in social psychological research: Conceptual, strategic, and statistical considerations. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 51, 1173-1182.

Bente

Rüggenberg

Krämer

N. C.

Eschenburg

(2008). Avatar-mediated networking: Increasing social presence and interpersonal trust in net-based collaborations. Human Communication Research, 34, 287-318.

Biocca

(1997). The Cyborg’s dilemma: Progressive embodiment in virtual environments. Journal of Computer-Mediated Communication, 3(2).

Biocca

Harms

Gregg

J. L.

(2001). The networked minds measure of social presence: Pilot test of the factor structure and concurrent validity. Paper presented at the proceedings of the Fourth Annual International Presence Workshop, Philadelphia, PA.

Choi

Kitzie

Shah

(2014). Investigating motivations and expectations of asking a question in social Q&A. First Monday, 19(3). doi:10.5210/fm.v19i3.4830

Cyr

Hassanein

Head

Ivanov

(2007). The role of social presence in establishing loyalty in e-service environments. Interacting With Computers, 19(1), 43-56.

Derlega

V. J.

Chaikin

A. L.

(1977). Privacy and self-disclosure in social relationships. Journal of Social Issues, 22(2), 102-115.

de Vries

R. E.

van den Hoof

de Ridder

J. A.

(2006). Explaining knowledge sharing the role of team communication styles, job satisfaction, and performance beliefs. Communication Research, 33, 115-135.

Gazan

(2011). Social Q&A. Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology, 62, 2301-2312.

10.

Gibbs

J. L.

Ellison

N. B.

Heino

R. D.

(2006). Self-presentation in online personals the role of anticipated future interaction, self-disclosure, and perceived success in Internet dating. Communication Research, 33, 152-177.

11.

Goffman

(1959). The presentation of self in everyday life. New York, NY: Penguin Books.

12.

Hanson

Haridakis

(2008). YouTube users watching and sharing the news: A uses and gratifications approach. Journal of Electronic Publishing, 11(3). doi:10.3998/3336451.0011.305

13.

Harper

F. M.

Raban

Rafaeli

Konstan

J. A.

(2008). Predictors of answer quality in online Q&A sites. In Proceedings of the SIGCHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems (pp. 865-874). New York, NY: ACM Press. doi:10.1145/1357054.1357191

14.

Hayes

A. F.

(2009). Beyond Baron and Kenny: Statistical mediation analysis in the new millennium. Communication Monographs, 76(4), 408-420.

15.

Jin

Zhong

Zhai

(2015). Why users contribute knowledge to online communities: An empirical study of an online social Q&A community. Information and Management, 52, 840-849.

16.

Kallio

Mäyrä

Kaipainen

(2011). At least nine ways to play: Approaching gamer mentalities. Games and Culture, 6, 327-353.

17.

Kim

Johnson

T. J.

(2012). Political blog readers: Predictors of motivations for accessing political blogs. Telematics and Informatics, 29(1), 99-109.

18.

Kim

Kwon

Cho

(2011). Investigating factors that influence social presence and learning outcomes in distance higher education. Computers & Education, 57, 1512-1520.

19.

Kim

Seo

Neuendorf

(2014). Cultural differences in preference for entertainment messages that induce mixed responses of joy and sorrow. Human Communication Research, 40, 530-552.

20.

Lee

(2013). Effectiveness of politicians’ soft campaign on Twitter versus TV: Cognitive and experiential routes. Journal of Communication, 63, 953-974.

21.

Lee

K. M.

(2004). Presence, explicated. Communication Theory, 14(1), 27-50. doi:10.1093/ct/14.1.27

22.

Lim

(2009). How and why do college students use Wikipedia? Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology, 60, 2189-2202. doi:10.1002/asi.21142

23.

Macmillan

(2014). With $80 million in new capital, Quora still has no business model. Retrieved from http://blogs.wsj.com/digits/2014/04/09/with-80-million-in-new-capital-quora-still-has-no-business-model/

24.

Manago

A. M.

Taylor

Greenfield

P. M.

(2012). Me and my 400 friends: The anatomy of college students’ Facebook networks, their communication patterns, and well-being. Developmental Psychology, 48, 369-380. doi:10.1037/a0026338

25.

Morris

M. R.

Teevan

Panovich

(2010, April). What do people ask their social networks, and why? A survey study of status message Q&A behavior. In Proceedings of the SIGCHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems (pp. 1739-1748). New York, NY: ACM Press. doi:10.1145/1753326.1753587

26.

Moyer-Gusé

(2008). Toward a theory of entertainment persuasion: Explaining the persuasive effects of entertainment-education messages. Communication Theory, 18, 407-425.

27.

Oliver

M. B.

Bartsch

(2010). Appreciation as audience response: Exploring entertainment gratifications beyond hedonism. Human Communication Research, 36(1), 53-81. doi:10.1111/j.1468-2958.2009.01368.x

28.

Oliver

M. B.

Bartsch

(2011). Appreciation of entertainment: The importance of meaningfulness via virtue and wisdom. Journal of Media Psychology, 23(1), 29-33.

29.

Oliver

M. B.

Bowman

N. D.

Woolley

J. K.

Rogers

Sherrick

B. I.

Chung

M.-Y.

(2015). Video games as meaningful entertainment experiences. Psychology of Popular Media Culture. Advance online publication. doi: dx.doi.org/10.1037/ppm0000066

30.

Oliver

M. B.

Raney

A. A.

(2011). Entertainment as pleasurable and meaningful: Identifying hedonic and eudaimonic motivations for entertainment consumption. Journal of Communication, 61, 984-1004. doi:10.1111/j.1460-2466.2011.01585.x

31.

Preacher

K. J.

Hayes

A. F.

(2004). SPSS and SAS procedures for estimating indirect effects in simple mediation models. Behavior Research Methods, Instruments, & Computers, 36, 717-731.

32.

Preacher

K. J.

Rucker

D. D.

Hayes

A. F.

(2007). Addressing moderated mediation hypotheses: Theory, methods, and prescriptions. Multivariate Behavioral Research, 42, 185-227.

33.

Raban

D. R.

(2007). User-centered evaluation of information: A research challenge. Internet Research, 17, 306-322.

34.

Raban

D. R.

(2009). Self-presentation and the value of information in Q&A websites. Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology, 60, 2465-2473.

35.

Raban

D. R.

Harper

F. M.

(2008). Motivations for answering questions online. New Media and Innovative Technologies. Retrieved from http://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/viewdoc/download?doi=10.1.1.119.1962&rep=rep1&type=pdf

36.

Raney

(2003). Disposition-based theories of enjoyment. In Bryant

Roskos-Ewoldsen

Cantor

Zillmann

(Eds.), LEA’s communication series. Communication and emotion. Essays in honor of Dolf Zillmann (pp. 61-84). Mahwah, NJ: Erlbaum.

37.

Raney

A. A.

(2005). Punishing media criminals and moral judgment: The impact on enjoyment. Media Psychology, 7(2), 145-163.

38.

Reinecke

Klatt

Krämer

N. C.

(2011). Entertaining media use and the satisfaction of recovery needs: Recovery outcomes associated with the use of interactive and noninteractive entertaining media. Media Psychology, 14, 192-215. doi:10.1080/15213269.2011.573466

39.

Reinecke

Vorderer

Knop

(2014). Entertainment 2.0? The role of intrinsic and extrinsic need satisfaction for the enjoyment of Facebook use. Journal of Communication, 64, 417-438. doi:10.1111/jcom.12099

40.

Schroer

Hertel

(2009). Voluntary engagement in an open web-based encyclopedia: Wikipedians and why they do it. Media Psychology, 12(1), 96-120.

41.

Shah

J. S.

(2008). Exploring characteristics and effects of user participation in online social Q&A sites. First Monday, 13(9). doi:10.5210/fm.v13i9.2182

42.

Shah

J. S.

(2009). Research agenda for social Q&A. Library & Information Science Research, 31, 205-209. doi:10.1016/j.lisr.2009.07.006

43.

Short

Williams

Christie

(1976). The social psychology of telecommunications. London, England: Wiley.

44.

Tamborini

Bowman

N. D.

Eden

Grizzard

Organ

(2010). Defining media enjoyment as the satisfaction of intrinsic needs. Journal of Communication, 60, 758-777. doi:10.1111/j.1460-2466.2010.01513.x

45.

Trepte

Reinecke

(2010). Unterhaltung online: Motive, Erleben, Efekte [Entertainment online: Motives, experiences, effects]. In Schweiger

Beck

(Eds.), Handbuch Onlinekommunikation [Manual online communication] (pp. 211-233). Wiesbaden, Germany: VS Verlag.

46.

Utz

(2011). Social network site use among Dutch students: Effects of time and platform. In Comunello

(Ed.), Networked sociability and individualism: Technology for personal and professional relationships (pp. 103-125). Hershey, PA: IGI Global.

47.

Vorderer

Bryant

(2006). Playing video games: Motives, responses, andconsequences. Mahwah, NJ: Erlbaum.

48.

Yang

Morris

M. R.

Teevan

Adamic

L. A.

Ackerman

M. S.

(2011). Culture matters: A survey study of social Q&A behavior. ICWSM, 11, 409-416.

49.

Zhou

(2015, March). With 17 million users, Zhihu attempts commercialization [in Chinese]. Retrieved from http://www.donews.com/net/201503/2885050.shtm

50.

Zillmann

(2000). Mood management in the context of selective exposure theory. In Roloff

M. E.

(Ed.), Communication Yearbook 23 (pp. 103-123). Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage.

51.

Zillmann

Vorderer

(2000). Media entertainment: The psychology of its appeal. New York, NY: Routledge.