Antecedents and consequences of lurking intention in organisations: the moderating role of social-related public social media use

Although many enterprises vigorously promote online information sharing, most employees lurk. Previous research has focused on lurking behaviour in nonwork contexts; however, our understanding of workplace lurking behaviour, particularly its potential consequences, remains limited. We integrate the stressor–strain–outcome (SSO) framework with the job demands–resources (JD-R) model to investigate the antecedents and consequences of lurking intention and examine the moderating role of social-related public social media (PSM) use. We conduct a web-based survey to collect data from 295 employees who use PSM in work contexts over two waves of data collection. The findings reveal that both role conflict and role overload positively predict lurking intention, which in turn negatively affects employee creativity. Lurking intention mediates the relationship between role stress and employee creativity. Moreover, social-related PSM use positively moderates the relationship between role conflict and lurking intention but negatively moderates the relationship between role overload and lurking intention. Furthermore, this factor also moderates the indirect impact of role overload on employee creativity via lurking intention. This study can improve our understanding of the antecedents and consequences of workplace lurking intention, thereby providing valuable insights that organisations can use to promote employee engagement and enhance employee creativity.