The role of motivational theories in the success of crowdsourcing engagement models: a review

Abstract

A plethora of research has been conducted on motivational theories in various fields including medical sciences, business and management, physiology, and sociology, especially in the natural sciences field. Motivational theories are considered a key to motivating the crowd over the internet to participate in the assigned tasks over online platforms commonly known as online crowdsourcing. However, research regarding the review of the theories discussed is scarce. Therefore, this literature review focuses to identify the motivational theories in literature over the last decade and mapping these theories onto the engagement models of crowdsourcing. Based on a review of 91 papers from the natural science domain, we identified 36 motivational theories and mapped the identified theories over crowdsourcing models of engagement. The analysis of the study identified the popular theories among the researchers as well as the new and nascent theories practiced in Crowdsourcing, from 2010 to 2021. Similarly, the mapping helped to identify the nature of the contribution and the theories' importance. The literature review help to understand the recent trends to motivate participants using motivational theories and help identify trends and possibilities for future research.