Determinants of knowledge sharing behavior

Abstract

In the new global knowledge has become a central issue for organization’s survival. Recently, in knowledge management (KM)-related research effective knowledge sharing (KS) is considered as a significant component of KM success. The importance of knowledge sharing in knowledge management can be interpreted as a blood circulating in the body. There has been a dramatically interest in examining the factors that encourage or hamper individual’s knowledge sharing behavior in social network. Some theories such as Social Exchange Theory (SET), Theory of Reasoned Action (TRA), Theory of Planned Behavior (TBP), and Technology Acceptance Model (TAM) are vastly used to understand human behavior and are also considered as a critical base to understand individual’s knowledge sharing behavior. For the present research, the authors intend to review the previous researches that explored different factors effect on knowledge sharing behavior. So, the purpose of this paper is to review recent research in KS determinants to find out the most important factors which influence KS behavior. This will help us to understand how various examined factors influence knowledge sharing behavior and how different perspectives could correctly formulate the knowledge sharing behavior. The paper first gives a brief overview of the recent history of KS, and some social-psychological models, which have been applied for determining the KS behavior and finally gives suggestions for future scholars who are interested to study more efficient in this area.