Benign Envy , Social Media , and Culture Completed Research Paper

Researchers have very limited understanding of how continuous usage intention of social media (SM) are associated with online benign envy and individual-level culture. This paper addresses this gap and provides a theoretical framework to illustrate how manifestations of national cultural values at the individual level of analysis may influence SM use behaviors through online envy. We argue that espoused individualism/collectivism and espoused uncertainty avoidance are important antecedents for eliciting benign envy, while the espoused power distance and espoused masculinity/femininity dimensions are salient moderators for the consequences resulting from online benign envy. Empirical results from a sample of 387 SM users supported the majority of the hypotheses, suggesting that espoused national culture interplaying with online benign envy are important factors for continuance use intention of SM. Finally, theoretical contributions and practical implications are provided.