Deciphering the role of social networking affordances in enhancing members' attachment from a configurational perspective: A preliminary content analysis

Social Networking Sites (SNSs) have become increasingly important for individuals to connect with others, obtain and share information, and entertain themselves. Due to intense competition in the social networking market, SNSs are imperative in increasing their appeal and bolstering member attachment to sustain their growth. Embracing a configurational view, this research-in-progress attempts to discover how SNSs can be designed to enhance members' bond- and identity-based attachments. Thirty-one technological features were elicited from fifteen predominant SNSs and categorized into two distinct types of affordances (social and content affordances) though content analysis. These features cover ten aspects of member behavior: profile building, social connectivity, social interactivity, social comparison, social privacy control, content creation, content discovery, content sharing, content aggregation and content privacy control. The next step for this study is to identify core configurations of social networking affordances that enhance member's attachment to social networking platforms by conducting an online survey questionnaire.