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In high collectivist cultures, people might be more willing to share information because it is good for the
community. On the other hand, high individualistic cultures, people might be more willing to share
information if they perceive an individual benefit to it. However, the willingness to share information
might depend on the type of information disclosed. Positive information - information that might
enhance the position of the person sharing it- will most likely be shared. In fact, past research has
demonstrated there is a bias to share positive information (Chow et al., 1999; Levinthal & March, 1993).
However, sharing negative information benefits the organization because it helps employees to learn
from the experience of others and to avoid repeating mistakes (Chow et al., 1999; Levinthal & March,
1993). Despite the benefits for the organization, employees are not likely to share negative information.
Disclosing information reflecting a negative aspect of the informant might be beneficial for the
organization but not for the employee disclosing it. The individualism/collectivism dimension predicts
that the interest of the group prevails over the interest of the individual. We argue this would be the
case only for positive information. That is, for positive information, members of collectivist cultures will
be more likely to share information than members of individualistic culture. Since both societies are
collectivist we anticipate high levels of information sharing. However, negative information can impose
a threshold of knowledge sharing regardless of the culture. That is to say, even for collectivist cultures,
members might not share their information if the information represents a threat to their well-being. If
this behavior is observed, it implies that the degree to which the interest of the group prevails over the
interest of the person has a limit in collectivist cultures. Based on the type of information to be
disclosed, hypothesis 1 is stated as follows.
H1 Participants will be more likely to share positive information than negative information
KMS, as opposed to face-to-face interaction, make anonymous information exchanges possible. The
effect of anonymity on knowledge sharing can be twofold. On one hand, anonymity can decrease
evaluation apprehension, which is a deterrent for sharing knowledge (Vera-Muñoz et al., 2006).
However, anonymity can also deter knowledge sharing for people seeking to increase their personal
reputation. Because of the twofold effects of anonymity, the following two hypotheses are stated.
H2 Participants will be more likely to share information if postings are anonymous when the type of
information to be disclosed is negative
H3 Participants will be less likely to share information if postings are anonymous when the type of
information to be disclosed is positive
Past research has demonstrate the positive effect of rewards on information sharing (Bonner, Hastie,
Sprinkle, & Young, 2000). In fact, some companies implement reward systems to promote information
sharing in KMS (Wasko & Faraj, 2005). Rewards might lure people to share information because some
people are primarily concerned with their own benefits (individualistic cultures) and would not willingly
share information if they do not see a personal gain in it (Chow et al., 2000; Chow et al., 1999). Again,
while we get no clues from individualistic cultures at this stage we do expect the obtainment of a cash
Convention