Steven Johnson
\nAssistant Professor, MIS
\nFox School of Business, Temple University<\/p>\n
November 30, 2012
\nSpeakman Hall 200, 1000am \u2013 1100am
\nSeminar Title :\u00a0The strength of words online: Emergent leadership in online communities<\/p>\n
\u00a0Abstract Please email swattal@temple.edu for a copy of the paper<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Steven Johnson Assistant Professor, MIS Fox School of Business, Temple University November 30, 2012 Speakman Hall 200, 1000am \u2013 1100am Seminar Title :\u00a0The strength of words online: Emergent leadership in online communities \u00a0Abstract Compared to traditional organizations, online communities lack formal power or leadership positions.\u00a0Instead, leadership in online communities is an emergent process resulting from […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":7,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[384467,401,142403,384469,384466,402,2685,68673],"class_list":["post-585","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","category-uncategorized","tag-computer-mediated-communication","tag-knowledge-management","tag-leadership","tag-natural-language-processing","tag-network-analysis","tag-online-communities","tag-steven-johnson","tag-temple-univ","entry"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/community.mis.temple.edu\/seminars\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/585","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/community.mis.temple.edu\/seminars\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/community.mis.temple.edu\/seminars\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/community.mis.temple.edu\/seminars\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/7"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/community.mis.temple.edu\/seminars\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=585"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/community.mis.temple.edu\/seminars\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/585\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":599,"href":"https:\/\/community.mis.temple.edu\/seminars\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/585\/revisions\/599"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/community.mis.temple.edu\/seminars\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=585"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/community.mis.temple.edu\/seminars\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=585"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/community.mis.temple.edu\/seminars\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=585"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
\n<\/strong>Compared to traditional organizations, online communities lack formal power or leadership positions.\u00a0Instead, leadership in online communities is an emergent process resulting from influencing others. The\u00a0objective of this paper is to investigate how network structure and language usage lead to influence in\u00a0online communities. Communication online occurs almost exclusively through written words. The study\u00a0of online influence has been dominated by a focus on structural network position with surprisingly little\u00a0research addressing how the comparative use of language shapes community dynamics. Using participant\u00a0surveys to identify influential members, this study analyzes a year of network history and message\u00a0content to identify if leader utterances have unique qualities compared to the utterances of other core\u00a0community members. Analysis supports the conclusion that online leadership derives from more than\u00a0network position; it is also associated with distinctive written communication patterns. The composite\u00a0view of emergent leaders in online communities is: they are in a central, core position in a network; they\u00a0concentrate participation in fewer message threads than others; and, they provide a large number of\u00a0positive, concise posts that include an above average number of external links and use simple language\u00a0familiar to other participants. Online community leaders emerge through both the context and content of\u00a0online communication.<\/p>\n