The impact of the number of participants and platform transparency on prosumers’ creative performance

Abstract

Purpose Prosumers’ creative performance in a co-creation activity is greatly affected by the disclosure of activity information. Extant research has separately examined the impact of participant numbers and the impact of platform transparency, but there is a lack of research on the interaction between the two. However, testing the joint effect of the two sources of information can provide a more comprehensive understanding of individuals’ co-creation behaviour. This paper aims to fill the gap and further reveal the psychological mechanism behind the behaviour. Design/methodology/approach Three experimental studies were conducted to test the hypotheses. Findings The results show that a large number of participants will stimulate and inhibit creative performances on untransparent and transparent co-creation platforms, respectively. Moreover, this study found that the effect of the number of participants on creative performance is mediated by arousal on untransparent platforms and by the constraint on idea expression on transparent platforms. Research limitations/implications This study advances knowledge of how the number of participants in an activity and platform transparency jointly influence prosumers’ creative performance and the corresponding mechanism. However, the main limitation of the study is that the findings are from scenario-based experiments. Practical implications This study provides a more comprehensive understanding of prosumers’ creative performance under the influence of the number of activity participants and platform transparency. The findings can help co-creation sponsoring companies and co-creation platforms improve activity performance by designing better information disclosure strategies, thereby enhancing platform value. Originality/value The findings enrich the literature on platform ecosystem and co-creation by integrating previously separate knowledge on the effects of participant numbers and platform transparency. In addition, the findings deepen the overall understanding of prosumers’ behaviour.