Microsoft Word 2007 ichrie conference Proceedings Final-Final 06-06-07. doc

 
2007 Annual International CHRIE Conference & Exposition 
345
EXAMINING THE DETERMINANTS OF KNOWLEDGE SHARING IN TOURISM ONLINE 
COMMUNITIES OF PRACTICE 
Pradeep Racherla 
School of Tourism & Hospitality Management 
Temple University 
USA 
and 
Clark Hu 
School of Tourism & Hospitality Management 
Temple University 
USA 
 
ABSTRACT 
Knowledge sharing and online communities of practice have received increasing attention in the tourism 
discipline. From the organizational perspective, this unique study focused on the online professional communities 
and drew upon theories of social capital and cognitive learning to explore the determinants of tourism practitioners’ 
intention to actively participate and share knowledge in such online environment. The authors proposed a research 
model and empirically tested its hypotheses through structural equation modeling. The results indicated that tourism 
professionals’ ability to identify with the common work practices in an online community and the propensity to 
share knowledge were strong predictors of knowledge sharing intention. The discussion and conclusion substantiate 
the applicability and contribution of the study to the tourism domain.
Key Words
: Community of Practice (CoP); Knowledge Management; Knowledge Sharing; Online Communities; 
Social Capital