Knowledge Sharing in Virtual Communities:
A systematic literature review
Abstract—Humans are not spared from social life.
Virtual community is one effective place for humans to
communicate with each other in informal languages.
Members of virtual communities can get benefit from
knowledge sharing. If there is no knowledge sharing in
virtual communities, then the community will die and the
members will be left behind. This study discusses what
factors influence the success of knowledge sharing in the
virtual community, benefits for members and challenges
faced by the virtual community. This study used the
PRISMA method for the literature review. Paper sources
were obtained from search results to IEEE, ScienceDirect
and Emerald Insight databases. The results obtained 19
factors that affect knowledge sharing in virtual
communities, 8 benefits for members and 4 challenges that
need to be faced. In conclusion the most widely mentioned
factor is member behavior, where member behavior greatly
influences knowledge sharing in virtual communities.
Factors found in number 19 were grouped into 3, namely
the technology group, personal factor group and social
factor group. The most mentioned benefit is the acquisition
of new knowledge for members. The challenges that need to
be faced are the availability of knowledge, the participation,
the fact that members have different backgrounds and
requires time for technical studies.
Keywords— virtual communities, knowledge sharing,
factor, benefit, challenges, PRISMA
I. INTRODUCTION
Humans cannot live alone, need a community to survive
[11]. Community means a group of people who share social
interactions, social ties, and shared 'space'. It provides support
for socialization, information, and ownership [15]. ICT is a very
useful tool for gaining access to a lot of information and
socializing with the community. With web 2.0 support, the
internet is explored rather than just taking information. Web 2.0
supports socialization, interacting, exchanging information,
collaborating, and sharing knowledge and ideas online. One
form of social network from web 2.0 is a social networking site
that is now used regularly by millions of people, and it seems
that social networking will be an enduring part of everyday life
[14].
Virtual interactions that are activated by computers can lead
to the formation of new communities and online identity
expressions, namely virtual communities. The internet is also
used to build, join, and participate in virtual communities [14].
Virtual community forms are based on web 2.0 technology. This
is because the purpose of virtual communities is to increase
knowledge exchange between community members and
increase reciprocal social interaction. This can be beneficial for
each member when they apply it [13]. This causes interactions
made through cyberspace to be more efficient than having to
come face to face and no need to worry about geographical
boundaries anymore [14]. Social networks like Facebook,
Twitter and LinkedIn, etc. is a form of virtual community and
has gained tremendous popularity [13]. sMembers of the virtual
community in communicating need to pay attention to the
language written, besides that members also recreate their
identity to create the impression they expected. [7].
Interactions in a community can occur both online and
offline. Offline meetings mean that community members meet
face to face as they do in seminars and meetings. The benefit of
face-to-face interaction is to build stronger bonds between
community members, so that virtual communities are expected
to meet offline. [13]
A vital factor for survival and success of virtual communities
is knowledge. The essential attribute of knowledge based on
traditional epistemology arguments is "truthfulness", but for
now it is also necessary to consider the attributes of "belief" and
"justification" of knowledge [5000]. Ini Cuma 1 kalimat dan
sumber sebelumnya lupa.
1. Tampilkan data jumlah komunitas virtual di sns
One of the ways to build knowledge is through the internet.
The internet is an easy tool to use. The internet can be used to
find information. The internet can also facilitate sharing their
personal experiences so that they can become knowledge for
others. That way, the internet encourages users to become
sources of information, not to depend on others [12]. Virtual
community when compared to traditional systems is a media that
shares knowledge that is feasible, cheap and fast [18]. The
success of members in gaining knowledge from virtual
communities depends on the voluntary involvement of their
members to share their knowledge and experience [10]. The
opinions of individuals who truly contribute to the online
community have increased knowledge sharing. Members can
also share real knowledge, backup or even divert facts, and even
post incomplete or inaccurate information [8].
Many have examined the motivation of knowledge
contributions in virtual communities. This study summarizes
several studies on knowledge and virtual communities through
the literature review study. The research question of this
research is what factors influence the success of knowledge
sharing in virtual communities, the benefits of being a member
of virtual communities and challenges that exist in virtual
communities.
 II. THEORY
A. Knowledge sharing
A person's ability, a person's state of mind or access to
information is a way of measuring knowledge. Knowledge is
something that is not used up after being shared and can be
enjoyed by others. There are four types of knowledge
conversion namely socialization, externalization, combination
and internalization. The four types of knowledge conversion are
illustrated in Fig. 1. Knowledge sharing means the spread or
transfer of knowledge which is conducted by individuals or
groups. Parties involved in knowledge sharing are "knowledge
owner" and "knowledge receiver". One form of knowledge
sharing is exchanging knowledge between the two parties
which is a form of reciprocal behavior. Sharing knowledge is
one of the productive activities that is voluntary. The driving
factors for voluntary knowledge sharing can be grouped into
internal and external factors. Both of these factors appear
simultaneously. [3]
Fig. 1. Types of Knowledge Conversion
B. Virtual Community
Jiang [8] defines virtual communities as a meeting of rational
community users, interacting with virtual space, and sharing
among users. Virtual communities consist of people, sharing
intentions, policies, and computer systems [8]. According to
Tang [15], virtual communities are a union between individuals
or organizations to share values, goals, goals or interests, make
transactions or produce fantasies through electronic media. The
main feature of virtual communities is gaining knowledge
through gathering information and user interactions [8]. When
people join together in shared companies sharing the same
expertise, they lead to a new form of organization known as the
community of practice (CoP) [17].
III. METHOD
3.1 PRISMA
A systematic literature review (SLR) is a means of
identifying, evaluating and interpreting all available research
relevant to a particular research question, or topic area, or
phenomenon of interest (Kitchenham, 2004). This study uses
the SLR PRISMA method (Transparent Reporting of
Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyzes). Prisma consists of 4
stages, namely identification, Screening, Eligibility and
Included.
3.2 Research Question
This systematic literature review guided with PRISMA is
used to answer the following question:
1. What factors influence the success of knowledge sharing
in virtual communities?
2. What are the benefits of members of virtual
communities?
3. What are the challenges that exist in virtual
communities?
3.3 Inclusion and Exclusion Criteria
To make sure that only relevant researches are included in
literature review, inclusion and exclution criteria must be
settled. Those criteria can be seen on table 1.
TABLE I. INCLUSION AND EXCLUSION CRITERIA
Inclusion Criteria:
 Articles that can answer the research question
 Articles are in English
 Articles that published from 2010 to 2019
Exclusion Criteria:
 Article is not a journal paper or conference
 Article that is not related to this research
 Articles in the form of SLRs
3.4 Article Selection Process
Online databases searching which are Science Direct,
Emerald, and IEEE Xplore were used to find relevant article.
Search is done using the keyword "Knowledge social network
virtual community". The search results with these keywords
were obtained 67 papers. After reading the abstract, there were
40 papers selected to enter the stage of reading the paper in its
entirety. There are 19 articles read full-text carefully and
organized the relevance item into Microsoft Excel spreadsheets.
The extracted items are titles, authors, domains, factors that
influence the success of virtual communities, benefits and
challenges. Article selection stage can be seen in Fig.2

Fig. 2. Article Selection Stage
IV. RESULT AND SYNTHESIS
4.1 Study Characteristics Result
This section explains the characteristics of this systematic
literature review. The majority of studies were obtained from
the journal Computers in Human Behavior. Other studies are
obtained from different journals and conferences. The majority
of publication years are 2011, followed by the 2010 study.
Characteristic results are shown in Table II.
4.2 Factors Influence the Success of Knowledge Sharing in
Virtual Communities
This section explains the list of factors that influence
knowledge sharing in virtual communities. From the literature
review 19 previous studies found 19 factors. The most widely
mentioned factor is the member behavior called by 6 studies.
The second most common factor is called the benefits for
members which are referred to by 4 previous studies. Followed
by the factors of network ties, motivation and language. The
factors that influence the success of knowledge sharing in the
virtual community are in Table III.

TABLE II. CHARACTERISTICS OF EACH STUDY TABLE III. FACTORS INFLUENCE KNOWLEDGE SHARING IN VIRTUAL
COMMUNITIES
Distribution Amount % No Factors Source
Applied Research in Higher 1 Member behavior [2], [3], [4], [5],
Education 1 5,56 [12], [13], [16]
Computers & Education 1 5,56 2 Desain web [2], [18]
Computers in Human 3 Network ties [4], [5], [9], [14]
Behavior 3 16,67 4 Security [12], [14]
5 Motivation [4], [5], [12], [16]
Decision Support Systems 1 5,56 6 Environment of a member [12]
Information and Software residence (urban or rural)
Technology 1 5,56 7 Member background (age, job) [12]
Information Sciences 1 5,56 8 Language [5], [7], [12]
International Symposium on 9 Paid [12]
Information Technology 1 5,56 10 Games in community [11]
Library Hi Tech 1 5,56 11 Mediator [13], [17]
12 Sense of belonging [3]
Journals Online Information Review 1 5,56
13 Trust [10], [13]
Qualitative Market Research 1 5,56 14 Technical support [6]
Technological Forecasting 15 Benefits for members [5], [6], [9], [13]
and Social Change 1 5,56 16 The existence of the expert [19]
Thérapie 1 5,56 17 Shared vision [5]
Conference on Computing 18 Easy to use [18]
Communication Control and 19 Service quality [4]
Automation 1 5,56
Conference on Innovative
Computing Technology 1 5,56 4.3 Grouping of Factors Influence the Success of Knowledge
Conference on Serious Games Sharing in Virtual Communities
and Applications for Health 1 5,56
Conference on System Factors that affect the success of knowlede sharing in virtual
Sciences 1 5,56 communities can be grouped into personal factors and social
2010 3 16,67 factors [4]. Technology also affects the adoption of knowledge
2011 4 22,22 in virtual communities [5]. This research tries to combine these
two theories. Factors that influence knowledge sharing in
2012 1 5,56 virtual communities are grouped into 3 groups, namely,
2013 2 11,11 technology, personal factors and social factors. Table IV
Year 2014 2 11,11 describes these groupings.

2015 2 11,11 TABLE IV. GROUPING FACTORS INFLUENCE KNOWLEDGE SHARING IN

VIRTUAL COMMUNITIES
2016 1 5,56
2017 2 11,11 Group Factor Influencing
2018 1 5,56 Desain web
Technology
Security
 Technical support such as getting feedback from products offered in virtual
communities.
Easy to use
Motivation 4.3 Challenges at the Virtual Community
Environment of a member
residence (urban or rural) In doing knowledge sharing in virtual communities,
Personal Member background (age, job) members also get challenges. For parents, of course, it takes
Factor time to learn technical internet usage in order to join virtually.
Language In forming strong bonds between fellow members of the virtual
Paid community also depends on the background of each member.
Benefits for members The difference will at least have an effect and be a challenge on
how to react. The community certainly requires active
Member behavior participation from each member. If no member actively asks or
Nnetwork ties gives knowledge, of course the community will be quiet. A
Games in community moderator is needed to continue to create a virtual community
atmosphere that is always alive and crowded Besides member
Mediator participation, the existence of new knowledge or knowledge is
Social Factor Sense of belonging needed, so that members remain in the virtual community.
Trust The following summarizes the challenges in knowledge
sharing in virtual communities:
The existence of the expert  Availability of knowledge [10,15]
Shared vision  Member participation [6]
Service quality  Members have different backgrounds [13]
 Requires time to study technical [3]
4.2 Benefit for Members
4.4 Theoretical Implication
Knowledge sharing carried out in virtual communities
This study provides several theoretical implications related to
certainly provides benefits to its members so that each member
virtual communities. Factors that affect knowledge sharing in
survives in that environment. The benefits received by members
virtual communities are discussed here. These factors are
are one of the factors that influence knowledge sharing in
grouped into 3 groups, namely technology, personal factors and
virtual communities mentioned in four studies. The following
social factors. In addition, this study also adds insight into the
are benefits received by members:
benefits received by members of the virtual community. The
 Add technical skills using the internet [6] benefits received by members are expected to maintain the
 Comfort because it does not assess member competency loyalty of members and invite newcomers to join. On the other
[4,11] hand there are some challenges that need to be anticipated so
 Creating motivation [1] that knowledge sharing in virtual communities can run
 Get feedback on questions or products that are smoothly.
distributed [9,14]
 Get new knowledge [4,7,9] 4.5 Practical Implication
 Increase creativity [15] This research has several practical implications. Because this
 Increase self-confidence because you get additional review discusses knowledge sharing in virtual communities, the
knowledge [3] results provide some practical implications for virtual
 Train yourself to be actively involved [9,11] community operators. First, if you want to attract newcomers,
operators can start by creating virtual communities on an easy-
Benefits received from adding skills related to technical to-use platform that also ensures data security. The design of
internet use, positive self-development in adding new the virtual community page is made as attractive as possible so
knowledge, confidence, and creativity, to additional benefits that it looks eye-catching. The existence of customer care
where asking for technical matters also helped increase the community that provokes member participation is needed so
interest of newcomers. that the community remains "alive".
If you have gathered several people to start a virtual
community. Admin can maintain member loyalty with several V. CONCLUSION
things, namely declaring the vision of this community. Giving The virtual community can be a media that has the potential
rewards or simply thanking parties who provide knowledge to to share knowledge because it involves many members who
other members can increase the enthusiasm of other members. communicate with each other. In order to increase the success
Games interlude can help refresh and get closer between team of sharing knowledge, it is necessary to consider the factors that
members. The existence of a mediator or admin from the influence its success.
 The factors most discussed by previous research are
member behavior. The next most supportive factor is the
motivation of members to share knowledge, the benefits factors
received by members and network ties that can make members
want to share knowledge in virtual communities. These factors
are grouped into 3 groups, namely technology, personal factor
and social factor. The benefits obtained by members were also
discussed in this study. The most widely mentioned benefit in
previous research is getting new knowledge for members. The
challenge faced in sharing knowledge in virtual communities is
the availability of knowledge, member participation, the fact
that members have different backgrounds and requires time to
technical studies. The challenges faced by the need to be made
a strategy to overcome them. This research has theoretical and
practical implications.
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