Participation in digital social networking for women’s economic empowerment: only when it enhances social capital?

This is the authors' abstract. We don't add key points for this paper.

Purpose This study aims to examine the impacts of participation in digital social networks on women’s economic empowerment at the individual level. Participation with different purposes was theorized to initially impact economic empowerment attitude, which in turn would influence empowerment behavior. Design/methodology/approach A sample of 249 women in three big cities of a developing country was collected to test the theoretical models. Measurement testing and regression analyses were implemented with SPSS software. Findings Analysis findings supported the hypotheses that social network participation in both Facebook and Zalo for different purposes indirectly influences empowerment behavior through empowerment attitude. More interestingly, no significant relationship existed between the frequency of using social networks or internet applications and attitude or behavior. Originality/value Unlike previous research at the community or country level, the authors’ study sheds light on the impacts of participating in digital platforms in general and social networks in particular, which would help enhance women’s economic empowerment at the individual level. More importantly, only at the individual level could the mediating role of the empowerment attitude be elucidated. Theoretically, the study suggested that participation in digital platforms might only be valid if such participation could be used to enhance the social capital of women.