Please stay with me! An empirical investigation on hedonic IS continuance model for social network games

It has long been a challenge for online game providers that, after playing a game for a certain period of time, online game players frequently switch to alternative games without much hesitation. Current IS continuance theories, that are mainly developed to interpret user continuance of general utilitarian IS, are ineffective to interpret user continuance of hedonic IS. In this study, based on the uses and gratifications theory, a hedonic IS continuance model is developed by incorporating three sorts of gratifications, namely hedonic gratification (enjoyment, fantasy and escapism), social gratification (social interaction and social presence) and utilitarian gratification (achievement and self-presentation). Age and gender are the moderating factors in the model. Based on 3919 validated respondents, the research model is assessed while a number of interesting findings are reported.