Cross-national differences in individual knowledge-seeking patterns: a climato-economic contextualization

3 Electronic knowledge repository (EKR) is one of the most commonly deployed knowledge 4 management technologies, yet its success hinges upon employees’ continued use and is further 5 complicated in today’s multinational context. We integrate multiple theoretical linkages into a 6 research model, conceptualizing knowledge-seeking as an instrumental behavior, adopting the 7 technology acceptance model to characterize the individual-level continued EKR 8 knowledge-seeking behavioral model, and drawing on the climato-economic theory to explain 9 cross-national behavioral differences. Using hierarchical linear modeling, we test the model with 10 data from 1,352 randomly sampled knowledge workers across 30 nations. We find that two 11 national-level factors, climate harshness and national wealth, interactively moderate the 12 individual-level relationship between perceived usefulness (PU) and behavioral intention (BI) to 13 continue seeking knowledge from EKR, such that the difference in the strength of this 14 relationship is larger between poor-harsh and poor-temperate nations than between rich-harsh 15 and rich-temperate nations. We find similar cross-level cross-national differences for the link 16 between perceived ease of use (PEOU) and PU but not for the link between PEOU and BI. 17 Implications for research and practice are discussed. 18 19