Determinants of Information Channel Choice: The Impact of Task Complexity and Dispositional Character Traits

During the last decade, a large set of innovative web-enabled technologies, such as social networks and mobile technologies has considerably changed the way people communicate and express their thoughts and ideas. At the same time, these developments significantly enlarged the number of information channels people have to choose from when looking for information in organizational contexts. This endeavor is further complicated by the fact that a new generation of young high potentials, which is used to naturally applying these technologies in daily life, will soon enter the job market. The goal of this quantitative study among 171 subjects is to (1) get a clear understanding of behavioral patterns with respect to the selection of information channels depending on task complexity and personality traits and to (2) substantiate that communication theories can be applied to IS-related topics in the field of human information behavior.