Editing Lurker (section)

==Rationale==
Lurkers lurk rather than participate for a variety of reasons. A majority of lurkers profess that they lurk simply because they think that browsing is enough for them.<ref name=nonnecke06 /> Users also choose to lurk in order to find examples to follow when they decide to participate, avoid making redundant posts or contributions, and learn more about the topics of conversation.<ref name=dennen08 /> A lurker's need to learn about the community before contributing also explains why almost twice as many users lurk on [[technical support]] communities where more information is required to post as compared to [[Online health communities|health support communities]].<ref name=nonnecke06 /> Researchers have shown that different motivations underlie reading, contributing, and [[Internet forum#Moderators|moderating]] web forums. Pure lurkers more often are motivated by the fact that the community is the only place to find a certain kind of content, while moderators and contributors are motivated by either duty or feelings of attachment.<ref name=bateman11>{{cite journal|title=The Impact of Community Commitment on Participation in Online Communities |vauthors=Bateman P, Gray P, Butler B |s2cid = 43544681|journal = Information Systems Research | year=2011|volume=22|issue=4|doi=10.1287/isre.1090.0265|pages=841–854}}</ref> Lurking on social media can also be a form of receptive reading, whereby users seek to understand the opinions of those with a divergent point of view.<ref>Sipley, G. M. (2020). 'LURKER' LITERACIES: LIVING IN/THROUGH NEIGHBORHOOD FACEBOOK GROUPS. AoIR Selected Papers of Internet Research, 2020. https://doi.org/10.5210/spir.v2020i0.11331</ref>
In much of the published literature, "lurking" is treated as a personal trait. However, concepts of [[legitimate peripheral participation]]<ref>{{Cite book|title=Situated Learning: Legitimate Peripheral Participation|last1=Lave|first1=Jean|last2=Wenger|first2=Etienne|publisher=Cambridge University Press|year=1991|isbn=0-521-42374-0}}</ref> and "de-lurking" <ref name="rafaeli04" /> suggest that lurking may be more situational than dispositional. In a study of online communities in which it was possible to see the total membership list, researchers were able to count the number of members who were public participants in one community while remaining silent or non-public participants in another community. 84% of the members fit this mixed pattern, indicating that people choose whether to lurk or to contribute on a per-community basis.<ref>{{Cite journal|last=Muller|first=Michael|date=2012|title=Lurking as personal trait or situational disposition: lurking and contributing in enterprise social media|journal=Proc. CSCW 2012|pages=253–256}}</ref>