Relationship between online and offline civic participation

Abstract

The study investigated psychological predictors of traditional and online civic activism, as well as factors moderating the relationship between the two on a representative sample of Serbian citizens (N=2014). Hierarchical regression demonstrated that only extraversion was a significant predictor of both forms of activism: extraverts were more likely to take both virtual and real-life civic actions, whilst self-esteem and political involvement remained insignificant predictors. Additionally, the relationship between online and offline participation was moderated by self-efficacy: the online to offline activism relationship was strongest in the case of high self-efficacy and weakest in the case of low self-efficacy. Extraversion seems to dispose people to engage in real-life, but in virtual actions as well. Higher self-efficacy is needed for activism "overflow", i.e. to translate virtual into real civic actions.