The spillover effect of participating in crowdsourcing contests: Empirical evidence from online health communities

Crowdsourcing contests have become an effective tool for gathering collective wisdom to address various needs across multiple fields. In response to patients’ needs for multiple doctor opinions, certain online health communities (OHCs) have introduced medical crowdsourcing contests where patients can post questions with specific rewards, and multiple physicians can chase for the rewards by providing solutions. Although crowdsourcing contests benefit patients greatly, participation in crowdsourcing contests may undermine physicians’ performance in other service channels. To clarify this spillover effect, we empirically examine the effect of participation in crowdsourcing contests on physicians’ economics- and reputation-based performance in their core online services in OHCs. We employ staggered difference-in-differences by leveraging the expanding crowdsourcing contest participation of physicians in OHCs. Our results indicate a positive spillover effect on both economics- and reputation-based performance from participation in crowdsourcing contests. Furthermore, we find that physicians with higher professional titles, more participation intensity, and winning numbers gain more online consultations and reputation improvement from participation in crowdsourcing contests. This study offers valuable theoretical and managerial insights, providing practical solutions to both physicians and OHC managers considering participation in or launching crowdsourcing contests.