The nature, dimensionality, and effects of perceptions of community governance

•The concept of community governance is examined as a verification process in wikis.•Community governance consists of community credibility and community vigilance.•Perceptions of community governance are positively related to content usefulness.•Content usefulness is positively related to content use from wikis.

Wiki technology enables organizational members to collectively verify content and increase the accuracy, relevancy, and legitimacy of contributions. This is referred to as community governance in this paper. The goals of this paper are to understand the nature and dimensionality of the perceptions of community governance construct, operationalize it, and examine its role in content use from wikis. Data analyses show that perceptions of community governance can be measured as a second-order construct with two first-order factors: community credibility and community vigilance. Further, perceptions of community governance are positively associated with content usefulness, which explains content use from community-governed wikis.