“Dazi socializing” among young netizens: The roles of perceived value and online interpersonal trust in companion-based social interaction

Companion-based social interaction has become an emerging form of lightweight digital sociality among young Chinese users. Existing studies have mainly discussed its social background and cultural meanings, but less attention has been paid to the psychological mechanisms underlying users' participation intention. Drawing on the Stimulus-Organism-Response framework, this study examines how platform-level conditions and individual predispositions are associated with companion-seeking intention through perceived value. Platform information quality and social affordance are treated as environmental antecedents related to perceived functional value, while extraversion and social motivation are treated as individual antecedents related to perceived emotional value. Online interpersonal trust is further introduced as a moderating factor. The findings show that perceived functional value and perceived emotional value link antecedent factors to behavioral intention. Online interpersonal trust weakens several antecedent-to-value relationships, suggesting that trust may reduce users' reliance on other evaluative cues. This study clarifies the value-based mechanism of companion-based social interaction and extends the application of the SOR framework to lightweight digital social contexts.