Schulz, MoritzMoritzSchulz2023-04-132023-04-132021https://www.alexandria.unisg.ch/handle/20.500.14171/111325Crowdfunding represents an alternative, collaborative source of finance for a variety of different projects and has gained considerable popularity during the last years. Even though crowdfunding attracted increasing academic interest during the last years, it remains mostly unclear what differentiates successful from unsuccessful crowdfunding projects and which project characteristics have the potential to attract potential capital-givers from the crowd. This dissertation has the objectives to (1) investigate and structure ongoing research on crowdfunding project characteristics with influence on the funding success, (2) understand the impact of project characteristics beyond directly observable variables (3) analyze the application and effectiveness of crowdfunding governance mechanisms. In order to account for these objectives, this dissertation is structured in three research streams. The first research stream aims to identify and structure project characteristics with influence on the funding success of a crowdfunding project. Based on the findings of a systematic literature review, the research streams structures existing research and defines four distinct research perspectives. The second stream aims to examine how creative and hedonic experiences in project presentation can impact the likelihood of successful funding. The findings are based on the Consensual Assessment Technique and a Multivariate Analysis of Covariance provide insights on how creative and hedonic experiences can be created in crowdfunding and contribute to a better understanding on the funding behavior of the crowd. Finally, the third research stream aims to define governance mechanisms in the field of crowdfunding and to measure their effectiveness towards funding success of a project. By applying a Qualitative Comparative Analysis, it presents specific configurations of governance mechanisms. Consequently, this dissertation provides three main theoretical contributions. First, it creates a structured view on crowdfunding research, including the identification of limitations of existing findings, and provides an overview and better understanding of determinants with impact on the funding success of a crowdfunding project. Second, it provides empirical evidence on the impact of creative and hedonic experiences and sensation seeking behavior of capital-givers. Third, the dissertation provides foundations on the application of governance in the domain of crowdfunding and the effective configuration of governance mechanisms.enCrowdfundingMenschenmengeEDIS-5072doctoral thesis