The rapid development of the Internet has increased the number of users shopping online. Many sellers thus focus on the shopping behavior on online environment. In this competitive environment, managers must understand factors that affect the online purchase behavior of customers to increase and maintain their competitive advantage. Therefore, this study aims to explore antecedents of online shopping behavior. Based on the social cognitive theory, this study proposes a research model of online shopping behavior. Code Shoppy This study argues that trust positively affects online shopping behavior; perceived website complexity negatively and directly affects online shopping behavior, and indirectly affects trust online shopping behavior via trust. These research results can be seen as references by future scholars and practical suggestions for platform managers to improve their businesses.
The number of online shoppers has increased in recent years. Reference [1] indicated that more than 60% of American consumers shop online at least once a month; only 1% has never shopped online. Reference [2] showed that in the past 12 months, more than 70% German and Finnish users have used the Internet to shop, and over 80% English users shop online. Reference [3] indicated the Internet enables companies and consumers to interact with each other through electronic commerce. In the wake of the enormously profitable online market, the competition among shopping websites is keen. Understanding the issue about online shopping is important for online sellers.
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Thus, this study focuses on the determinants of online shopping behavior. Purchasing is the main method of obtaining actual products, regardless of product type (physical or digital) [4]. A variety of explanatory models have been developed and aimed at predicting and explaining online purchasing behavior based on user acceptance theories such as the technology acceptance model (TAM) and the theory of planned behavior (TPB). Such studies have improved understanding of why individuals purchase products/services online [5]. Recent studies have demonstrated that the environmental factors are important for fostering shopping behavior [6]. For example, store environment may influence product evaluation and store choice. However, previous studies, such as TAM and TPB, less concern the influence of environmental factors on online shopping behavior. In social cognitive theory, there is a triadic mechanism among personal characteristics, such as cognitive states, psychical features, such as external environment factors, and behavior [7]. Social cognitive theory is a strong theory that accounting for the human behavior argued by [7]. There are many studies adopting social cognitive theory to explain the online customer behavior. Reference [8] used social cognitive theory to assess the determinants of internet banking adoption. The results shown that websites’ social feature, trust, compatibility with lifestyle and online customer services have a significant effect on customers’ intentions to adopt Internet banking. Reference [9] adopted social cognitive theory to consider the role of personal factors and environmental influences in individual behavior. The results of these studies are shown that social cognitive theory is a powerful theory for validating individual behavior. Reference [10] indicated that using the social cognitive theory proposed by [11, 12] is a novel and useful starting point to guide future research in sustainable consumption. However, few studies have employed social cognitive theory to explain the antecedents of online shopping behavior. Social cognitive theory, which is developed in social psychology, has received little attention within in online purchase field. Most of prior researches which employed social cognitive theory as a theoretical framework focus on the specific aspect of social cognitive theory, such as the self-efficacy and outcome expectancy [9]. The core concepts within the social cognitive theory, in particular environmental and personal dimensions are less concerned. For further understanding the issue about online shopping behavior, this study adopts social cognitive theory to explore the antecedents of online shopping behavior by considering personal factors and environmental factors. In social cognitive theory, regarding on personal factors, [7] expressed that cognitive state is a kind of personal characteristics. On a shopping website, trust is a key factor influencing consumer decision [13]. Trust can be defined as the trustor perceives that the trustee has the ability, integrity, and benevolence features to bring benefit to the trustor [14]. That is, in this study, trust can be regarded as a cognitive state of social cognitive theory. Reference [8] indicated that website features are essential in determining the usage of a website. The layout, design, features, and characteristics of websites are considered as website design. Thus, this study adopts perceived website complexity which is proposed by [15] as an environmental factor of social cognitive theory. This study explores the determinants including trust and perceived website complexity of online shopping behavior. The results can be seen as practical suggestions for platform managers to improve their business.
Based on social cognitive theory, this study proposes a research model to explore the relationships among trust, perceived website complexity, and online shopping behavior. Besides, previous studies have indicated that online store environment is a key factor influencing online purchase [23]. However, perceived website complexity is less considered. Thus, this study regards perceived website complexity as an environmental factor and explores the relationship between perceived website complexity and online shopping behavior. Understanding this issue will contribute to online shopping research agenda and will help online shopping managers to obtain advantages in the face of environmental stresses. Future works can collect and analyze empirical data to verify this research model.
