The impact of social presence in the tnterface on customers purchase intention toward online store

This thesis first presented discussion of previous literature in order to identify thedefinition of concepts in research model included social presence, perceived usefulness,enjoyment, t

Dang Thi Tuong Vi

THE IMPACT OF SOCIAL PRESENCE

IN THE WEB INTERFACE ON

CUSTOMER’S PURCHASE INTENTION

TOWARD ONLINE STORE

MASTER OF BUSINESS

Ho Chi Minh City – Year 2014

Dang Thi Tuong Vi

THE IMPACT OF SOCIAL PRESENCE IN THE WEB INTERFACE ON CUSTOMER’S PURCHASE INTENTION TOWARD

ONLINE STORE

ID: 22120080.

MASTER OF BUSINESS SUPERVISOR: Dr VO NGOC THUY

who are gratefully acknowledged here.

At the very first, I would like to express my deepest gratitude to my supervisor,

Dr Vo Ngoc Thuy With their guidance, I could have worked out this thesis They had offered me valuable suggestions and criticisms with his profound knowledge in rich research experience

I am grateful to express my sincere to Prof Nguyen Dinh Tho I have

learned from him a lot not only about research design, but also data analysis

technique I am also extremely to give thankful to UEH – International School of business (ISB) supported me in all process

I would like to extent my sincere thanks to all my classmates and friends Their kindness and supports have contributed very much in my working process Most important, I would like to express my most sincere thanks to my family for their

continuous encouragement and support

work and effort and that is has not been submitted, either in part or whole, anywhere for any award.

Information and ideas taken from other sources as cited as such This work has notbeen published

Signature

Dang Thi Tuong Vi

Date: 09/03/2015

CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION 1

1.1 Research Background 1

1.2 Problematic of Research 2

1.3 Research Objectives 3

1.4 Significance of Research 3

1.5 Scope of Research 4

1.6 Structure of thesis 4

CHAPTER 2: LITERATURE REVIEW 6

2.1 Introduction 6

2.2 Theoretical background 6

2.2.1 Social presence 6

2.2.2 Perceived usefulness 8

2.2.3 Trust in an online environment 9

2.2.4 Enjoyment 10

2.2.5 Attitude and its determinants 12

2.2.6 Purchase intention 13

2.3 Research Model and Hypotheses Development 14

2.3.1 Social presence and Perceived of usefulness 15

2.3.2 Social presence and trust in an online shopping 15

2.3.4 Perceived of usefulness and attitude’s customer 16

2.3.5 Trust in an online shopping and attitude’s customer 16

2.3.9 Attitude and purchase intention 18

2.4 Conclusion 18

CHAPTER 3: RESEARCH METHOD 20

3.1 Introduction 20

3.2 Research process 20

3.3 Qualitative research 21

3.4 Measurement Scales 22

3.5 Quantitative research 24

3.5.1 Sample method 25

3.5.2 Questionnaire administration 25

3.6 Data analysis method 25

3.6.1 Contruct reliability (Cronbach’s Alpha) 25

3.6.2 Contruct validity - Exploratory factor analysis (EFA) 26

3.6.3 ANOVA 26

3.6.4 The structural equation model (SEM) 26

CHAPTER 4: ANALYSIS AND RESULTS 27

4.1 Introduction 27

4.2 Respondents demographic 27

4.3 Scale validation 29

4.3.1 Construct reliability 29

4.3.2 Construct validity 31

4.5 Model fitness 35

4.5.1 Test of mediating effects 36

4.5.2 SEM 37

4.5.3 Bootstrap 39

4.6 Hypotheses testing 39

4.8 Conclusion 41

CHAPTER 5: CONCLUSIONS AND LIMITATIONS 42

5.1 Discussion and conclusions 42

5.2 Implications 45

5.3 Limitations and future research 47

REFERENCES

APPENDICES

Figure 4.4: Modified research model 35

Figure 4.5.2: SEM result of research model (Standardized) 38

Table 4.3.2: Rotated Component Matrix 33

Table 4.3.4: Multiple Comparisons 34

Table 4.5.1: The mediator test 36

Table 4.5.2: Relationship between constructs in research model (standardized) 38

Table 4.5.3: Bootstrap estimate result with N = 1000 39

Table 4.6: Result of hypotheses testing 40

Composite ReliabilityExploratory Factor AnalysisElectronic commerce

Goodness-offitKaiser-Myer-OlkinMaximum LikelihoodOnline Shopping Acceptance ModelStructural Equation Model

Statistical software packageStandardize root mean square residualThe Root mean square of approximatelyTechnology Acceptance Model

Tucker & Lewis index ()Theory of Planned BehaviorTheory of Reasoned ActionVietnam E-commerce and Information Technology Agency

In framework of e-commerce, many previous researchers have been conducted to testthe influence of social presence on online buyer To date the expansion of information systems

in the way friendlier and closer to human feeling, however, some elements of social cue arestill not studies For this reason, the author decided to test further social cues in web interface,with the aim of evaluating the manipulation of these social elements to purchase intention forfurther development

This thesis first presented discussion of previous literature in order to identify thedefinition of concepts in research model included social presence, perceived usefulness,enjoyment, trust, attitude and purchase intention EFA method was used with 22 originalobserved variables but only build up five constructs because “Trust attitude” formed a concept.With modified model, SEM test showed the significant relationship between the factors ofmodel, social presence was infused through perceived usefulness and enjoyment then directlyaffected to purchase intention and indirectly through attitude Besides that, the statistic results

of Anova test proved the difference influences in manipulation of social cues such as socialrich picture, text, customer rating and recommendation in turn of three levels web interface Aninteresting discussion disclosed adding social rich picture and text are supported to push ahigher purchase intention, the customer rating and recommendation does not work

The results of the experiment reveal that social presence is effective elements to enhancepurchase intention The findings contribute to confirm the earlier theories and supply asignificant implication in form selection of web design which support e-business haseffectively investment in marketing and better customers approach

CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION

1.1 Research Background

E-commerce has been becoming an effective trading channel for many companies, besidetraditional stores, to sell their products and services, and to interact with customers That arestores open 24 hours a day, seven days a week, and 365 days a year, a sales person who doesn’tneed breaks or holidays With low running cost, online stores create opportunity to reach thenew markets because of unlimitedness for any customer who wants to find the products overthe world

Increasing of internet users, extend to over the world, has been predicted for a tremendousdevelopment of e-commerce According to Tran (2014), head of VECITA (Vietnam E-commerce and Information Technology Agency), cites that Vietnam is one of the potentialmarkets of growth e-commerce in South Eastern Asia Vietnam is the highest internet user inarea of South East Asia with 16.1 million users by the time of July 2013 The internet users inVietnam gain 36 percent of population, relevant to 32 million users Company with increment

of internet user, e-commerce also makes a strong and effective growth Survey of VECITA in

2013 in two big cities of Vietnam (Hanoi and Ho Chi Minh City), 57 percent Internet userspurchase items through online channel, and the business to customer e-commerce sales areestimated USD 2.2 million Forecasting by 2015, goes along with the increment of 40-45percent of Internet users in Vietnam, the rate of Internet user purchasing item online ispredicted to reach around USD 4 million This is “a delicious pancake” for any companies whowant to raise their revenue and expand their market

Aim to foster the possibility of rising profit and growth of business, many companies aremore and more interested in e-commerce and identify it take a critical role in strategy of mostenterprises over the world Therefore, none of business can ignore this idea if they want to existand develop in future However, the key point is how businessman to apply e-commerceeffectively as well as suitable with model and strategy of company

1.2 Problematic of Research

E-commerce in Vietnam, however, is still earlier market, not reach its full potential yet Somecompanies have been successful in building an online shopping channel or thriving in business byattracting more and more customers While the other just pause at install and experiment a website,revenue from selling online is still low In accordance to VECITA report, survey result in Vietnam

in 2013, 41 percent of businesses only announce their increased through the e-commerce channel,

13 percent is decrease and 46 percent almost is unchanged

In framework of B2C e-commerce, no mention to software transaction, hardware andtravel service, online shopping is still not widely and familiar with internet users Although,buying product or service through internet, customers have benefit due to opportunities ofassessment of the global market and various choices from difference of e-retails, customersoften do not trust on the vendors who supply product and services

Explain for this issue, Gefen and Straub (2003) believe that lack of human interaction or

at least the belief that system has characteristics of social presence is the main reason This isone of the major different between physical store and its electronic counterparty (Suki, 2007).Going to the physical store, customer can touch the real product and communicate directly withthe seller Meanwhile, online shopping is impersonal, anonymous, and automated becausecomputer controls it, in result consumer cannot feel human warmth, physical face-to-facecontact and sociability (Gefen and Straub, 2003) In fact, most of e-commerce website spacetends to display the product and exhibit little emotional or social appeal (Hassenein and Head,2005) Hence, a challenge for businessperson is to indentify how to design and adopt onlinetransaction to as close as traditional store and provides for a socially rich Finding solution forthis issue requires a deeply understanding attitude, intention, and behavior of customer

This study investigates how social presence, which is one of factors enhance human warmth

of e-commerce, through the web interface influence to consumer attitudes and purchase intentiontowards online shopping store Numerous of prior researches (Gefen and Straub, 2003; Hassaneinand Head, 2007, Shen, 2012) find out the impact of social presence on trust,

perceived usefulness and enjoyment as “a catalyst” to increase the positive attitude of onlineshopping customer These studies also show the different results when analysis the impact ofeach factor in various character product and diverse cultural country (Hassanein and Head,2005; Hassanein et al., 2009) However, these researches still do not examine the potentialimpact of social presence on purchase intention, which implies promise to one’s self to buy theproduct again whenever one makes next trip to the market (Hassanein et al., 2009; Tarig et al.,2013) Besides that, in perspective of social cue design, little researches detect the influence ofsocial media such as customer rating and customer recommendations As such, this thesissupplements these social elements in the website interface to investigate their impact toattitude, and then explain to purchase intention of online customers in the end.

1.3 Research Objectives

This study is critically assessing the purchase intention of online buyer underlying theimpact of perceived social presence in website interface As discussion in section 1.2, althoughmany empirically researches study about this matter, the widely implications and diversify ofinformation system still motivate the expansion approach to discovery In view of Vietnammarket, this thesis aims:

- To identify the effect of social presence on purchase intention through perceived usefulness, enjoyment, trust and customer’s attitude

- To evaluate how the elements of social presence contribute to enhance purchase intention of online customers

1.4 Significance of Research

This research is a review the theory related to social presence, particularly in the commercial website Through testing the effect of perceived social presence on attitude andpurchase intention, this study would be beneficial to businessperson to recognize which theelement of social presence is the impact to the purchase decision of their customers.Accordingly, they could be effective investment strategy in website design to engage more andmore customer to visit and buy product from their website

e-1.5 Scope of Research

Jewelry is selected as the online product to sell on the website As the customer can beeasily to identify the materials such as diamond, gold, silver, other metal materials… so thatthe exhibition of product in website is close to the real product without the need for tactileevaluation The component materials of the jewelry are quietly familiar to and specific identifywith user Moreover, product is a meaningful present or a luxurious fashionable grocery, whichshows out the presentation of users to the other Selling this product online has potential todevelop strongly if businessperson building an effective website According to Hassanein et al.(2009) socially description related to product is foster a positive attitude also to online store.Therefore, a fictitious website containing social cues is designed for selling jewelry Survey isconducting in the experienced online customers in Ho Chi Minh

Chapter 2 - Literature review

Chapter 2 presents the theoretical foundation of the research, including the definition ofeach concept in research model and their relationship in literature From that, the hypothesesare argued and proposed for this research

Chapter 3 - Research method

Research method describes the way of establishment of the measures and conducting thesurvey This part includes two main sections, qualitative research to review draft measurementscale and quantitative research design to test the hypotheses.

Chapter 4 – Analysis and results

Chapter 4 exhibits the outcomes of this research The results are evaluatedcorresponding to each step of the data analysis According that, the research hypotheses aretested

Chapter 5 – Discussions, Implications and Limitations

The last chapter of this study discusses the research results by affirming the exploratoryvalues as well as connecting to the realistic conditions to suggest the practical implication.Finally, the limitations arouse the direct for further research in the future

CHAPTER 2: LITERATURE REVIEW

2.1 Introduction

In framework of investigation of the relationship between social presence andantecedent of customer attitude, and their impact to purchase intention, author heritagesresearch model built by the previous research (Gefen and Straub, 2003; Hassanein and Head,2007) On purpose discovery and thoroughly aware of conceptual, author synthesizes theknowledge from various sources in different fields of electronic technology system to defineeach construct and discuss its relationship hypotheses among the constructs

2.2 Theoretical background

2.2.1 Social presence

In psychological respect, Argyle and Dean (1965) interpret the meaning of socialpresence in concept of “immediacy behavior” which is used to create “intimacy”, which is afundamental supporting for the later related research to find out the way to explain clearer thedefinition of social presence Some researchers characterize the social presence of a medium asits capacity to transmit information about facial expression, posture, dress and non-verbal cues(Short et al., 1976) Its definition has clarified as the extent to which a medium allows users toexperience others as being psychologically present (Fulk et at, 1987) Social presence is as a

“mediated communication” in relation of property of a medium and the perception behavior orattitudes of participants in a “mediated interaction” (Gunawardena, 1995) Hence, socialpresence is considered as the degree to which users can feel others' presence in the result ofinterpersonal interactions during the communication process In other words, it regards as thelevel of awareness of the co-presence of another human being or intelligence (Biocca andNowak, 2011)

Many researchers explain social presence on its close relationship to information richness(Rice et al., 1989; Straub, 1994; Straub and Karahama, 1998), which centers on the interactivity ofthe media (Sproull and Kiesler, 1986) Gefen and Straub (2003), however, emphasize thepsychological connection, where social presence is concerned about “human warmth” Thus,

the determinant of social presence relies on a medium convey sociable, warm, sensitive,personal or intimateis (Shen and Khalifa, 2009)

Especially, Karimov et al (2011) have a summary research which comprises thousands ofthe previous researches related to the website design dimension; indicate that the “social cuedesign” measured via human like, assistive interface and social media In detail, human likecues is manipulated social presence by facial photo of shop representation, product worn bypeople in emotion setting and text evoke positive emotion Assistive interface features transfersocial presence via avatar, recommendation agent, and these elements are not much noticed inthe research Social media cues such as non-experimental information from others (includingfrom the other website and site searchers), objective source rating, customer or viewer ratings,and social network (facebook, youtube, Twitte online blogs and forum etc), all are infusingcomponents boost social presence as well Research has shown that increase sense of socialpresence can be achieved through stimulating the imagination of interaction with other humans.Studies have shown that technologies such as personalization, recommendation, and consumerreviews can enable the feeling of a place where people interact, thus increasing the socialpresence of websites (Kim and Benbasat, 2003) through socially rich text and picture content,personalized greetings, human audio and video, intelligent agents, or by providing means foractual interaction with other humans (Hassanein and Head, 2007)

Social presence has significance in connecting user to online store According to Shenand Khalifa (2009), it is a major design principle and important concept in explaining therelationship between online community artifact and online behavior in multidimensional ofpsychology including awareness, affective and cognitive social presence These dimensionsform the overall sense of social presence Rajasekhar and Vijayasree (2012) confirm theemotions and sociability plays vital role in psychological perspectives, they are a potentialfactor to influence the making decision process while in making and correcting the processeffectively

2.2.2 Perceived usefulness

TAM (Technology Acceptance Model) has been widely used to study online shoppingenvironments It has been explained how users of acceptance and use technology base on twomainly factors perceived of usefulness (PU) and perceived ease of use (PEOU) Usefulness isexplained as the individual’s perception that using the new technology enhances or improvesuser performance which supports to increase the outcome of the online shopping experience(Davis, 1989) TAM predicts individual adoption and attitude willing use technology (Rauniar

et al., 2014) Applying to online environment, high of PU and PEOU motivate users to visit orparticipate interaction in website For example, some social website like facebook, twitter etcare attracting millions of participant due to its usefulness as it supply a tool for people tocommunicate with others, and its ease of use when innovate website as the way make simplemanipulations

Developing from the theory of TAM (Chen et al., 2002; Davis, 1989), Zhou et al (2007)building model of OSAM (Online Shopping Acceptance Model) which predicts and explainsconsumer acceptance of online shopping by extending the belief-attitude intention behaviorrelationship in TAM from the perspectives that are specific to online shopping The researchcaptures the characteristics of the perceived usefulness, not just only perceived a genericinformation systems but also deep into the ultimate goal of an online shopping which show offthe potential benefits such as term of convenience, search ability, and rich product informationenvironment as concept of “perceived gain” (Bhatnagar and Ghose, 2004a, p.765), whichunderlies the importance of reducing online shopping uncertainty and risks

Growth of Internet shopping primarily is attributed to the advantages the Internet providesover other traditional forms of retailing Its powerful utilities empower consumers with theability to access and perform the entire shopping process anytime, anywhere Thus, eachcommerce website, anyway, contributes to improve user performance in shopping orinformation seeking by save money and save time Furthermore, attending online shopping

allow user to get the best deal or find out adequate information effectively related to theproducts, such that enhance the usefulness of internet shopping (David, 1989).

2.2.3 Trust in an online environment

Trust is a complex concept that has been widely studied (Hassanein and Head, 2007).However, it remains a difficult concept to describe due to its dynamic, evolving and multi-facered nature (Ambrose and Johnson, 1998; Lewicki and Bunker, 1996) According toRousseau et al (1998), although there many ways to describe this concept, the most commonlycited definition of trust in various contexts is the “willingness of a party to be expectations thatthe other will perform a particular action important to the trustor” (p.394), as proposed byMayer et al (1995) It is also, “The more trusting we are, the more willing we may be to takethe risk of engagement/interaction” (Hassanein and Head, 2007, p 692) For instance,consumers are more willing to purchase products from a vendor if they can trust that thevendor’s word can be relied upon and the vendor will not take advantage of the consumer’svulnerabilities (Geyskens et al., 1996)

Following to the above perceived of trust definition, application to the onlineenvironment, many researchers define concepts of trust or consumer trust in online shopping.For instance, Lee and Turban (2001) identify consumer trust in Internet shopping as “thewillingness of a consumer to be vulnerable to the actions of an Internet merchant in an Internettransaction, based on the expectation that the Internet merchant will behave in certain agreeableways, irrespective of the ability of the consumers to monitor or control that Internet merchant”(p.79) Trust can be seen as reliability and trustworthiness of the e-vendors supplying products

or services (Hassanein and Head, 2007) More specifically, it is a series of specific beliefsincluding belief of ability, belief of benevolence and belief of competence of the online vendor(Gefen, 2000)

Trust is generally important in the adoption of new technologies (Fukuyama, 1995),including web (Gefen, 1997) and e-commerce (Gefen, 2000) Trust is an important aspect incommerce, in general, because of the inherent uncertainly created by the need to depend upon

others in many types of commerce interactions (Fukuyama, 1995; Luhmann, 1979;Williamson, 1985) and the resulting possibility of encountering opportunistic behavior, such asvendor is not candidly revealing all the appropriate risks (Williamson, 1985) or behaving in anunpredictable manner (Luhmann, 1979) The same applies to e-commerce where consumersneed to depend upon often the unknown e-vendors who may resort to opportunistic behavior(Frederick, 2000; Gefen, 2000).

In an online shopping context, consumers may be vulnerable themselves as dealing withe-vendors who are not to engage in potential, but clearly undesirable, opportunistic behaviorsuch as the retailers to sell information about you to unknown others, (Miyazaki andFernandez, 2006), a product or service may not perform as expected and suffering the loss ofthe desired benefits (Stone and Gronhaug, 1993), purchasing unfair price, unauthorizedtracking of transactions and unauthorized use of credit card and purchase information (Gefenand Straub, 2003) Similarly, Bhatnagar et al (2000) suggest that the likelihood of purchasing

on the Internet decreases with increases in product risk At once perceived of these risks, consumer becomes uneasy to accept the transaction, which mainly causes the fails of onlineshopping Therefore, building trust is especially important in the online environment topositively impact consumers’ attitudes and purchasing intentions (Bart et al., 2005; Gefen &Straub, 2003; Roy et al., 2001; van der Heijden et al., 2001; Wang and Emurian, 2005;Hassanein and Head, 2007)

e-2.2.4 Enjoyment

Originating from the definition of “flow state” (Csíkszentmihályi, 1990), which mentalstate when one is completely focused, absorbed, and engaged in an activity, others researcherextended by plus enjoyment Clarke and Haworth (1994) state the enjoyment of the activity isone of very important element of flow These authors describe “flow” as an experience that istotally satisfying beyond a sense of having fun and specific by a heightened sense ofplayfulness Therefore, enjoyment is results from the fun and playfulness of the online

shopping experience, reflects consumers’ perceptions regarding the potential entertainment ofInternet shopping.

Participant online shopping, e-consumer expects to receive a satisfaction the humandemand with the application of the advantage of high technology “Online shopping is avoluntary and hedonic activity, and user participate because they are intrinsically motivated”(Shen, 2012, p 201) Beside the economic outcome, consumer voluntarily participates in arelationship due to leisure activity, which is fun and enjoyable (Mathwich, 2002) This is apositive psychology according to the theory flow which an experience that is so enjoyableshould lead to positive effect and happiness in the long run (Csíkszentmihályi, 1990) Lee et al.(2003) found that shopping enjoyment and purchasing convenience are the factorssociopsychological value which contributes significantly to attainment online customersatisfaction Relation to the technology adoption, the concept of perceived enjoyment has beendefined and measured as the extent to which activity of using a specific system is perceived to

be enjoyable in its own right, aside from any performance consequences resulting from systemuse (Davis et al., 1992; Shen, 2012) Using system with fun is also link to perceivedentertainment value which reflects the website ability to enhance the experience of visitor to awebsite

Synthesizing the previous research, three latent dimensions of enjoyment concept areescapism, pleasure, and arousal (Mathwick et al., 2001; Monsuwe et al., 2004) and each ofconstruct specifically impact to consumer attitude by offering an escape from the demand ofthe day to day world, feeling of happiness, satisfaction and stimulation of action Monsuwe et

al (2004) states that:

“ If consumers are exposed initially to pleasing and arousing stimuli during their Internetshopping experience, they are then more likely to engage in subsequent shopping behavior:they will browse more, engage in more unplanned purchasing, and seek out more stimulatingproducts and categories” (p.109)

2.2.5 Attitude and its determinants

Prominent psychologist Allport (1935) has been stated that attitudes is "the mostdistinctive and indispensable concept in contemporary social psychology"(p.798) It expressesthe favorable or disfavorable toward a particular object Thus, it is changeable and affect to thehuman emotion and behavior

In this study, attitude is mainly examined as the endogenous construct rather thanbehavioral intention based on three reasons First, this research applies a controlledexperimental design with manipulated fictitious websites Despite the fact that we design anexperimental website which looks and feels as real and professional e-commerce site, thehypothetical and simulated nature of the experiment was clearly evident to participants.Measurement of behavioral intention of participants by survey as if they are likelihood topurchase from or return to an artificial website, may not be realistic It should solicit perception

of attitude, as a predisposition to influence behavior (Hassanein and Head, 2007) Second,attitude has particularly connection to the consumer decision-making (Venkatesh and Brown,2001) Research of Hsu and Bentler (2012) has been shown that consumer attitude have apositive direct impact on online shopping intentions In addition, a positive attitude leads toease online transactions and decrease barriers of online shopping (Jarvenpaa et al., 1999;Pavlou and Chai, 2002) At last, attitude is closely influent to behavioral intention whenacceptance are voluntary (Davis et al., 1989; Hassanein and Head, 2007) and amongexperienced users (Karahanna and Straub, 1999; Yu et al., 2005) As such, the participants inthis study are experienced users and online purchaser in voluntary context

Theory of Reasoned Actions (TRA) mentions that there are relationship betweenindividual’s performance and behavioral intention, which is actually determined by theindividual’s attitude Meanwhile, the Technology Acceptance Model (TAM) focuses onexplaining acceptance of information systems Developing TAM theories, the empirical studieshave proven that user’s attitude toward high technology is influenced by the perceived ofusefulness and perceived ease of use

Studying psychology of consumer, Babin et al (1994) suppose the motivation ofshopping initiate of utilitarian and hedonic dimensions First factor is that customer payattention to how to purchase product in efficiency and timely manner to achieve their goals.Then, customers care about the enjoyment that they seek fun, playfulness in online shopping,and satisfaction with the service Both of two respects are inside perceived person and “thebasic determinants of attitude” toward shopping in the internet (Monsuwe et al., 2004).

Meanwhile, many previous studies have summarized other significant factors that couldinfluence consumers’ attitude toward online shopping such as security, privacy, after- salesservice, marketing mix, and reputation In this investigation, however, we focus on threefamiliarly dimension of attitude within the web context: TAM constructs (perceived usefulnessand perceived ease of use); Trust; and Enjoyment These factors are significantly influenced bysocial presence as well (Hassanein and Head, 2007)

2.2.6 Purchase intention

Defining the online purchase intention, many authors agree that it attaches with the actionwilling to pay and user behavior in making decision process Pavlou (2003) defines onlinepurchase intention as a situation where a consumer does not object to pay and intends to makeonline transactions This term also is used by George (2004) in online process when customerswillingness to search, select and purchase products via the Internet Similarly, Khalifa andLimayem (2003), interpret internet purchase behavior as a process of purchasing products,services and information via the Internet, base on earlier theories related to customer behaviorand intention George (2004) expresses that many customers do not accept online shopping due

to psychology of customer care about personal information and privacy This means thatprocessing of customers making their decisions on what product or services to purchase onlinereveals the buying behavior of online customers The way of decision-making behaviorinteracting with online shopping is clarified in three stages of pre-purchase, purchase and postpurchase (Sheth and Mittal, 2004) Therefore, customer online purchase intentions in the web-

shopping environment particularly decide the power of a consumer’s intention to do apurchasing behavior via the Internet (Salisbury et al., 2001).

In the scope of e-commerce, Theory of Reasoned Action (TRA), Theory of PlannedBehavior (TPB), and Technology Acceptance Model (TAM) are fundamental of knowledge inexplaining and predicting consumers’ intention towards adopting an online shopping behavior

in later research (Delafrooz et al., 2011) While TAM focuses on user with concept ofperceived usefulness as a determinant of attitude, the researches based on TRA and TPBdevelop in extend to present cognitive processing and level of behavior change

2.3 Research Model and Hypotheses Development

Heritage from model research of Hassenien and Head (2007), here author develops themodel by closer approach mental of internet user via purchase intention which is an importantstep in making buying decision The proposed research framework and hypotheses arepresented in figure 2.3

Perceived Usefulness

Figure 2.3: Conceptual model

2.3.1 Social presence and Perceived of usefulness

There is a psychological connection between perceiving that a medium is warm and itsusefulness across a range of communication tasks (Rice and Case, 1983; Steinfield, 1986) Inconcerned about the relationship between perceived social presence and perceived usefulness,many researchers have investigated While Gefen and Straub (2003) are not able to show a linkbetween perceived social presence and perceived usefulness in an e-Services context Straub(1994); Karahanna and Straub (1999) have confirmed that users' social presence has a positiveeffect on perceived usefulness in the online shopping environment Hassanein and Head (2007)and Shen (2012) states that “social presence conveys through the website effect PU and PE”.Thus, there is enough evidence to suggest the following hypothesis:

H1: Social presences have positive impact to perceived usefulness in online stores

2.3.2 Social presence and trust in an online shopping

Trust is created within the context of a social environment (Fukuyama, 1995) In context

of social presence of website, Simon (2001) claims “information richness and social presenceare closely related concepts”, and “information rich, consumer oriented websites should helpreduce ambiguity, increase trust and reduce risk, and encourage users to purchase with lowerlevels of consumer dissonance” (p.26) Gefen and Straub (2003) show social presence has aneffect online consumer’s trust and is a necessary condition for the development of trust.Designing website with a higher social presence factor can create a higher trust (Gefen andStraub, 2003; Wang and Emurian, 2005; Hassanein and Head, 2007) As such it helps toimprove e-commerce trust as customer more influenced by direct relationship than indirectrelationship with the online merchant (Lah et al., 2013).Therefore, the hypotheses is suggestedthat:

H2: Social presences have positive impact to trust in online stores

2.3.3 Social presence and enjoyment

The most prominent psychological impact of social presence is enjoyment (Lombard andDitton, 1997) Heeter (1995) finds that users experimenting with a virtual reality entertainment

system enjoyed the system more when they felt a stronger sense of social presence Past studieshave been proven the positive relationship between social presence and perceived enjoyment

on a product website selling apparel (Hassanein and Head, 2007), or in a virtual world website(Yeh et al., 2011, Shen, 2012) Therefore, author hypothesizes that:

H3: Social presences have positive impact to enjoyment in online shopping websites

2.3.4 Perceived of usefulness and attitude’s customer

According to the TAM, perceived usefulness is the degree to which a person believes thatusing a particular system would enhance his or her job performance Base on this model,researchers has been shown the impact of perceived usefulness on attitude’s customer invarious field using online transaction such as online ticket airline (Renny et al., 2013) , e-banking (Jarhangir and Begum, 2007) In the words of Davis, Bagozzi, and Warshaw (1992),perceived usefulness refer to consumers’ perceptions regarding the outcome of an experiencethat process to recognize and conclude benefit of user A system in high perceived usefulness,

as a result, enhances the existence of a positive use-performance relationship

H4: Perceived usefulness have positive to attitude in online shopping websites

2.3.5 Trust in an online shopping and attitude’s customer

Trust is “the moral importance of an emotional attitude” (Miller, 2000, title) Trust in online

shopping is considered as an important element affecting consumers’ intention to adopt commerce (Gefen and Straub, 2000) Consumers’ trust in online shopping has played a critical roleand a prerequisite influencing on consumers’ intention to online shopping adoption Trust helpscustomers reduce their risk perception and make them more comfortable sharing their personalinformation them (McKnight and Choudhury, 2006) Subsequently, consumer trusts in acompany’s website generates more favorable attitudes towards the company and willingness to buyfrom the online vendor (Li and Yang, 2002; Gefen and Straub, 2003; McKnight and Choudhury,2006) With model research trust-oriented perspective, drawing the same directly path from trust tocustomer attitude plus the perceived risk in the online store ,

e-Jarvenpaa et al (1999) find that increasing trust reduce the perceived risk, and positive impactthe attitude toward internet shopping Thus, author hypothesizes that:

H5: Trust will result in a more positive attitude towards online shopping website

2.3.6 Enjoyment and attitude’s customer

Childerset et al (2001) declare “enjoyment” to be a consistent and strong predictor ofattitude toward online shopping If consumers enjoy their online shopping experience, theyhave a more positive attitude toward online shopping, and are more likely to adopt the Internet

as a shopping medium Subsequently, the prior researches (Gefen and Straub, 2003; Hassaneinand Head, 2007; Shen, 2012) have indicated that perceived enjoyment can positively impactconsumer attitudes of online vendors and their websites Supporting for this view, research ofKim and (2007), show that perceived entertainment and enjoyment value is a strongdeterminant of attitude toward product virtualization technologies Agree with in the result ofthese researches, author hypothesizes that:

H6: Enjoyment will result in a more positive attitude towards online shopping website

2.3.7 Perceived usefulness and Purchase intention

Factors affecting the intention of purchasing online have been investigated for manyyears Perceived usefulness is a basic factor significantly influencing the online customer’sintention (Atchariyachanvanich et al., 2006) Due to human tend to maximize useful of theinformation technology until they really get believable to act the next task performance, theperceived usefulness takes role as infusion to motivation individual accept objective or not.Actually, perceived usefulness toward using a computer has been found to positively influenceindividuals' behavioral intentions toward computer usage (Davis et al., 1989) Hence,hypothesis is settled as below:

H7: Perceived usefulness will result in a more positive attitude towards online shoppingwebsite

2.3.8 Enjoyment and purchase intention

In frame of research enjoyment as a component creates the flow experience, series ofresearch mentioned about the obvious impact of e-satisfaction on user intention to revisit awebsite Childers et al (2001) confirm that enjoyment, entertainment, and humor are importantfactors to enhance consumers' revisiting intentions to Web sites They agrees with idea tocreate more enjoyable online shopping contexts through images, color, humor, animation, andother interactive features would help outstanding online shopping Moreover, enjoymentimplied by perceived playfulness (Koufaris and Hampton-Sosa, 2002) and the consumer’shedonic orientation (Delafrooz1 et al., 2011) has been proven significantly impact on purchaseintention Hence, author hypothesizes that:

H8: Enjoyment will result in a more positive attitude towards online shopping website

2.3.9 Attitude and purchase intention

According to Yu and Wu (2007), when performing a behavior decides intention towardsonline shopping, a positive attitude is the factor to urge greater intention to shop for product viainternet A stronger negative attitude contributes lower behavior intention While Donthu andGarcia (1999) discovery the consumer innovativeness positively influences online shoppingbehaviors and online shopping intention, the indirect effects being mediated by attitude Theresearchers (Vijayasarathy, 2003; Chang and Chen, 2008; Delafrooz et al., 2011) haveextensively adopted on the theory of planned behavior and the technology acceptance model(Davis, 1989; Vijayasarathy, 2003) to explain or predict consumer online shopping attitude,and online shopping intention All of these studies confirm that attitude is significant positiveimpact on online shopping intention and behavior Hence, author hypothesizes that:

H9: Positive attitude will enhance purchase intention towards online shopping website

there are many different discussions, research expects on positive influence among modelconstructs These empirical researches allow author to find out the general trends of internetuser in decision making and improve the perception of earlier theories.

CHAPTER 3: RESEARCH METHOD

3.1 Introduction

This section present about the methodological approach research It outlines all steps inprocess research, then, displays the method to develop the measurement scales In addition, itdescribes the plan to collect opened information in qualitative research and main data for thefinal analysis in quantitative research Finally, method of data analysis is chosen to be suitablewith the purpose of research model

3.2 Research process

We applied both qualitative and quantitative methods to modify the measurement scalesand test the research model Collecting data process of this study was designed into two stages.The first was a pilot test with qualitative research and the second was main survey withquantitative research (figure 3.2)

Measurement Scales

Cronbatch’s AnphaEFA- Exploratory factor analysis

ANOVA test

Modified Research Model

Hypothesis Test Conclusion

Figure 3.2: Research process 3.3 Qualitative research

A qualitative research aimed at confirming the model and exploring sufficiently theimpact of social presence on antecedents of attitudes, as well as the factor affect to attitude’scustomer toward online shopping Author made a survey with an opened interview question tothe customer who experienced in online shopping in order to identify what they thought aboutthe factor in suggested model Interview questions, those were designed without implied, email

or ask directly to participants

The survey showed clearly the objective of studies and interpreted clearly about the socialelements appearing in website interface There were14 participants experienced in onlineshopping reply this survey

Previous research had been drawn to the concept of social presence to explore the lack of human warmth online (Chen et al., 2002) Therefore, solution to overcome the lack of human warmth was by increasing the social presence such as presence of avatar or presence of

socially rich description or pictures of products These increased the probability of purchase decision as well (Song et al., 2008)

The interviewers were asked about the factor which affect to attitude’s customer andpurchase intention, and their feeling when adding socially rich text, picture customer rating andrecommendation Through their answer, 85 percent participants perceived the usefulness ofwebsite when adding social rich elements in website interface They suggested an ease toreceive more information about the product Meanwhile, there were 50 percent participants feelenjoyable, expressive and more attractive when looking product as “real” 21 percent ofanswers felt persuasive and trust in the website because the product seemed to fit for the user.Reply to the factors affect to their attitude toward the online store, the interviewers mentionedmany factors such as display or design of website interface, privacy security, trustworthy,customer service, comparing price, warranty policy of product 35 percent interviewerconcerned about the trustworthy, 14 percent referred to the usefulness of website and 28percent indicated the enjoyment when they experienced a beautiful and friendly website Result

of survey showed the items were realizable and suitable with the psychology of customer’sonline shopping This investigation supported all factor of research model and the items weresignificantly reflected the conceptual

3.4 Measurement Scales

In order to comprehend conceptual and make sure the reliability in conduct the research,

we applied the items, which were adapted in previous studies Hassanein and Head (2007)advise that all items should be come from the existing literature, and have been proved strongcontent validity repeatedly through different researches Hence, the below scales were usedpopular in various studies related to attitudes, intention, and behavior in electronic commerce

As literature review section, there were six factors in the research model

Social presence (SP)

Scales item of social presence were adapted from Gefen and Straub (2003), Shen (2012).They were included:

SP1 There is sense of human contact on this website

SP2 There is sense of sociability on this website

SP3 There is a sense of human warmth on this website

SP4 There is a sense of human sensitivity in the website

Perceived of usefulness (PU)

Scales item of perceived of usefulness were gathered from the research of Moon and Kim(2001) and Chen et al (2002) They were included:

PU1 This website provides good quality information

PU2 This website improves my performance in assessing jewelry online

PU3 This website increases my effectiveness for jewelry assessment online

PU4 This website is useful for assessing jewelry online

Enjoyment (EN)

Measuring this factor, author synthesized the scales of enjoyment from three studies:Ghani and Deshpande (1994), van der Heijden (2003), Hwang and Yi (2002) They wereincluded:

E1 I found my visit to this website interesting

E2 I found my visit to this website entertaining

E3 I found my visit to this website enjoyable

E4 I found my visit to this website pleasant

Trust (TR)

As Gefen and Straub (2003) had thoroughly research related to conceptual of trust, scalesitem of trust were adapted from their studies They were included:

T1 I feel that this online vendor is honest

T2 I feel that this online vendor is trustworthy

T3 I feel that this online vendor cares about customers

T4 I feel that this online vendor would provide me with good service

Attitude (AT)

Scales item of attitude were collected from van der Heijden et al (2001) They wereincluded:

A1 I would have positive feelings towards buying a product from this site

A2 The thought of buying a product from this website is appealing to me

A3 It would be a good idea to buy a product from this website

Purchase intention (PI)

Adopted the scales item from Jarvenpaa et al (1999), scales item of purchase intentionwere included:

PI1 How likely is it that you would consider purchasing from this website?

PI2 How likely is it that you would consider purchasing from this website?

PI3 In case you intend to buy jewelry in online store, how likely is it that you would buy from this website?

All of these items were measured by a seven point Likert scale, anchored by oneequivalent to strongly disagree to seven equivalents to strongly agree Although someconstructs had been drawn from two or three validated sources, they were assumed that theseitems are measuring the same underlying construct which is being tested reliability byCronbach’s alpha in next section

3.5 Quantitative research

The survey via questionnaires was executive after qualitative survey reveal the socialpresence cue indeed affect to customers perception Purpose of quantitative research was toexplain to the problematic research- how the social present affected to attitude and purchaseintention by analysis collected data and based on representative sample of customers whoexperienced in online shopping

3.5.1 Sample method

An empirical study was conducted to validate the proposed research model and test ourproposed hypotheses There were total 22 items, which measured six conceptual The sampleestimated around 300 participants in the survey Subject gave the task of purchasing a presentfor friend on jewelry online stores

Survey questions were sent by email or the other social network such as facebook, skype,yahoo etc to people who had known or experience buying products in online stores in Ho ChiMinh City Three websites were intentionally designed present three levels of social presence.The first one was simple interface with product and basic information of product (price, code,material etc) The second one added the social rich text and picture The last one display allcontend of the second but plus with customer rating and recommendation Accordingly,participants were divided in three groups which 100 members in each group to answer thesurvey attachment of the websites interface present three levels of social present as appendix C

3.5.2 Questionnaire administration

There were 292 people take part in answering this survey However, author only chose 210correspondents, approximate 71 percent, who were in age from 23-35 as a specific segmentcustomer in this online store Because these users have advantage in using internet application andhave high demand in buying online The others were excluded in this investigation All of thesevalid data were input in SPSS 20 and AMOSS 22 in order to process analysis statistics

3.6 Data analysis method

3.6.1 Contruct reliability (Cronbach’s Alpha)

According to Connely (2011), Cronbach’s alpha was used as only one criterion forjudging instruments or scales It was commonly used as an estimate of the construct reliability

In book of SPSS for intermediate statistics, Nancy, Karen and Goerge (2005) indicated that thismethod was widely applied because it supplied a measure of reliability that could be valid fromone testing session or one administration of a questionnaire

3.6.2 Contruct validity - Exploratory factor analysis (EFA).

Norris and Lecavalier (2010) supposed that “EFA is based upon a testable model andcould be evaluated in terms of its fit to the hypothesized population model; fit indices could begenerated to help with model interpretation” (p.9) Moreover, analysis data accessing by EFA

helped to identify latent constructs underlying a set of manifest variables In this method, we

paid attention to test the convergent and discriminant validity of each item which were the twosubtypes of validity that make up construct validity (Campbell, 1959)

3.6.3 ANOVA

Due to objective of research to identify the impact of social presence through three levels

of website interface, data analysis exhibited the differences in means from each other groupscorrespondence to each level for statistical significance An Anova, stand for “analysis ofvariance”, was conducted in order to compare simultaneously three levels of social presence

3.6.4 The structural equation model (SEM)

SEM was used as the main method for analyzing the research model by testing theassumed causation among a set of dependent and independent variables Through this method,

we could find out the relationship between conceptual and level of each conceptual to the other

in research model Specially, author noted the indices of model fit such as Chi-Square,RMSEA, TLI, CFI, SRMR

3.7 Conclusion

This chapter showed the methods research used in this thesis According to this, thesurvey question was built up from the prior research and confirm via qualitative research Then,quantitative research was conducted by sending survey to participant via internet Number ofdata collection was totally met the requirement of analysis method in SPSS and AMOSsoftware All method analysis including cronbach’s alpha, EFA, Anova and SEM were thebasic testing to explain the outcome of research in next chapter

CHAPTER 4: ANALYSIS AND RESULTS

4.1 Introduction

This chapter focused on the analysis and interpretation of data that was collected Firstpart, respondents demographic demonstrated the characters of data by using the SPSS –Statistical software package The second part, the scale of contrast was tested the reliabilitythrough cronbach’ alpha and the validity mainly using EFA In addition, an Anova test wasconducted in this part as precedent condition for testing the manipulation of social presence viathree levels The third part, model fitness was examined via testing mediator, SEM andbootstrap Finally, hypotheses test was conducted to explore the relationship among thevariables of model

4.2 Respondents demographic

From the collected data of 210 answers, author used SPSS – Statistical Softwarepackage to release the frequencies of each demographic factor as table 4.2

Demographic Profile Category Frequency Percentage

Table 4.2: Demographic Table

As purpose of this research, author focused on the specific segment of customer, allparticipants was age from 23 to 35 year- old chosen for this investigation Descriptive statisticsresult indicated that the percent of between female and male was relative equally, equivalent at

58 percent and 42 percent The academic attainment of the respondents was high rating at theachievement of College or Bachelor with 81 percent The respondents had education level atpost graduated was 13 percent, and only 6 percent of high school The income was centered atearning form 5 million to VND 10 million, equivalent over a haft of interviewers with 55percent, the others was equal earning percent at 15 percent with three incomes of less thanVND 5 million, over 10 million to VND 15 million, and over VND 15 million As expectation,