A longitudinal investigation of continued online shopping behavior: An extension of the theory of planned behavior

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Abstract

The purpose of this study is to propose an extended model of Theory of Planned Behavior (TPB) by incorporating constructs drawn from the model of Expectation Disconfirmation Theory (EDT) and to examine the antecedents of users’ intention to continue using online shopping (continuance intention). Prior research has demonstrated that TPB constructs, including attitude, subjective norm, and perceived behavioral control, are important factors in determining the acceptance and use of various information technologies. These factors, however, are insufficient to explain a user's continuance intention in the online shopping context. In this study we extended TPB with two EDT constructs—disconfirmation and satisfaction—for studying users’ continuance intention in the online shopping context. By employing longitudinal method with two-stage survey, we empirically validated the proposed model and research hypotheses.

Introduction

Continued usage (continuance) of the information technologies (IT) is a key research issue in the information systems (IS) field (Bhattacherjee, 2001; Bhattacherjee and Premkumar, 2004) and many studies have empirically examined its determinants (e.g., Bhattacherjee, 2001; Karahanna et al., 1999; Davis et al., 1989). In the past decade, most studies have viewed users’ continuance and acceptance decisions as the same as acceptance decisions. Those studies implicitly considered continuance as an extension of acceptance behaviors. Based on the Theory of Reasoned Action (TRA) (Fishbein and Ajzen, 1975), Karahanna et al. (1999) employed the same set of TRA's constructs (i.e. intention, attitude, and subjective norm) to explain acceptance decisions and continuance decisions. Their study provided preliminary evidence that acceptance and continued usage behaviors are determined by different factors. Hence, any further research applying the acceptance model to study IT continuance needs to address how other variables may affect users’ continuance decisions.

This study aims to examine the change of users’ cognitive beliefs and attitude from pre-usage stage to usage stage and how they influence users’ intention to continue using online shopping. Theory of Planned Behavior (TPB) is one of the most widely used models in explaining and predicting individual behavioral intention (BI) and acceptance of IT. TPB is an attitude–intention–behavior model, which posits that an individual's behavior is determined by perceived behavioral control and intention. Intention, in turn, is determined by attitude, subjective norm, and perceived behavioral control. Many studies (e.g., Mathieson, 1991; Liao et al., 1999; Venkatesh et al., 2000; Hsu and Chiu, 2004a) have replicated and investigated these three constructs and agreed that they are valid in explaining individual intention to use various ITs. Moreover, previous studies have provided evidence to suggest that subjective norm and perceived behavior control could be modified as the increasing IT usage experience (e.g. Hartwick and Barki, 1994; Taylor and Todd, 1995b; Karahanna et al., 1999; Venkatesh and Davis, 2000; Venkatesh et al., 2003), implying that the beliefs users hold for continuance intention may not be the same set of beliefs lead to initial adoption (Karahanna et al., 1999). However, TPB has rarely been applied to examine factors influencing continuance intention, especially factors influencing attitude change after initial adoption. Furthermore, most TPB-based studies have been conducted in a statistic standpoint, yet few studies have directed their attention to employ TPB in a dynamic perspective. We believe that TPB may not fully reflect a user's continuance motives, making the introduction of additional explanatory variables to the theory necessary. Thus, this study considers that extends TPB in a longitudinal viewpoint may be helpful to validate the temporal change in users’ beliefs and attitude and examine their effects on online shopping continuance intention.

The post-purchase model of Expectancy Disconfirmation Theory (EDT) (Oliver, 1980) theorizes that consumer's post-purchase satisfaction is a function of pre-purchase expectation and expectancy disconfirmation. Satisfaction, in turn, is believed to influence post-purchase attitude and repurchase intention. EDT has been adopted in the IS literature to explain the relationships among expectation, disconfirmation, and satisfaction with IT use (e.g., Bhattacherjee, 2001; McKinney et al., 2002). Recently, it has been used to validate the change in users’ beliefs and attitude regarding IT usage over time by extending TAM with EDT (Bhattacherjee and Premkumar, 2004). To provide a better explanation of the online shopping continuance decision process, this study extends the traditional static model by bringing in dynamic perspective to propose a continuance model that correlates internal influence, external influence, perceived behavior controllability, user disconfirmation, satisfaction, attitude, and continuance intention. In summary, this study elaborates how users’ beliefs and attitude change during the practice of IT usage, defines emergent constructs driving such change, and proposes a temporal model of belief and attitude change by drawing on TPB and EDT.

Section snippets

Theory of planned behavior

TPB (Ajzen, 1988, Ajzen, 1991), an extension to TRA, was conceived to explain and predict individual acceptance of IT (Mathieson, 1991; Taylor and Todd, 1995a, b; Venkatesh et al., 2000; Chau and Hu, 2002; Hsu and Chiu, 2004a, Hsu and Chiu, 2004b; Huang and Chang, 2005; Luarn and Lin, 2005; Wu and Chen, 2005). According to TPB, an individual's behavior is determined by BI and perceived behavioral control, and BI is determined by attitude toward behavior (A), subjective norm (SN), and perceived

Data collection

The two-stage data was collected from college students majoring in different areas in Taiwan. The subjects were asked to shop in the biggest and famous online shopping store in Taiwan—PChome Shopping Store. It's a branch department of the portal site—PChome Online—and once won a successful online shopping award in 2001, 2002, and 2003. This study recruited student subjects for several reasons. First of all, Metzger et al. (2003) found that college students rely very heavily on the Web for both

Data analysis

LISREL was used for data analysis, since it has been considered as a technology with distinct advantages than others (Gefen et al., 2003) and its result is more accurate parameter estimation and a “more realistic” (Bollen, 1989). Following a two-stage methodology recommended by Anderson and Gerbing (1988), this study assessed reliability and construct validity by conducting conformation factor analysis, then, the structure model was examined.

Discussion and implications

The purpose of this study is to develop an extended TPB model by incorporating constructs from EDT to examine temporal change of factors from pre-usage period to usage period and their impacts on users’ intention to continue using online shopping. The findings presented herein may respond to the research questions addressed in this study. First, the results challenge some of the basic tenets of TPB. TPB theorized that attitude, SN, and PBC were the key determinants of user intention to accept

Conclusion and limitations

We demonstrate the importance of disconfirmation and satisfaction with prior use in applying TPB to study the motivational factors in an individual's intention to continue using online shopping. Thus, disconfirmation and satisfaction with prior use might also be important considerations in the design of online shopping sites/systems.

Although our findings provide meaningful implications for online shopping continuance, our study has some limitations. First, some threats to internal validity may

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