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The success of social commerce depends on the actual transactions of consumers, which will be prevented in the presence of high uncertainty. However, attention paid to the uncertainty reduction strategies in social commerce is limited, especially from a unified theoretical framework. Based on uncertainty reduction theory (URT), this paper aims to investigate how three uncertainty reduction strategies (i.e. situational normality, perceived effectiveness of social commerce institutional mechanisms (PESIM) and swift guanxi) affect perceived uncertainty in social commerce, which in turn affects buyers' purchase intention and purchase behavior. The moderating effects of PESIM on the relationships between the other two strategies and perceived uncertainty were also tested.

In this study longitudinal data from 211 buyers who have usage experience of Xiaohongshu were collected to test the proposed model and hypotheses.

Results show that the three uncertainty reduction strategies significantly reduce perceived uncertainty. PESIM negatively moderates the relationships between situational normality and perceived uncertainty, swift guanxi and perceived uncertainty. Perceived uncertainty is negatively related to purchase intention. Purchase intention positively affects purchase behavior.

This study focuses on the role of uncertainty reduction mechanisms in promoting purchase behavior through uncertainty reduction and sheds light on the relationships among situational normality, PESIM, swift guanxi and perceived uncertainty based on URT, which have not been extensively studied from a theoretical perspective in social commerce contexts. Besides, this study investigates the moderating role of PESIM, which improves the understanding of the role of swift guanxi and situational normality in reducing perceived uncertainty under the boundary condition of PESIM.

Although Agtech firms have promoted digital platforms for retailing farm supplies (RFS), farmers are sceptical while purchasing them online. As a result, they struggle to generate a sustained demand. Among other approaches, these platforms onboard complementors to become full-stack farming solution providers. Whether platform complementarity can induce farmers' trust remains ambiguous. Literature on network externality theory highlights that complementarity positively affects the perceived value for buyers. The sociotechnical systems literature indicates that perceived value is an antecedent of user trust. In this vein, the authors ask: Does perceived complementarity affect farmers' trust in the RFS platform? Alternatively, the Agtech firms augment the platform's look and feel to make the digital retail setting appear “normal” to farmers. The extant research on the social cognitive theory indicates that a retail setting conforming with the generalised expectancy of buyers harbours their trust. Against this backdrop, the authors ask whether situational normality affects farmers' trust in the RFS platform.

The study is based on a questionnaire survey of 212 Indian farmers using RFS platforms. The data were analysed using structural equation modelling (SEM) analysis.

This study establishes that platforms' complementarity and situational normality ameliorate farmer trust. The authors also identify the socioeconomic factors shaping the farmers' trust in platforms.

The present study has taken all RFS together as a single umbrella category, which can be considered a limitation. Also, the study is based on the cross-sectional survey of RFS platform users; the farmers' attitudes are dynamic in nature and evolve over time; however, the temporal factors shaping the farmer attitudes have not been considered in this study.

The study establishes the epistemological relationship between complementarity, situational normality and farmers' trust in agricultural platforms.

The purpose of this paper is to identify factors that affect continuance intention towards internet banking usage using the institutional trust theory.

Data were collected from 481 internet banking users from a bank in Ghana using a questionnaire. The respondents were internet banking users. Data were analysed using partial least square-structural equation modelling.

The results from the analysis revealed that information quality, service quality, privacy and security concerns were significant predictors of both trust and satisfaction. Structural assurance and situational normality were also found to significantly affect trust. Other factors that were found to be significant of continuance intention included satisfaction and trust.

Studies investigating customers’ continuance intention towards internet banking usage using the institutional trust theory in an emerging economy like Ghana is rare. Hence, this study provides a model for banks operating in Ghana to understand internet banking customers’ continuance intention towards internet banking usage.

The purpose of this paper is to investigate why users are willing to diffuse healthcare knowledge in social media by drawing on the communicative ecology theory (CET) and prior research on interpersonal communication.

This paper conducts a large-scale scenario-based online survey in WeChat (the most popular social media platform in China) to test the proposed research model and hypotheses. The final data set consists of 1,039 useful responses from WeChat users.

The results indicate that interestingness, emotionality and institution-based trust are the strongest antecedents in predicting healthcare knowledge-diffusing likelihood, followed by usefulness, source credibility and positivity. Further, the relationship between institution-based trust and healthcare knowledge-diffusing likelihood is partially mediated by source credibility.

Healthcare practitioners who seek to motivate individuals to disseminate healthcare knowledge need to phrase or frame healthcare knowledge in a way that draws greater interest, evokes stronger emotion, increases perceived usefulness or reflects positively on themselves. Healthcare organizations should also pay attention to strengthening users’ trust in the platform and source-related information that can indicate source authority.

This study is one of the first to investigate the dissemination of healthcare knowledge in the context of social media (WeChat in particular). Compared with other types of information, healthcare knowledge is more scientific and professional to the extent that most laypersons do not have relevant expertise to directly evaluate whether the content is credible and of high quality. Rather, their sharing likelihood is dependent more on other factors than perceived information quality and credibility; those factors include platform-related factors that may play an important role but has been overlooked in prior literature on interpersonal communication. By combining CET with interpersonal communication-related research and including institution-based trust as an important determinant of healthcare knowledge dissemination, this study provides a comprehensive analysis of healthcare knowledge diffusion process.

Via an initial trust‐building model, the purpose of this paper is to examine consumers' initial trust in an unfamiliar online retailer, considering cognitive perceptions of the retailer and institutional beliefs about the online environment.

A random sample of 2,000 US households, resulting in 477 usable responses, was surveyed by assigning subjects to one of the two shopping scenarios portraying an online insurance retailer with a weak or strong reputation.

Structural equation modelling revealed that second‐hand cognitive and first‐hand institutional information have comparable and contrasting effects on purchase intent through formation of initial trust.

Results imply that consumers form initial trust using a combination of cognitive perceptions about the online retailer and consumers' institutional beliefs regarding the online environment. Ways in which researchers and online retailers can shape initial trust formation via these antecedents are suggested.

The influence of an institutional belief, situational normality of the online environment, on initial trust has not been previously investigated by simultaneously assessing relative influences of institutional beliefs and cognitive perceptions of the online retailer.

The purpose of this paper is to identify antecedents of e-finance continuance intention with Alibaba’s Yu’E Bao as an example.

An online questionnaire was used to collect the data (n=293), and partial least squares structural equation modeling was employed for data analysis. Four e-finance features (perceived reputation, website quality, e-finance familiarity and situational normality) are introduced with trust acting as a moderator between the users’ satisfaction and continuance intention to use an e-finance platform.

The results find that website quality, familiarity and situational normality can influence perceived ease of use (PEOU) and perceived usefulness (PU). PEOU and PU, together with reputation, are positively associated with confirmation which further leads to satisfaction. The positive effects that satisfaction and trust have on e-finance continuance intention are confirmed, and trust is found to be a significant moderator on the relationship between satisfaction and continuance intention.

The findings can be used to guide e-finance providers to improve their platform design and services to retain users.

This study combines the theory of trust, Technology Acceptance Model and Expectations Confirmation Theory to investigate the factors that influence the continuance intention in the context of e-finance in China.

The purpose of this paper is to investigate the effects of trust in service and structural assurance on the continuance intention of FinTech services, and the roles of technical factors (i.e. situational normality and system quality) and social factors (i.e. herding and subjective norm) in developing trust in service and structural assurance. YuEbao is selected as the subject as it is a representative example of FinTech services in China.

A survey questionnaire was deployed and a ten-point sliding scale with two-decimal points was applied to improve the accuracy of the questionnaire. Partial least squares structural equation modeling was used to analyze the data.

Trust in service and structural assurance can encourage continuance intention of FinTech service. System quality, situational normality and subjective norm can boost the development of trust in service. Both herding and subjective norm can affect structural assurance significantly.

The study highlights the important roles played by technical factors (i.e. situational normality and system quality) and social factors (i.e. herding and subjective norm) in developing the two levels of trust (i.e. trust in service and structural assurance). It also validates the influences of trust in service and structural assurance on encouraging customers’ continuance intention in the novel context of FinTech.

The findings of this study can be used by practitioners to encourage customers to continue using their FinTech services. To encourage continuance, service providers can improve the quality of their system, design the system to be aligned with customers’ using habits and show customers that their close friends are also using the service.

This study adds to the existing body of trust literature by investigating the direct effects of trust in service and structure assurance on continuance intention and how these two levels of trust are developed from technical and social aspects. It generates interesting insights into customers’ continuance behavior of FinTech services.

The purpose of this paper is to understand the connection among trust’s antecedents, dimensions and consequences in the context of e-banking.

A survey of 510 and 122 respondents in Taiwan and New Zealand (NZ), respectively, was conducted.

The empirical results indicate that, first, not all trusts’ precursors the authors considered have significant influence on generating consumers’ trust and, second, that influential weights of these precursors on building consumer trust vary across consumers and cultures. Meanwhile, all factors on the e-banking side hold greatly significant influence on consumers’ trust in both NZ and Taiwan cases.

Practical and academic implications culled from the empirical results are discussed, and these implications may also be applicable to other information and communication technology (ICT) solutions and innovation banking services.

Before banks shift their focus on to trust resources of consumer side, banks are advised to create clients’ trust from e-banking side, such as situational normality and structural assurance.

This paper takes a holistic view to investigate the links between trust’s dimensions, antecedents and consequences in a single research structure, and the implications may also be applicable to other ICT solutions and innovative banking services.

The purpose of this study is to characterize consumers with high impulse buying tendency (IBT) by comparing them with low-IBT consumers in an online shopping context.

Data were collected through a postal survey to a random sample of Swedish citizens, resulting in 144 responses, which were analysed statistically..

Results indicate that high-IBT consumers, compared to those with low IBT, are on average younger, more likely to be female and more frequent online shoppers with higher levels of trust in the internet. However, they seem more likely than low-IBT consumers to abandon their online shopping carts before completing the purchase, often because of need uncertainty.

The findings can give retailers a better understanding of consumers with high IBT and thereby increase the possibility to target and communicate with them more effectively. This is an interesting opportunity as both multi-channel shopping and impulse buying behaviour is likely to become even more common in the future.

The study contributes to the understanding of impulsive consumers, as it addresses the role of situational and socio-demographic attributes of high-IBT consumers compared to low-IBT consumers. The differences in online purchases, intentions to buy fashion online, shopping cart abandonment and trust in the internet suggest that even if IBT is a relatively stable and general personal trait, the tendencies to act on buying impulses may be more context-specific.

The purpose of this research is to investigate how the consumer’s trusting mechanism influences their behavioral adoption intention in the context of genetic testing.

Based on the technology acceptance theory and trust formation theory, the research posits and develops a comprehensive trust model by integrating trust-related factors that correlate to the consumer’s trusting beliefs and trusting intention. Survey data with 525 respondents allow to test and validate the model.

The tested model shows that technology institutional trust base, end-user’s cognitive trust base and social influence are significant determinants of trusting beliefs. The findings also reveal that mediation effects of performance expectancy and perceived risks exist in the relationship between trusting beliefs and trusting intention.

The foreseeable positive impact and rapid market growth of emerging healthcare technologies necessitate the strong need to study user acceptance. However, there is a lack of research on how consumers trust and their adoption intention of such innovations. Prior empirical evidence from different contexts and perspectives also show contradictory findings. This research extends the existing technology acceptance literature to a healthcare context, provides an improved generalized understanding of the consumer’s trusting mechanism in emerging biotechnology and discusses practical insights for regulatory authorities, healthcare institutes and medical professionals.