The current study uses risk theory to explore factors mitigating consumers’ intention to use SSTs. The findings of an empricial study reveal that the perceived time, security and addiction risk indirectly reduce consumers’ intention to use SSTs through the per-ceived psychological risk. Most importantly, this study’s findings show that an increas-ing autonomy of SSTs strengthens the effects of perceived addiction risk.
The purpose of this study was to explore how consumer traits(technology anxiety and need for interaction) explain attitude toward self-service technologies in fashion retail stores. We examined if technology anxiety influences perceived productivity and attitude toward self-service technologies, and if so, how the need for interaction with employees moderates the impact of technology anxiety on perceived productivity and attitude. For the purpose of the study, a web-based survey with Korean consumers was conducted. The final sample size was 214. Structural Equation Modeling Analysis and PROCESS in SPSS were employed to test the proposed hypotheses. The findings indicated that technology anxiety negatively affected perceived productivity and attitude toward self-service technologies in which perceived productivity affected attitude positively. Need for interaction with employees was found to moderate the relationship between technology anxiety and perceived productivity. It also moderated the relationship between technology anxiety and attitude. This study contributes to the self-service technology literature by identifying two antecedents of consumer attitude toward selfservice technologies: technology anxiety and the need for interaction. The findings further provide valuable insights to retailers and marketers as to how technology anxiety, perceived productivity, and the need for interaction work in enhancing consumer attitude toward self-service technologies in the context of fashion retail.
In service encounter, value creation comes not only from customer-to- service provider interaction but also from customer-to-customer interaction (CCI). A number of studies have demonstrated that the CCI plays an important role in perceived service quality, value creation, and customer satisfaction. Although prior researcher have explored the effect of CCI, they have focused more on traditional service encounter which service employee is present than on technology-based self-service (TBSS) encounter without employee presence. TBSS is an activity or benefit based on hard technologies that service providers offer so that customers can perform the service, or parts of the service by themselves. Focal customers can be influenced directly or indirectly by other customers in service encounter. To examine the effect of ICCI on service quality in TBSS, we conducted two studies. Study 1 focus on the impact of ICCI on service quality and the mediation of service experience. Study 2 explore whether the service failure moderates the relationship between ICCI and service experience. In experiment 1, a single factor (other customers: presence VS. absence) experiment was conducted with two different level of ICCI. Results show that compared with other customer absences when other customer presences focal customer perceived service quality is lower. That is, ICCI has a significant main effect on service quality. In addition, Experiment 1 provided evidence that a partial mediating factor underlying the relationship between ICCI and service quality was customers’s emotion. In experiment 2, A 2 (other customers: presence VS. absence) × 2 (service failure: yes VS. no) between subject design was conducted. An ANOVA on negative emotion yielded a significant ICCI × service failure interaction. The participants in the other customer presence condition experienced service was more discomfortable when the service was failed than when the service was succeeded. However, this effect was strengthened for the other customer absence condition. With advances in information technology, there has been a proliferation of self-service technologies across the services sector in the past decade. The quality and experience of technology-based self-service are very much worth the attention of service providers. Our study reveals the effect of ICCI on service quality and the mechanism by the mediation of negavtive emotion and the boundary condition of the link between ICCI and negative emotion. These results suggest that service providers should avoid ICCI, such as providing closed ATM, kiosk, and so on. In addition, the firms should try their best to guide customer to ensure the production and delivery of self-service to reduce service failures.
The flourishing trend of using multiple technology-based self-service channels (hereafter, SSCs) can be found across various service industries. So far, no studies have explored the effect of multichannel interaction on breadth consumer relationship breadth (i.e., cross-buying intention). Based on brand extension theory and the cross-buying literature, this study proposed a conceptual model for understanding the key determinants of consumer cross-buying intention in the context of multiple SSCs. A total of 262 respondents who had experience with using both online and mobile banking were collected. The result revealed that perceived online banking quality (i.e., original SSC), image congruity, and value congruity facilitate consumer trust and satisfaction toward a mobile banking service (i.e., extension SSC). In addition, the trust and satisfaction toward mobile banking have a positive influence on crossbuying intention. The result of this study not only provides an academic contribution to the multichannel service and SSC literature but also provides suggestions for service providers who wish to develop their multiple-SSC strategies.
Self Service Technology (SST) refers to technological interfaces that enable customers to produce a service independently, without service employees’ direct involvement. Because of the recent technological evolution and rising labor cost, most companies in the retail and service industries tend to use more technology-based SST options. In this study, we tried to investigate the effects of technology readiness and consumer readiness on SST service quality, attitude toward using SST, and intention to use SST in franchise fast food restaurants. The study results showed a significant and positive influence on all six dimensions of SST service quality. This research found that consumer readiness has a stronger and statistically more significant influence on all of SST service quality’s six constructs than does TR. Within a setting in which a customer is using SST, consumer readiness is a concept that is composed of the following: customer’s own role clarity, ability to utilize SST, and self-efficacy about using SST. Shim & Han (2012) confirmed that Consumer Readiness is a strong variable that effects motivation to use SST. This research presents academic significance in that it verified that consumer readiness is a major leading variable that influences perceived SST service quality. This research confirmed the moderating effects of consumer traits (self-consciousness, need for interaction, technology anxiety) and situational factors (perceived crowding, perceived waiting time) within the relationship between SST service quality and attitudes and intentions toward using SST. Study results showed that all variables have moderating effects. Ease of SST use was shown to have a strong influence on developing attitudes and intentions toward using SST in people with high levels of technology anxiety. For people with low levels of technology anxiety, ease or difficulty of SST use did not affect their attitude toward using SST. The expectation of increased enjoyment through SST use had an impact on developing attitudes and intentions toward using SST. This implies that expectation of increased enjoyment does not affect the development of intention toward using SST for people with high technology anxiety, as their technology anxiety is greater than such expectation. In contrast, this expectation of increased enjoyment greatly affects the development of attitude toward using SST for people with low technology anxiety. As a result, when introducing SST, firms need to design the system to appeal to people with high technology anxiety. Results also revealed that innovativeness does not have statistically significant influences on enjoyment or convenience. Because our results confirmed that technology readiness is an important leading variable of SST service quality, our research supported the works of Lin & Hsieh (2006) and Zeithaml et al. (2002). Managerial implications and limitations of the study were also discussed.
The introduction of self-service technologies (SSTs) in retail stores aims to provide customers with a more satisfying shopping experience. Many retailers are increasingly turning toward the adoption of self-service technologies in providing services directly to customers. Given that previous SST research has focused mainly on the impact of the introduction of SST on customer responses, the present study explored the impact of the presence of employees in the relationship between SST and customer responses. Based on the two ground theories, motivation-based theories of behavior and social impact theory, this study tested the relationships between shopping motivations, SST use intention, and retailer attitude. Moderating effects of the presence of employees on the three relationships were also tested. Data were collected using an online survey and analyzed through structural equations modeling. Test results showed that both hedonic and utilitarian shopping motivations effect on SST use intentions, and SST use intentions effect on retailer attitude, subsequently. Although the presence of employee did not moderate the relationship between shopping motivations and SST use intentions, the employee presence moderated the relationship between SST use intentions and retailer attitude. The impact of SST use intentions on retailer attitude was higher in the high presence of employee group than in the low group.