Title: Did Covid-19 influence adoption of e-commerce among elderly citizens? The role of social presence, self-efficacy and trust

Authors: Boudhayan Ganguly; Tirthankar Nag; Pritha Chakraborty

Addresses: International Management Institute Kolkata, 2/4 C Judges Court Road, Kolkata 700027,West Bengal, India ' International Management Institute Kolkata, 2/4 C Judges Court Road, Kolkata 700027,West Bengal, India ' International Management Institute Kolkata, 2/4 C Judges Court Road, Kolkata 700027,West Bengal, India

Abstract: The 2020 lockdown amidst the Covid-19 pandemic has so far been the biggest lockdown in recorded world history. During this phase many of the elderly citizens had reduced their frequency of visiting marketplaces and some of them had shifted their buying behaviour from offline marketplaces to online apps with the intention of minimising the risk of getting infected. Although this has been supported by literature there are many studies that state lack of trust to be the primary reason for avoiding online shopping. This study has focused on the influence of social presence and Internet self-efficacy of elderly citizens in building trust with the apps. We have also empirically shown that trust acts as a mediator the relationships between social presence and purchase intention and between self-efficacy and purchase intention amongst elderly citizens.

Keywords: self-efficacy; social presence; trust; purchase intention; elderly citizens; mediator; moderator; online apps; Covid-19; pandemic.

DOI: 10.1504/IJISD.2024.135228

International Journal of Innovation and Sustainable Development, 2024 Vol.18 No.1/2, pp.30 - 44

Received: 16 Sep 2021
Accepted: 04 Apr 2022
Published online: 03 Dec 2023 *

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