Understanding Consumer’s Acceptance of Technology-Based Innovations in Retailing

Abstract

The availability of a huge number of studies about the Technology Acceptance Model (TAM) for predicting consumer's acceptance and usage of innovations in points of sale motivates writing of the present. Review, with emphasis on the new variables integrated in the traditional model. This is concerned with a synthesis of the current progresses in the field, thus offering a unified view of consumers' behaviour towards new technical solutions. Such synthesis is achieved from an extensive literature analysis, including computer science, innovation, human-computer interaction, and technology management perspectives. For each case, both opportunities and issues are outlined in order to advance the current knowledge and highlight what practitioners and scholars should take into account for developing new and efficient corporate strategies. ly applied also at retailing and consumers' usage of a new system in the points of sale (Pantano and Servidio, 2012). Hence, there is a huge amount of studies on the extended TAM, thus the need of a review able to synthesis the current progresses in this direction emerges for proposing a unified view of consumers' behaviour towards the new technical solutions in the points of sale. The aim of this paper is to provide a more comprehensive view of current researches in marketing and management studies, by reviewing the extant literature on TAM for advanced technology-based innovations for retailing including computer science, innovation management, human-computer interaction, and technology perspectives. We pursue this objective by reviewing studies that provide summaries of the variables and key findings of papers that directly address TAM. To achieve this task, we outline opportunities to enrich the knowledge of the phenomenon along with issues that practitioners and scholars should take into account for the development of new and efficient corporate strategies.The first part of the paper is devoted to the definition of emerging lines of inquiry and discussions of the theoretical contributions to the overall understanding of the phenomenon; whereas the second one focuses on the avenues for future perspectives, research methods and directions, suggestions on possible overviews for improving understanding of theoretical and practical issues emerged from the analysis. Conceptual frameworkIn the last decades an important line of inquiry focused on users' acceptance of new technologies has emerged, by understanding the main variables able to predict the actual usage of a system, in order to properly tailor new services and products to the market based on Technology Acceptance Model (Davis, 1989). In fact, literature proposes a wide range of successful applications at several sectors, such as e-learning (Liu et al.

Demand pull and technology push perspective in technology-based innovations for the points of sale: The retailers evaluation

“…), (ii) the enjoyment while using this innovation (Venkatesh, 2000;Wang, 2012), and (iii) the influence of others (i.e. relatives, partners, and friends; Chong et al, 2009;Pantano and Di Pietro, 2012). In fact, these variables are able to influence consumers' intention to use and the effective use of technical innovation, which requires providing fun, trust and use by a certain numbers of friends/relatives/etc.…”

“…Past studies on consumers' usage of innovative advanced technologies in points of sale underlined the important role played especially by (i) the trust in the technical system, which acquires a vital value when the technology substitutes face-to-face interaction with the retailer such as in the electronic channel (Pantano and Di Pietro, 2012;Chattaraman et al, 2012;Park et al, 2012;Rafiq et al, in press. ), (ii) the enjoyment while using this innovation (Venkatesh, 2000;Wang, 2012), and (iii) the influence of others (i.e.…”

“…A justification might rely on the uncertainty, risks, huge monetary investments and late returns on investment involved in the innovation process, with consequences for technology failure (Evans, 2011;Alkemade and Suurs, 2012;Pantano et al, 2013), which could discourage retailers to afford the technology-based innovations adoption process. For instance, uncertainty for retailers would be related to the consumers' acceptance of the technology, and the level of system usage, as well as the risk of obsolescence (in terms of obsolescence of components, threats of substitution with newer technology, and damages by users; Pantano and Di Pietro, 2012;Pantano et al, 2013;Zhu et al, 2013). Hence, the diffusion and utilization may be affected by several externalities able to reduce the exploitation of all benefits of the innovation.…”

“…In particular, the current advances in technologies are able to enhance both consumers' shopping activity and retailers' job (Pantano and Di Pietro, 2012;Zhu et al,2013). For instance, new interactive systems (such as touch screen displays) are able to provide more customized information on available products, as well as applications for clients' mobile devices that can support consumers in product searching inside the stores.…”

Adoption of Computer-Aided Technology (CAx) in Textile and Apparel Industries

“…Perceived competitive advantage: the degree to which customers believe that using a particular new technology would enhance their competitive advantage in the market [25]. Cost effectiveness: the degree to which customers believe that the cost of a new technology desired to be adopted is affordable and it deserves for the intended service [25] [26]. Perceived security: the degree to which customers believe that using a certain technology is secured; it would be safe, free from risk and maintain their privacy [27] [28].…”