Exploring Online Transaction Self-Efficacy in Trust Building in B2C E-Commerce

This study offers insight into whether trust-building and purchase intention can be affected by incorporating a motivational factor such as self-efficacy into online consumer trust-building. Previous e-trust study has illuminated individual online consumer trust in e-commerce as the outcome of a subjective judgment mechanism. In an effort to expand understanding of trust-building, self-efficacy, an important factor in explaining motivation of individual judgments and behaviors, has been incorporated into the domain of business-to-consumer (B2C) e-commerce. To overcome the limitation of the introduction of self-efficacy attempted in existing information system study, domain-specific self-efficacy has been introduced in the online purchases situation, and the relationship between general self-efficacy and situation-specific self-efficacy also has been taken into consideration. Results show that online transaction self-efficacy, as proposed and used as a situation-specific self-efficacy, affects trust in the online vendor and positively influences an individual online consumer’s purchase intention.