Untangling Utilitarian & Hedonic Consumption Behaviors in Online Shopping : Methodological Design

1. BUS 982 – Dissertation Development Workshop Untangling Utilitarian & Hedonic Consumption Behaviors in Online Shopping: Methodological Design [ Eric Lim ]

2. methodological design • online survey method because:- • respondents are likely to be Internet-savvy individuals • everyday consumer as the unit of analysis automatically precludes case studies in capturing a representative sample • huge number of constructs far exceeds the pragmatic figure feasible for experimental manipulation • survey measures will be generated from extant literature and then tested for construct validity through conducting two rounds of card sorting exercises(Moore and Benbasat, 1991) • resultant questionnaire will be pre-tested on a convenient sample of graduate students and faculty members to:- • verify the wording of the items to further validate content validity • scrutinize the clarity of the instructions since there will not be face-to-face interaction between the researcher and actual respondents • assess proper functioning of the online survey across a variety of browser platforms, display resolutions and hardware systems

3. methodological design (continued…) • survey participants for this study will be recruited from a commercialized marketing research company with track record in e-commerce studies • email pre-notifications will be sent to invite each respondent to enroll for the survey; instructions are automatically mailed out to each individual upon receipt of his/her consent • participants will be requested to assess an e-commerce website from which they have performed a transaction within the period of the last six months • a conservative estimate of non-response bias will be computed by dividing the total number of responses over the number of unique visits to the online survey questionnaire • chi-square (χ2) tests will be performed to determine whether any significant differences existed between the profile of survey respondents and that of the demographic distribution documented in the latest e-commerce study

4. data analysis • Partial Least Squares (PLS) will be utilized for data analysis due to its:- • ability to handle highly complicated predictive models with a large array of formative and reflective constructs(Barclay et al, 1995) • small sample size requirement because the response rates from online surveys are extremely inconsistent as demonstrated in previous studies • convergent validity is evaluated based on the average variance extracted (AVE) and reliability for each construct whereas discriminant validity is assessed from inter-construct correlation and cross-loading tables • verification of the structural model includes estimates of the path coefficients that indicate the strength of the relationship between a pair of dependent and independent variables as well as the R2 values • pseudo-F tests will be conducted to determine the impact of dropping each constituent dimension of transactional functionalities and aesthetic properties on their respective overall attitudinal constructs of functional and aesthetic performance