E-commerce in the fashion business: the roles of the COVID-19 situational factors, hedonic and utilitarian motives on consumers' intention to purchase online

The study intends to investigate the roles of the COVID-19 epidemic situational factors and hedonic and utilitarian motives on consumers' intent to buy fashion products online. It is theorised that the COVID-19 epidemic situational factors include physical obstacles caused by the lockdown and the closings of brick-and-mortar retailers, the antecedent states linked to the anxiety during the outbreak, the store atmosphere characterised by the risk of contracting the Coronavirus during shopping activity, and social distancing. An online questionnaire was collected from 351 Indonesian consumers. SmartPLS 3 and PLS-SEM were used for hypothesis testing. The results reveal that the COVID-19 epidemic situational factors, utilitarian and hedonic motives positively and significantly affect consumers' intent to buy fashion products online. These findings will help online marketers and retailers develop their websites and improve their selling endeavours.

Utilitarian Ethical Triage Bayesian Decisions With Monetary Value During COVID-19 - A Bayesian Probability Analysis

Utilitarian ethical triage decisions with monetary value are complex and difficult to estimate, with possible benefits for a patient compared to other patients. A triage decision during an emergency combines expected economic value. It includes social and bioethical factors. A new Bayesian approach addresses risk probabilities and improves utilitarian triage decisions. Admission to the ICU (Intensive Care Unit) and the allocation of ventilators for patients depends on a risk-based comorbidity score. It considers the medical prognosis, social factors, personal and social costs. The rankings of the critical factors among patients with predefined ethical treatment success criteria depend on the likelihood of response to treatment and the patient's social circumstances. A sensitivity analysis with regression coefficients shows how the expected monetary value of patents is correlated to make a better judgment. Patient 3 in scenarios 1 and 2 is ranked consistently in priority. Low-ranked patients are placed on a waiting list as the demand for intensive care units increases dramatically with the number of patients infected with COVID-19 or its variants. The problem with utilitarianism ethics is that high net worth patients get an advantage, although disadvantaged patients with social liability are given due consideration. Furthermore, this research introduces a new hedonic Net Present Value based calculus of utilitarian ethics. © 2022 IGI Global. All rights reserved.

Intrinsic motivations affecting millennial mobile impulsive shopping in emerging markets during the COVID-19 pandemic

Purpose: This study examines intrinsic motivations and antecedents that affect millennial mobile impulsive shopping in markets with the technology acceptance model (TAM) during the COVID-19 pandemic. Design/methodology/approach: The study has been conducted by collecting data from 367 regular mobile shopping millennials, which was analyzed by structural equation modeling. Findings: The findings reported that the perceived ease of use correlates positively with perceived usefulness. Similarly, perceived ease of use, usefulness, perceived utilitarian value and hedonic value significantly impacts shoppers' trust and attitude toward impulsive mobile shopping. Perceived trust was found to exhibit a positive association with mobile shopping. Finally, perceived usefulness, ease of use, utilitarian value, hedonic value, trust and attitude significantly positively impacted millennials' impulsive mobile shopping. Practical implications: This study's results will help e-retailers establish novel techniques and efforts to enhance market volume and build solid connections with mobile customers by ensuring secure purchase habits. The results would also help companies develop customer satisfaction-focused business strategies. Originality/value: This study contributes to the body of literature by finding a significant impact of attitude, trust and shopping values on impulsive mobile shopping. These constructs have not been explored as factors impacting mobile impulsive shopping, especially when it comes to a pandemic. © 2023, Emerald Publishing Limited.

Intrinsic factors affecting online impulsive shopping during the COVID-19 in emerging markets

PurposeIn an emerging market, understanding shoppers' behavior in an online market is essential to developing online retail strategies. This research study examines the effects of intrinsic factors, namely, perceived utilitarian, hedonic value, materialism, fashion interest and enjoyment, on impulsive online shopping with mediating role of trust and online shopping attitude in the Indian emerging market.Design/methodology/approachData are collected from 443 Indian respondents, using purposive and snowball sampling. The data were analyzed using the IBM Statistical Product and Service Solutions (SPSS) and Analysis of Moment Structures (AMOS) package using structural equation modeling.FindingsThe results showed that perceived utilitarian, hedonic value, materialism and enjoyment factors significantly impacted perceived trust and online shopping attitude, but fashion interest had no effect. Mediating factors positively impacted impulsive online shopping and showed a significant association between intrinsic factors and impulsive online shopping.Research limitations/implicationsThe geographical area of study was limited to only India. Consequently, the findings and conclusions of the study had their limits. The research used the information continuum with a purposive and snowball approach that does not necessarily generalize the findings of the analysis. This work looked at factors stimulating the impulsive online shopping pattern of Indian shoppers in an emerging market.Practical implicationsThis research would help e-retailers develop new strategies and plans to increase sales volume and create strong relationships with online customers by providing trustworthiness and security in buying practices.Social implicationsThis study helps to understand the consumer impulsive buying during coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19), and it helps e-retailers to adopt a new online store to draw the attention of the consumers and enhance their online sales.Originality/valueIn this COVID-19 situation, this study explores the inherent factors influencing impulsive online shopping in the emerging Indian market. As a result, it contributes to visual identity literature by expanding the field of impulsive online shopping behavior.

Young People Under ‘Finfluencer': The Rise of Financial Influencers on Instagram: An Abstract

Under the shadow of the covid-19 pandemic, millions of young people have the resulting consequences (e.g., increased uncertainty regarding their careers and economic prospects: McGrindle, 2020;Yuesti et al., 2020) started to think more seriously about how to manage their financial resources. As a result, personal finance has become trendy to speak about. Rather than proactive actions coming through the formal financial services industry to address the increasing demand for accessible financial information that does not require an advisor or costs a fortune, we are witnessing the uprising of personal finance influencers. These financial influencers (a.k.a. Finfluencers) talk about how to manage various aspects of financial life and do so by promoting their advice on a broad scope of money related topics (ranging from dealing with student loans, buying a house, how to ask for a pay raise, budgeting tips, and tricks, filing for tax returns, stock investment opportunities, and portfolio management) in short, light-hearted video formats that are posted on Instagram, Tiktok, YouTube and other social media platforms. Although currently, these Finfluencers can be regarded as a niche influencer marketing group, it is expected to grow exponentially in the coming years – especially now that designated sections on social media platforms are taking off (e.g., #FinTok, #FinTwit, #Finmeme, #StockTok, #Findependence). In line with this trend, this research explores how consumers consume social media influencers when they offer utilitarian (rather than hedonic) oriented products, services, and advice. Using text-mining techniques, we examine the content of personal finance influencers on Instagram to investigate how consumers respond to the recommendation of more utilitarian-oriented products. In addition, gender and race are an integral part of the consumer's perception of financial expertise. This research looks at the moderating role of gender and race on influencers' financial expertise on consumer response. We found that influencers with financial accreditations generate a more positive affective response compared with financial influencers who mainly share information stemming from personal experience. In addition, we found that influencers' gender and race moderate the relationship between financial expertise and consumers' affective responses significantly. © 2023, The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG.

Spending Windfall ("Found") Time on Hedonic versus Utilitarian Activities

Consumers often gain extra free time unexpectedly. Given the increasing time pressure that consumers experience in their daily lives, it is important to understand how they spend windfall (or unexpected) free time, which we term found time. In a series of five laboratory experiments and naturalistic field studies, we found that consumers spend more of their free time on hedonic activities than on utilitarian activities when they gain the time unexpectedly (i.e. found time), but not when they know about the free time in advance. This pattern occurs consistently regardless of whether consumers gain the time from canceled work-related or leisure activities. In addition, our studies uncovered perceived busyness as a ubiquitous yet unexplored moderator for the windfall gain literature: the inclination to allocate found time to hedonic consumption decreases when consumers perceive themselves to be busy at the moment. We discuss several potential accounts for the effect of unexpectedness on time expenditure, including a perceived fit between the nature of found time (a fun windfall gain) and hedonic consumption, need for justification, and planning. [ FROM AUTHOR] Copyright of Journal of Consumer Research is the property of Oxford University Press / USA and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full . (Copyright applies to all s.)

Effects of perspective switching and utilitarian thinking on moral judgments in a sacrificial dilemma among healthcare and non-healthcare students.

During the COVID-19 pandemic, healthcare professionals have often faced moral challenges, which required them to choose between endorsing self- or other-sacrifice for the greater good. Drawing on the altruistic rationalization hypothesis and trait-activation theory, this study investigates (a) whether healthcare students' endorsement of utilitarian solutions to sacrificial moral dilemmas varies when they are confronted with the minority group, majority group, or third-person perspective on the given dilemma and (b) whether individual differences in utilitarian thinking, as measured by the Oxford Utilitarianism Scale (both instrumental harm and impartial beneficence), predict endorsement of utilitarian solutions to moral dilemmas. The study population was divided into a group of healthcare students and a group of non-healthcare students. It was found that the members of both groups expressed a stronger pro-utilitarian position when making moral dilemma judgments from a majority perspective than from the two other perspectives. However, a difference was observed with healthcare students being more reluctant to endorse the utilitarian action than their non-healthcare counterparts in the self-in-majority context. The instrumental harm component was a significant predictor of utilitarian judgments in the healthcare group, but impartial beneficence significantly predicted utilitarian judgments in the non-healthcare group in the self-in-majority context. Supplementary Information: The online version contains supplementary material available at 10.1007/s12144-023-04380-z.

Online Shopping During COVID-19: A Comparison of USA and Canada

During the COVID-19 pandemic, many governments restricted economic activity by imposing lockdowns or requiring capacity constraints, thereby impacting brick-and-mortar businesses. Consumers responded by staying at home and turning to online shopping. Some consumers were already familiar with online shopping, whereas for others it was a new experience. As restrictions are removed or reduced, consumers may permanently change their shopping habits and continue to buy online with greater frequency than prior to the pandemic. With empirical data from a cross section of Canadian and American consumers, this study investigates the factors that influence the continuation of online shopping. The results show that there is little difference between Canadians and Americans, with perceptions of convenience significantly influencing perceived usefulness, and efficiency being a significant factor as well but only for Americans. Perceived usefulness is important for continuance intentions, with hedonic motivation having a moderating effect. Our results provide guidance to practitioners who are interested in consumers' online shopping intentions after the pandemic and factors that can foster such activities.

How to increase consumer intention to use Chatbots? An empirical analysis of hedonic and utilitarian motivations on social presence and the moderating effects of fear across generations

As chatbots become more advanced and popular, marketing research has paid enormous attention to the antecedents of consumer adoption of chatbots. This has become increasingly relevant because chatbots can help mitigate the fear and loneliness caused by the global pandemic. Therefore, unlike previous work that focused on design factors, we theorize that social presence serves a mediating role between consumer motivations (i.e., hedonic and utilitarian) and intention to use a chatbot service based on self-determination theory. Our results from a structural equation model (n = 377) indicate that hedonic (but not utilitarian) motivation significantly affects chatbots' social presence, ultimately influencing intention to use the chatbot service. We also found that fear of COVID-19 amplifies the effect of social presence on intention to use the chatbot service. In this dynamic, we found an additional moderated moderation effect of generational cohorts (i.e., baby boomers and Generations X, Y, and Z) in experiencing different levels of fear of COVID-19. Overall, our findings emphasize the importance of motivation-matching features for consumer adoption of chatbot services. Our findings also indicate that marketers may utilize the fear element to increase adoption of chatbot services, especially when targeting the young generations (e.g., Generation Z). © 2023, The Author(s), under exclusive licence to Springer Science+Business Media, LLC, part of Springer Nature.

Predicting consumers' purchase intention through fast fashion mobile apps: The mediating role of attitude and the moderating role of COVID-19

Nowadays many people use mobile applications for different purposes to manage their daily activities more conveniently and efficiently. Thus, mobile apps contribute to the optimization of consumers' shopping experience during the decision-making process. Based on the S-O-R framework, the present study explores the direct and indirect impact of utilitarian, hedonic and social attributes of mobile apps on consumers' attitudes and purchase intention through fast fashion mobile apps. An online survey was conducted to test the proposed conceptual model, and the partial least squares (PLS) modeling technique was used for the reliability and validity assessment of the reflective constructs. The results indicate that hedonic motivations have a higher impact on consumers' attitudes than utilitarian ones. Attitude has multiple mediation roles, while channel-switching behaviour caused by COVID-19 moderates the relationship between attitude and purchase intention. The findings are relevant for marketers and fashion retailers to optimize branded mobile apps from a utilitarian and hedonic point of view.

The effect of utilitarian and hedonic motivations on mobile shopping outcomes. A cross‐cultural analysis

Mobile devices are ubiquitous in the lives of modern consumers, who use them for information‐seeking and purchasing activities, fostering the emergence of m‐commerce. This trend has been exacerbated by the COVID‐19 pandemic, which has boosted m‐commerce growth in both developed and developing countries. Hence, there is a need for cross‐cultural research concerning the factors affecting behavioural intentions. Drawing upon the hedonic information systems model, we measure the impact of utilitarian factors on satisfaction, repurchase intention, and eWOM through the mediation of enjoyment across two countries characterized by different stages of m‐commerce readiness and culture: China and Italy. Findings suggest that the impact of utilitarian factors on satisfaction is stronger among Italian users than Chinese users. On the contrary, for Chinese users, who use their mobile phones as a primary device to shop online, the mediation effect of enjoyment on satisfaction and eWOM is stronger. With this study, we contribute to cross‐cultural research in m‐commerce and provide guidelines to mobile retailers operating in diverse international markets.

The Impact of COVID-19 on Online Fashion Apparel Purchase Intention

The purpose of this study is to determine the influence of Covid-19 on the intention to purchase online fashion clothing. A structured questionnaire was used to collect data from 231 customers in an online survey. The researchers utilised exploratory factor analysis to uncover the most important elements that influence customer behaviour while purchasing online fashion items. Multiple regression study revealed that situational variables, practical motive, and safety and precaution had a positive and substantial influence on customers' online buy intention for fashion items. Hedonic incentive, on the other hand, had a minor impact, despite being beneficial on purpose. A structured questionnaire was shared with the respondents for data collection. The Questionnaire was floated between individuals who purchase fashion apparel online. The questions assessing the four predictors were first subjected to an exploratory factor analysis. Second, multiple regression was used to determine the influence of these variables on online purchase intentions among customers.

Preference for utilitarian or hedonic value options during a pandemic crisis: The moderation effects of childhood socioeconomic status and sensation-seeking.

This research investigated hospitality consumers' relative preferences for utilitarian or hedonic value under COVID-19 pandemic conditions. A series of four experiments and one secondary data analysis showed that the salience of the infectious disease threat increased consumers' preferences for hospitality options that provide relatively more utilitarian than hedonic value. Additionally, we identified two individual differences (i.e., childhood socioeconomic status (SES) & sensation-seeking) that moderated the effect of the infectious disease threat on the preferred hospitality consumption value. Specifically, the higher the childhood SES, the higher was the preference for the utilitarian value option, and the lower the level of sensation-seeking, the greater was the preference for the utilitarian value option. This research extends our understanding of the influence of the infectious disease threat on preference changes in hospitality decisions.

THE IMPACT OF THE COVID-19 PANDEMIC ON ONLINE CONSUMER BEHAVIOR FOR THE BOOK MARKET IN ROMANIA

The COVID-19 pandemic and the subsequent lockdown, along with the social distancing rules imposed by governments around the world, have caused major changes in the publishing industry and, therefore, in the book consumption patterns. The main goal of this paper is to identify the changes in the purchasing habits of book consumers within two different frameworks of motivations: utilitarian and hedonic – both studied during the COVID-19 pandemic. A model was developed to study the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic as a circumstantial impact, because it implicated the temporary shutdown of physical bookshops, the uncertainty of contracting the virus by visiting the shops once they re-opened along with the upgrades that online bookshops developed during the pandemic to attract customers. Data were gathered from 410 Romanian consumers by applying an online survey. Multivariate data analysis applied to the model showed that the COVID-19 pandemic context had a positive and significant influence on the customers' intents of online book purchasing. Moreover, while hedonic reasons exerted a compelling influence on the customers' intents to buy books online, the association between utilitarian reasons and online buying intents is positive, but insignificant. These results could support all stakeholders within the book market, such as publishing firms and online bookshops to strengthen their online presence – to develop their websites, their social media pages, as well as expand their advertising operations through different channels. The outcomes of this research are important and useful also for the academic environment, as the changes within the book market and the evolution of book consumption behavior influence research and academic writing overall. © 2022, Technical University of Liberec. All rights reserved.

Improving export performance trough innovation capability during COVID-19 pandemic: The mediation role of aesthetic-utilitarian value and positional advantage

Globalization has made exports an important activity for several companies including the growing Small and Medium Enterprises (SMEs). This is observed in the wood craft SMEs which is one of the main pillars supporting the Balinese economy when the tourism sector experienced a decline during the COVID-19 pandemic. It is important to note that innovation capability is a special asset for SME to increase exports, especially when the products have value and advantages. Therefore, this study analyzed value creation through the adoption of the Service-Dominant Logic (SDL) theory which was manifested in the aesthetic-utilitarian value variable. The study population includes all the 242 woodcraft SMEs in Bali while the samples were selected using the census method and the data obtained were analyzed through the partial least squares technique. The results showed that innovation capability has a positive effect on export performance, aesthetic-utilitarian value, and positional advantage. Moreover, aesthetic-utilitarian value and positional advantage were discovered to have a positive influence on export performance and also partially mediated the relationship between innovation capability and export performance. This implies SMEs need to develop high innovation capabilities to ensure their products are superior to those of their competitors. Furthermore, the value offered also needs to be unique and in line with customer needs. © 2023 Growing Science Ltd. All rights reserved. © 2023 by the authors;licensee Growing Science, Canada.

The Maze Runner, the pandemic, and the Gospel

The Maze Runner book series and movie trilogy is set in the future, when ecological disaster and a global pandemic strike. Many children and young adults are immune to the disease and are therefore quarantined, studied, and used to develop a cure for the "flare. " This article examines some of the ethical frameworks experienced in the COVID-19 pandemic using the Maze Runner movies as illustrations. It also examines contemporary culture and proposes that a more robust gospel witness is needed to better deal with future global pandemics.

Post-pandemic revisit intentions: how shopping value and visit frequency matters

PurposeThis paper examines the effect of shopping value (utilitarian, hedonic and social) on shopping satisfaction and store revisit intention in the post-pandemic phase. Additionally, the authors investigate how shoppers' COVID-responsible behaviour and visit frequency are contingent on their shopping value evaluations.Design/methodology/approachData were collected (n = 527) using the store intercept method during March 2022 (a recovery phase from the third wave of COVID-19 in India). The authors adopted structural equation modelling to test the proposed model.FindingsShopping values significantly impacted shopping satisfaction and store revisit intentions. The effects of utilitarian and hedonic value on satisfaction were stronger for frequent shoppers than infrequent shoppers. While utilitarian value contributes to stronger satisfaction of COVID-responsible shoppers, COVID-non-responsible shoppers are better satisfied with social value. The impact of hedonic and social value on satisfaction has reduced significantly from the pre- to post-pandemic phase.Practical implicationsPractising managers should recognise that positive shopping value evaluations are important for generating satisfaction. Notably, the utilitarian value becomes more important in times of environmental exigencies. The study provides insights to devise strategies to attract and retain frequent shoppers who are major contributors to the store's profit.Originality/valueThis study is one of the few studies which focuses on in-store shopping and consumers' shopping value evaluations in a COVID-19 recovery phase. This study is one of the first that compares the post-pandemic shopping value judgement to a pre-pandemic phase. The authors provide valuable insights into store revisit intentions of shoppers who behave responsibly in a challenging environment.

Effects of the Implementation of an Intervention Based on Falls Education Programmes on an Older Adult Population Practising Pilates-A Pilot Study.

Age brings consequent physical deterioration of body balance, strength, flexibility and agility. It has been demonstrated that daily physical activity (PA), managed by professionals, is fundamental to ageing with increased quality and to reducing the number of falls, which are a consequence of factors highlighted above. This has been most evident during the COVID-19 pandemic. The aim of this study is to determine and analyse the effects of a multidisciplinary intervention based on the Safe Fall, Safe Schools, adapted utilitarian judo (JUA) and Pilates programmes in a population of older people. After an intervention of 60 min, 2 days a week for 12 weeks, the changes produced in variables such as quality of life, balance, lower body strength, flexibility and agility were analysed. A p-value ≤ 0.05 is accepted. The data show that the intervention can help to improve quality of life, especially two of its dimensions: pain (increases 12 points) and health transition (increases 13 points). It also helped to improve balance, lower body strength, flexibility and agility to a lesser extent. It is concluded that this type of intervention has positive effects for the sample in all the variables mentioned above.

The effect of deliberative process on the self-sacrificial decisions of utilitarian healthcare students.

BACKGROUND: The COVID-19 pandemic has highlighted prosocial behavior as a professional healthcare core competency. Although medical students are expected to work in the best interests of their patients, in the pandemic context, there is a greater need for ethical attention to be paid to the way medical students deal with moral dilemmas that may conflict with their obligations. METHODS: This study was conducted in the spring semester of 2019 on 271 students majoring in health professions: medicine, dentistry, and veterinary medicine. All participants provided informed consent and completed measures that assessed utilitarian moral views, cognitive reflections, cognitive reappraisal, and moral judgment. RESULTS: The healthcare-affiliated students who scored higher on the instrumental harm subscale in the measurement of utilitarian moral views were more likely to endorse not only other-sacrificial actions but also self-sacrificial ones for the greater good in moral dilemma scenarios. In particular, those engaged in deliberative processes tended to make more self-sacrificial judgments. The mediation analysis also revealed that the effect of deliberative processes on self-sacrificial judgments was mediated by cognitive reappraisal. CONCLUSIONS: These findings suggested that cognitive reappraisal through deliberative processes is involved when the students with utilitarian inclination make prosocial decisions, that it is necessary to consider both moral views and emotional regulation when admitting candidates, and that moral education programs are needed in the healthcare field.

The effect of utilitarian and hedonic motivations on mobile shopping outcomes. A cross-cultural analysis

Mobile devices are ubiquitous in the lives of modern consumers, who use them for information-seeking and purchasing activities, fostering the emergence of m-commerce. This trend has been exacerbated by the COVID-19 pandemic, which has boosted m-commerce growth in both developed and developing countries. Hence, there is a need for cross-cultural research concerning the factors affecting behavioural intentions. Drawing upon the hedonic information systems model, we measure the impact of utilitarian factors on satisfaction, repurchase intention, and eWOM through the mediation of enjoyment across two countries characterized by different stages of m-commerce readiness and culture: China and Italy. Findings suggest that the impact of utilitarian factors on satisfaction is stronger among Italian users than Chinese users. On the contrary, for Chinese users, who use their mobile phones as a primary device to shop online, the mediation effect of enjoyment on satisfaction and eWOM is stronger. With this study, we contribute to cross-cultural research in m-commerce and provide guidelines to mobile retailers operating in diverse international markets. © 2022 The Authors. International Journal of Consumer Studies published by John Wiley & Sons Ltd.