Modeling Consumer Adoption of the Internet as a Shopping Medium: ...

Conceptual Framework

First, an integrated theoretical foundation, incorporating both the adoption of innovation and consumer shopping behavior perspectives, is developed to guide this research. Both innovation theory and consumer decision-making literature are used to build the theoretical foundation of this research. From an innovation adoption perspective, the innovation diffusion theory, the technology acceptance model, the theory of reasoned action, and the theory of planned behavior are all reviewed in a complementary manner in Chapter Two. The consumer decision-making process is integrated to conceptualize consumers’ adoption of the Internet as a shopping medium and to identify factors influencing adoption.

Second, to address the multidimensional features and dynamic nature of consumer adoption of the Internet as a shopping medium, this research conceptualized the construct of adoption into two dimensions: the decision-making steps completed through the Internet and the intention to continue shopping online. With respect to the steps of the decision-making process completed through the Internet, this research categorizes adoption into partial adoption versus full adoption to reflect both online visiting and purchasing behavior. With respect to the intention to shop online, this research categorizes adoption into active adoption versus discontinued adoption so as to capture any shift of online consumers’ shopping behaviors over time. Conceptualization of consumers’ adoption of the Internet as a shopping medium through the use of these two dimensions allows the research to examine the extent to which the Internet has been adopted.