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Role

Doctoral Researcher, Ecommerce and Social Commerce

University of Sussex

September 2010 – Present (3 years 7 months)

This research aims to develop a shopping environment, which strengthens the social context of online shopping and creates a social interaction similar to what customers experience in a normal shopping experience, e.g. when they visit the store with friends or relatives. This study explores how social and co-presence, like other important elements of shopping, exploited to produce intense 'trust' can be built, measured and improved within online retailers' websites? We investigate the impact of social and co presence and its subsequent effect on customers' attitudes towards shopping online when these socially rich elements, embedded in a shopping environment, are adjusted. Does social presence have a direct or indirect impact on online shopping, including involvement, engagement, interactivity and control? How can a socially designed shopping environment influence customers' search, evaluation, recommendation and decision behaviour in the context of online shopping? What is the scope of social influence on customers' attitude when online shopping is shared with friends or relatives? To answer these questions, our studies are designed to investigate and understand the factors that affect social presence and co-presence in a shopping environment. A research model was proposed for examining the impact of socially rich elements on social and co presence. The proposed model also provides additional insight into the effect and consequences of social and co presence on perceived involvement, engagement and interactivity in the online shopping experience

A fractional factorial trial of three intervention was planned. The experiment involved small groups of two participants who perform a group experimental task in a computer laboratory. Design of each experiment involve design of a structured questionnaire, a shopping environment and an experimental task. Appropriate subjective measures in the form of post-experiment questionnaires are selected. The population of this research includes staff and students of the University of Sussex. Paid volunteers will be recruited. The volunteers are eligible to partake in the study if they had previous online shopping experience. Participants will be invited to participate in a group with one social contact, e.g. a friend or a relative. Participants will be randomly assigned to four treatment conditions. The experiment involve small pilot groups of 4 (total of 8 people) who perform a group shopping task of one treatment condition. The result of pilots will be used to validate the designed-questionnaires, the experimental methodology, the effect size of each treatment condition and the sample size

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