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ABSTRACT
Drawing upon the stimulus-organism-response framework, this study investigates contextual and environmental stimuli effects (streamer attractiveness, para-social interactions, and information quality) from a live streaming commerce context on viewer's cognitive and emotional states (cognitive assimilation and arousal) and their subsequent responses (hedonic consumption, impulsive consumption, and social sharing). Based on 300 valid survey data, we found 1) the three stimuli have direct effects on cognitive and emotional states, and cognitive and emotional states have direct effects on three responses, 2) the streamer attractiveness and para-social interaction effects on the three responses are mediated by arousal. However, cognitive assimilation only mediates the information quality effect on the three responses. These findings provide insights into how live streaming stimuli influence consumer's cognitive and emotional states, in turn influencing consumer behavior in a live streaming commerce context.
Keywords: Live streaming commerce; Stimulus-Organism-Response; Para-social interaction; Arousal; Social sharing
1.Introduction
E-commerce development is experiencing an evolution through the adoption of various types of emerging novel applications to enhance customer participation and achieve greater economic value [Huang and Benyoucef 2013]. As an interactive multimedia platform providing entertainment, social and commercial activities, live streaming has gained in popularity since 2011 [Hilvert-Bruce et al. 2018]. According to the Interactive Advertising Bureau [IAB, May 2018], 47% of live streaming viewers worldwide spend more time watching live streaming compared with a year ago [Emarketer 2018]. From a retailer's perspective, taking advantage of live streams opens up a wealth of opportunities in marketing, customer service, and revenue. There is no wonder that major retailers like Amazon and QVC operated their own live video shopping platforms in 2019 [Wowza Media Systems 2019]. China had up to 433 million live streaming viewers in August 2019 [CNNIC 2019]. The use of live streaming to promote brands and products is "exploding" in the E-commerce field in China [Aliresearch 2020]. For example, during the "June 18" event in 2019, Taobao's live streaming platform drove sales of 13 billion yuan, with the number of merchants broadcasting live streaming increasing by nearly 120% year-on-year. The number of broadcasts grew by 150% year- on-year [CNNIC 2019]. Great changes can be seen when applying live streaming commerce compared to more conventional marketing strategies.
With the integration of live streaming in e-commerce, greater potential is...
