Psychological factors affecting the intention to use e-commerce: a theoretical approach

There is a need in the literature for an application of the well known social cognitive theory in the area of e-commerce. Hence, this paper develops and models a theoretical framework to study the impact of psychological factors based on the social cognitive theory on the intention to use e-commerce. More specifically, the paper examines the role of individuals' beliefs about their abilities towards the intention to use e-commerce technology (e-commerce self-efficacy). A conceptual model, based on Bandura's social cognitive theory, was developed to test the personnel innovation in information systems, e-commerce self-efficacy, outcome expectations, trait anxiety, e-commerce anxiety, and consumer trust on the customers' intentions to shop online. Thus, the model developed can be applied to enhance the research in the area of e-commerce and can be used in different areas of e-commerce. Future studies can be employed in testing the model via using exploratory survey analysis to provide further support for the social cognitive theory and its application in the area of e-commerce.