Influencing Factors And Mechanism Of Continuance Intention On Internet Consumer Credit Products

In the traditional credit industry,financial institutions focus on serving the powerful 20% of customers in the “20-80 Law”,while the remaining 80% of long-tail customers are faced with higher credit constraints due to such characteristics as diverse financial needs and high-risk costs.However,under the background of online finance and the application of big data technology,online financial enterprises have the characteristics of light asset and low cost,which allows them to serve long-tail users.Thus,the market value of long-tail users has started to attract attention for research.In the face of online consumer credit products offered on the market,80% of long-tail users can obtain credit support to meet their consumption needs,while 20% of big customers can also choose online consumer credit products as a supplement.The liquidity constraints of consumers are further reduced.Up to now,there is still a lot of room for improvement in the development of online consumer credit in China compared with the international level,both from the perspective of individuals and that of families.From 2013 to 2015,online finance ushered in the rapid development stage,but then the risks of online finance became prominent.The occurrence of various risk events reduced the confidence of consumers with the demand for credit,and they became more cautious about the choice over credit products.While encouraging the development of the online finance industry,the government has gradually strengthened the supervision on the industry,with the emphasis placed on the sensible development of the industry and the rational choice of consumers.In respect of market space,some research reports have indicated that the only 150 million potential customers remaining in China will be fully covered by 2021,and enterprises will enter the era of stock competition.Therefore,taking online consumer credit products as the research object,it is of much significance to explore the influencing factors in the willingness to continue using the products and their acting mechanisms for stimulating consumer credit demand,assisting enterprises in adjusting their operation strategies and promoting the healthy development of the whole industry.Relevant studies have demonstrated the research status of online consumer credit,the theoretical basis of consumer behavioral intention and the construction direction of influencing factor models.In spite of this,there remains a large space of improvement for the research on the sustained behavioral intention for online consumer credit scenarios.On this basis,a conceptual model is constructed in this paper of the factors affecting the continuance intention of online consumer credit products,and an in-depth study is conducted.The main research contents of this paper are detailed as follows:(1)The theoretical basis of the research is sorted out systematically and the empirical research views of key variables are summarized.By understanding the basic theory on the willingness to consume credit,the two basic motivations for consumers to continue to use online consumer credit products are clarified.Then,the related concepts,types and empirical research hotspots of online consumer credit are summarized.With the assistance of consumer decision model,customer valuesatisfaction theory and expectation confirmation theory,the intention of continuous use is understood,and then the relevant dimensions and connotation of the intention of continuous use are defined in combination with the research of post-purchase behavioral intention.Finally,by summarizing the influencing factors in behavioral intention and sustainable use intention in this research,the influence of environmental factors,marketing factors and personal factors on the sustainable use intention of consumers is highlighted.(2)The research conceptual model is constructed,the research hypothesis is proposed,and the questionnaire scale is designed.Based on the prior literature on the influencing factors in willingness to categorize the continuous use,and in combination with consumer behavior on behalf of the model and the features of online consumer credit scene,the logical relationship between model variables is represented from a theoretical perspective.Besides,combined with environmental factors,individual factors are put forward for the sustainable use of online consumer credit products which will influence the factors and mechanism of the conceptual model,and the path is proposed based on the literature and empirical research hypothesis.The content and items of the questionnaire were preliminarily determined by referring to the maturity scale and semi-structured interview.In the process of pre-test analysis,exploratory factor analysis was conducted to identify and verify the characteristic dimensions of nine research variables,including quality in product encounter,quality in brand encounter,quality in technical encounter,credit perceived risk,confirmation of credit expectation,credit motivation intensity,external environmental atmosphere,consumer satisfaction and continuance Intention.(3)Formal investigation and data collection are conducted,and the research hypotheses are verified using statistical methods.In the phase of formal investigation,the sample data passing the normality test,common method deviation test,reliability and validity test,confirmatory factor analysis,correlation analysis and multicollinearity test was empirically analyzed.With Internet entrusted payment type and Internet direct lending type products as the research object,first of all,the method of structural equation model was applied to conduct the data analysis of 688 questionnaires.This paper discusses how the research variables affect the path of significance by comparing the coefficient of transformation to continue using the variables which will have direct effect and indirect effect as well as the total effect of differences.Secondly,the robustness of the research model was tested by multigroup analysis.Then,stratified regression analysis was carried out to explore the regulating effect of external environmental atmosphere.(4)Countermeasures and suggestions are put forward,while the empirical research work and conclusions are summarized.Based on the stimulation of consumer demand for credit,it enhances consumer confidence in the credit,enables the consumer credit industry to promote Internet development,and promote the growth of national economy.Combined with the empirical research results from the dimension of the government,enterprise dimensions and the consumer dimension,the corresponding countermeasures and suggestions are proposed,to represent the Internet in the consumer credit industry for participation in the main body,with the subjects of the government,consumers and enterprises involved to promote the healthy development of the industry.Then the main work,research conclusion,research innovation,shortage and prospect of this paper are detailed.Among the 18 research hypotheses included in the conceptual model of influencing factors and their action mechanism behind the continued use intention of online consumer credit products as constructed in this paper,15 research hypotheses have been verified and 3 research hypotheses are identified as invalid.The research conclusions are presented as follows:(1)Confirmation of credit expectation has a significant impact on the quality in product encounter and credit perceived risk.The results show that confirmation of credit expectation can significantly improve the perception of consumers about quality in product encounter and significantly reduce their perception about credit risk.However,when the absolute value of the influence coefficient is compared,the expected confirmation after using online consumer credit products has a slightly more significant effect on the reduction of credit perceived risk than on the promotion of quality in product encounter,indicating that consumers can better reduce the perceived risk of online credit products after their expectations are confirmed.(2)Quality in product encounter,quality in brand encounter,quality in technical encounter,credit perceived risk,confirmation of credit expectation and credit motivation intensity all have significant effects on consumer satisfaction.Among them,only credit perceived risk has a negative impact on consumer satisfaction,while quality in product encounter,quality in brand encounter,quality in technical encounter,confirmation of credit expectation and credit motivation intensity can all exert a positive effect on consumer satisfaction.According to the absolute value of coefficient,credit motivation intensity is the key influencing factor in consumer satisfaction,followed by quality in product encounter,confirmation of credit expectation,credit perceived risk,quality in brand encounter and quality in technical encounter in order.(3)Quality in product encounter,quality in brand encounter,credit perceived risk,credit motivation intensity and consumer satisfaction have significant effects on continued use intention,while quality in technical encounter has no direct impact on continuance intention.Most of the influencing factors have both direct and indirect effects on the continuance intention.Only the quality in technical encounter has indirect effect on the continuance intention through consumer satisfaction,so that the influence of quality in technical encounter is least significant.The direct effect of quality in technical encounter on the continuance intention becomes insignificant after the model variables are enriched,which indicates that the significant effect of quality in technical encounter will be replaced when there are other influencing factors at play.Through comparison of the influencing factors in the continuance intention of the total effect,it can be found out that customer satisfaction is the critical factor,which prompts consumers to continue using the product.Then,the factors that will influence continuance intention are credit motivation intensity,credit perceived risk,confirmation of credit expectation,quality in brand encounter andn quality in technical encounter in order of effect size.Consumers can be directly and indirectly encouraged to continue using online consumer credit products by cultivating the habit of consumers to use credit products for improving the strength of credit motivation and reducing perceived credit risks through financial policy information transparency.(4)The external environmental atmosphere has a significant moderating effect on credit perceived risk,credit motivation intensity and continuance intention.But it has no significant moderating effect on quality in product encounter,consumer satisfaction and continuance intention.Among them,the external environmental atmosphere has a negative moderating effect on the perceived risk of credit and the continuance intention,and it has a positive moderating effect on the motivation intensity of credit and the continuance intention,which indicates that the better the external environment is,the less significant the negative effect of credit perceived risk on the intention to continue use,and the more significant the positive promoting effect of credit motivation intensity on the intention to continue use.Therefore,creating a positive external environment can affect the psychological perception of consumers,help enterprises maintain customer relations,and promote the continued use of online consumer credit products and the sustainable development of business.In this paper,the research field is put into the online consumer credit scenario,and the influencing factors in the continued use intention of online consumer credit products and their acting mechanism are discussed in detail and empiricalized,as mainly reflected in the following three points of innovation:(1)It enriches the theoretical connotation of consumers’ motivation to use Internet consumer credit products.The introduction of credit motivation intensity is mainly based on cognitive theory,which enriches the influencing factor model of consumers’ continuance intention from internal and external driving factors.The connotation combined with credit motivation intensity mainly refers to the theories related to credit consumption intention,so as to develop a measurement scale and carry out data collection and empirical analysis.Existing studies have introduced the empirical analysis of motivation intensity into consumer behavior,with some progress made in the exploration into the relationship between motivation and the intention to use online products.However,there is still a lack of empirical conclusions reached on the connotation definition and dimension division of motivation intensity for online consumer credit products.Based on the life cycle hypothesis,lasting income theory and buffer-stock saving theory,this paper sorts out the smooth consumption motivation of consumers and buffer-stock saving motivation of using credit products,thus enriching the connotation of consumers’ motivation of using online consumer credit products and clarifying the relevant theoretical support.(2)The conceptual model of the research on the willingness to continue using online consumer credit products is constructed.The conceptual model constructed in this paper reflects the perception of consumers about product information in combination with the quality in service encounter and perceived credit risk,and then explores the relationship between the two aspects and their continuance intention.In this paper,based on the contact theory,combined with the theory of consumer behavior and on behalf of the research model,the reference of existing research on the definition of similar logic,the online consumer credit products of quality in service encounter is clarified,and divided into quality in product encounter,quality in brand encounter,quality in technical encounter,abandoned the original personnel contact quality dimension in theory.Different from the fact that service contact quality reflects the perception of consumers about product performance from a positive perspective,this paper effectively distinguishes the measurement contents of credit perceived risk to avoid the repetition and crossing of variable measurement contents.Through a small-scale interview and combined with the theory of risk perception,the main credit risk perception scale is designed in this paper to measure the online consumer credit products with technical risk and social risk,psychological risk for consumers.On the one hand,the consumer contact is improved with the product of mental stimulation.On the other hand,it is reflected that the risk characteristics of online consumption credit products are unique.(3)The moderating effect of external environmental atmosphere on the intention to continue use is revealed.The existing relevant studies mainly focus on the relationship between the external environment and corporate behavior of enterprise subjects,with less attention brought to the external environment and consumer behavior,especially the online consumer credit scenario.Firstly,this paper divides the environmental factors,marketing factors and personal factors that affect the behavioral intention of consumers,and clarifies the components of external environment.Then,the content and object are converted by referring to the measurement items about the external environment of enterprise,while the maturity scale about the social environment is applied for reference to complete the scale design.Finally,the adjustment effect of the external environment on the key variables and the continuance intention is verified.To sum up,this paper studies online consumer credit products,in the hope to confirm the model as a benchmark while enriching and expanding specifically the role of various influencing factors in the continuous use,so as to find the effective path of enhancing the continuance intention,while provide the theoretical basis and practical guidance for the Internet in the consumer credit market main body together to promote the healthy development of the industry.