A StudStudy On The Factors Affecting College Student Consumers' Initial Trust In B2C Tourism Electronic Business Websites

Fast-growing tourism market and the growing amount of consumers in the internet, which has brought a new opportunity for the development of tourism electronic commerce. Meanwhile, research on e-commerce trust has been a very hot issue, most of the current study is based on mature trust. However, trust is a dynamic process in which initial trust is the first step, but also the most important step. B2C tourism e-commerce website as a platform plays an important role in connecting tourists or potential tourists with online travel products provider. As environment of tourism e-commerce is virtual, in this case, B2C tourism e-commerce websites would serve as a role of traditional distributor in the tourism business, consumers will create the initial trust in the B2C tourism website according to its features, then decide to purchase tourism product from the website. Therefore, it is a critical first step to win consumer's initial trust in the B2C tourism e-commerce website for the success of tourism e-commerce.In this paper, based on literature review and in accordance with the needs of this study, as well as the actual situation of domestic tourism B2C e-commerce websites, the author selected five factors which might affect consumer's initial trust in a B2C tourism e-commerce website from the perspective of the website specifically, The five site factors as independent variables, respectively, are website design, website's ease of use, website usefulness, information quality and privacy protection. This study used questionnaires to explore the relationships between the five independent variables, consumer's initial trust and purchase intention. The results of data analysis show that the website usefulness, information quality and privacy protection significantly affect consumer's initial trust in a B2C tourism e-commerce website, consumer's initial trust also significantly influence consumer's purchase intention. Besides, the study also confirmed consumer's initial trust in a B2C tourism e-commerce website had partial mediating effect between three independent variables such as web site usefulness, information quality, privacy protection and purchase intention. Finally, the study provided some managerial implications for the operators of B2C tourism e-commerce websites.