Coparticipant effect in group buying: How coparticipant response speeds affect consumer postpurchase regret?

Abstract

The introduction of consumer-initiated models with small group size has increased the popularity of group buying. With lower size requirements for forming buying groups, more impulsive buying is facilitated while more postpurchase regret is spawned. Consumer postpurchase regret not only poses challenges to the coordination of group buying but may also eventually lead to merchant losses. Therefore, understanding the factors that may affect consumer postpurchase regret in group-buying contexts is crucial. Drawing on observational learning theory and expectancy disconfirmation theory, the present study focuses on how the response speeds of group-buying campaign coparticipants intertwined with publicly available information of group-buying deals (i.e., the deal popularity and expected savings) to affect campaign initiators' postpurchase regret. Through secondary data analysis and a laboratory experiment, we find that a lower coparticipant response speed is associated with a higher likelihood of the initiator experiencing postpurchase regret. In addition, when deals have a higher level of popularity, this effect is amplified. Our findings demonstrate the potential importance of considering the coparticipant effect to discourage negative consumer behavior in group-buying contexts.