The role of negative physical contagion in the online purchase of second-hand products

Abstract

The perception of negative physical contagion has been identified in the literature as a deterrent to the purchase of second-hand goods in an offline context. In view of the growth of second-hand shopping on the Internet, this article studies the effect of the salience of physical contact between the previous owner and the product in the purchase of second-hand products online. An initial experiment reveals a negative physical contagion effect on purchase intention, an effect mediated by perceived physical risk. However, many sellers of second-hand products on the Internet adopt presentation strategies aimed at emphasizing their similarity to new products. A second experiment shows that similarity with a new product reduces perceived physical risk for non-experts in the product category, while it decreases perceived quality for experts. In both experiments, the effect of disgust, which plays an important role in physical sales channels, is found to be not significant.