Abstract
ABSTRACTThis article explores how perceived disempowerment impacts the intention to adopt smart autonomous products. Empirically, the paper builds on three studies to show this impact. Study 1 explores the relevance of the perceived disempowerment in respect of smart autonomous products. Study 2 manipulates autonomy of smart products and finds that perceived disempowerment mediates the link between smart products’ autonomy and adoption intention. Study 3 indicates that an intervention design―that is, a product design that allows consumers to intervene in the actions of an autonomous smart product―can reduce their perceived disempowerment in respect of autonomous smart products. Further, Study 3 reveals that personal innovativeness moderates the role that an intervention design plays in product adoption: an intervention design shows a positive effect on adoption intention for individuals with low personal innovativeness, but for those with high personal innovativeness no effect of an intervention design is present on adoption intention. The authors suggest that managers consider consumers’ perceived disempowerment when designing autonomous smart products, because (1) perceived disempowerment reduces adoption and (2) when targeted at consumers with low personal innovativeness, an intervention design reduces their perceived disempowerment.
Highlights
Google presented its first prototype of an autonomous car without a steering wheel, brake pedal, clutch or accelerator in the spring of 2014
Smart heating systems are semiautonomous smart products when they are connected to a smart phone, which enables their users to switch heating on or off from remote places
By providing insights into the interaction between perceived disempowerment and smart product adoption, this paper contributes to the understanding of the potential driver of users’ reluctance to adopt autonomous smart products
Summary
Google presented its first prototype of an autonomous car without a steering wheel, brake pedal, clutch or accelerator in the spring of 2014. Users operate semiautonomous smart products, for example, via the smart phone, to have the product perform a certain task. Autonomous smart products can operate and interact with other devices without human interaction; they often independently improve their performance by means of learning algorithms (Gershenfeld et al, 2004; Porter & Heppelmann, 2014). Since no consumer input is needed, users may perceive autonomous smart products as. Autonomous cars without steering wheels and brake pedals provide users with very limited possibilities to intervene if the car malfunctions or hackers attack its IT systems
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