Trust and mobile commerce in North America

Abstract

Mobile Commerce (mCommerce) activities include the act of shopping and buying on mobile devices, along with the more recent emergence of mobile payment systems. Within North America, mCommerce activities have become increasingly popular and will likely continue on this upwards trend as mobile devices further proliferate markets. Historically, one common issue with the adoption and use of eCommerce systems (e.g., commerce activities on personal computers) is trust. Yet we know little of how trust and other social factors may affect mCommerce usage—a new genre of commerce activities that explicitly occur on mobile devices. To help address this problem, we have conducted two studies that explore users' mCommerce activities. The first is a diary and interview study of mCommerce shoppers who have already adopted the technology and shop on their mobile devices regularly. Our study explores typical mCommerce routines and behaviors along with issues of trust, given its long-term concern for eCommerce. The second is a diary and interview study of new and existing users of mobile payment services in North America. Participants used a variety of services, including Google Wallet, Amazon Payments, LevelUp, Square and company apps geared towards payments (e.g., Starbucks). Our results show that when it comes to shopping on mobile devices, people have few trust concerns. Yet when mobile devices are used for payments within physical stores, trust issues emerge along with pre-purchase anxiety and mental model challenges. We discuss these results and show the value in adapting and developing new trust mechanisms for mCommerce.