The influence and moderating effect of trust in streamers in a live streaming shopping environment

Abstract

With its powerful real-time interaction and rich user experience, live streaming shopping has rapidly become consumers' new favorite. However, the frequent "rollover" incidents affecting the reputation of well-known streamers significantly reduce consumers' trust in the streamers. Academic research on trust in live streaming shopping has thus far mainly focused on purchase motivations. Few studies have focused on the factors influencing trust from the streamer's perspective, and they have ignored the moderating role of streamers and product factors, situational factors and individual characteristics of consumers. Therefore, this study introduces three new moderating variables – streamer-product matching, live streaming online reviews, and online shopping experience – to explore their moderating effects on streamers' reputation, popularity, and trust. The results show that streamers' reputation and popularity have a significant positive impact on trust in streamers, and streamer-product matching has a positive moderating effect on the relationship between streamers' reputation, streamers' popularity, and trust in streamers. Online reviews have a positive moderating effect on the relationship between streamers' popularity and trust, while online shopping experience has a positive moderating effect on the relationship between streamers' reputation and trust in streamers.