Understanding trust and user behavior in online platforms

Guide(s)

Bandi, Rajendra K

Department

Information Systems

Area

Information Systems

University

Indian Institute of Management Bangalore

Place

Bangalore

Publication Date

3-31-2024

Year Awarded

March 2024

Year Completed

March 2024

Year Registered

June 2017

Abstract

Understanding Trust and User Behavior in Online Platforms. Online platforms have become an integral part of our lives. They have revolution how we connect, communicate, transact, and conduct business. With globalization the introduction of digital platforms, interactions and transactions with such worldwide have been made possible. With such global interactions, it is hum: impossible to possess complete information and the necessary capabilities to eval the competencies and intentions of the other party. In such cases, trust acts decision heuristic to overcome the underlying vulnerabilities and proceed interactions. Trust, therefore, becomes a currency in the digital realm an paramount factor that underpins the success and sustainability of digital platform Thus, any platform involving human interactions must consider the dynamics of t in its design choices. With this as the motivation, in this thesis, we intend to understand the role of trust in online platforms and how it influences different user behaviors. This thesis consists of three essays. The first essay is a literature review paper analyzing and synthesizing the vast body of empirical work on trust in online platforms published in the past 23 years. The unified framework developed in this essay provides a snapshot of the humungous body of knowledge and helps novice researchers and practitioners understand the various factors influencing users' trust in platforms. This essay also lists the potential limitations of prior literature and identifies possible avenues for future research. From the list of future research opportunities provided at the end of this review, we select two potential research topics to explore in the second and third essays due to their novelty and significant relevance to practice. The second essay identifies that consumers' trust is well explored and exploited in academia and practice. However, the understanding of providers' trust and the comparative examination of providers' and consumers' trust has received minimal attention. To address this limitation, the second essay empirically examines the platform-specific antecedents of providers' and consumers' trust and conducts a quantitative comparative study between the providers and consumers to examine if trust is perceived differently by the two user groups. Using online surveys and partial least square structural equation modelling for data collection and analysis, this essay shows that platform-specific antecedents influence providers' and consumers' trust in platforms but do not influence their trust in the transacting parties. The comparative analysis between the user groups does not show significant differences between the providers and consumers, indicating that the two groups don't vary in how they perceive trust. This essay studies trust holistically from a triadic relationship (relationship among platform, providers, and consumers), unlike most prior works exploring trust only in a dyadic fashion. It is also one of the early studies to empirically examine the moderating effect of user type. Even though the study results do not show significant differences across the user groups, a conversation in this direction is a much-needed step in this field of research. The third essay identifies and examines a contradictory finding in the prior literature. While literature suggests that trust is crucial for users' initial and continued engagement with the platforms, it is also shown to influence users' circumvention of platforms under certain circumstances. Thus, the role of trust seems to be paradoxical and unclear. Circumvention/ Disintermediation/ Platform Leakage denotes users bypassing the platform and connecting directly with other users on the platform. It is a novel and practically relevant problem that has received much less attention in academic and practitioner literature. To address the contradictory findings, this essay aims to understand trust and circumvention through a qualitative exploratory study. It employs grounded theoretic methodology to build a theory for explaining the phenomenon and the contradictory findings. The theoretical framework developed in this essay details the drivers and deterrents of circumvention, the different types of circumventing behaviors, the strategies employed to initiate circumvention, the consequences of circumvention, and the coping mechanisms, followed by the insights on detecting and tackling strategies used by the platforms. This essay serves as a conversation initiator in the field and opens the door to exciting research questions in the field of platform research. It also provides valuable practical insights that platform organizations could leverage to devise strategies to control and curb circumvention. Overall, employing a balanced mix of quantitative and qualitative methods, this dissertation addresses some of the pertinent and relevant questions at the intersection of trust, online platforms, and user behavior.

Pagination

xvii, 257p.

Copyright

Indian Institute of Management Bangalore

Document Type

Dissertation

DAC Chairperson

Bandi, Rajendra K

DAC Members

Venkatagiri, Shankar; Tripathi, Ritu

Type of Degree

Ph.D.

Relation

DIS-IIMB-FPM-P24-20

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