فرهنگ عمومی و اعتماد مصرف کننده به تجارت الکترونیک National culture and consumer trust in e-commerce

1. Introduction Trust in the online environment has gained wide interest in research along with the increase in online transactions and electronic commerce becoming more popular. Lack of trust is a major barrier in the adoption of e-commerce (Chang, Cheung, & Tang, 2013) and concerns about an online store’s trustworthiness are among the most important factors distinguishing online buyers from non-buyers (Kim & Park, 2013). Trust, on the other hand, is found to drive the adoption of information and communication technologies across countries (Kirs & Bagchi, 2012). Indeed, e-commerce has internationalized, and buying products online across national borders has become straightforward and convenient for consumers, providing new business opportunities for both domestic and international online stores. Some consumers shop actively online, but others do not, and consequently managers and academics alike are interested in better understanding the underlying factors between these differences. The influence of an individual’s personality on their adoption of e-commerce in addition to disclosing private information online has recently received growing academic interest (e.g. Bansal, Zahedi, & Gefen, 2016). Trust particularly plays a crucial role in e-commerce, because individuals show different levels of trust towards e-commerce, but individuals between national cultures also vary in their overall level of trust (World Values Survey, 1981–2014). Consequently, the current study integrates the theory of national culture with the research conducted on online trust, in order to explore how dimensions of national culture influence consumers’ beliefs of online store’s trustworthiness. In their research agenda for trust in the online environment, Gefen, Benbasat, and Pavlou (2008) identify the dimensionality of trust, as well as the impact of culture on trust as research areas requiring further exploration. In order to address the above-mentioned research gaps, we apply the cultural theory of Hofstede (1980) to explore how dimensions of national culture influence individual’s general tendency to trust, i.e. trusting disposition, and individual’s beliefs about online store’s trustworthiness. Theoretical research suggests that national culture and trust are interrelated (e.g. Doney, Cannon, & Mullen, 1998; Hofstede, 1980), but empirical research validating their relationship is surprisingly scarce, particularly in the online environment (Gefen & Heart, 2006; Huang et al., 2014; Hwang & Lee, 2012; Jarvenpaa, Tractinsky, & Saarinen, 1999; Yoon, 2009). In the current study we also focus on the dimensionality of trust and trust related constructs, because the constructs of trust, trustworthiness (including ability, integrity and benevolence) and disposition to trust are too commonly used synonymously and mixed in the research (see discussion e.g. Colquitt, Scott, & LePine, 2007; Serva, Benamati, & Fuller, 2005, 2002). Recently, some academics have focused on drawing a better picture on the relationship between these constructs (e.g. Colquitt et al., 2007; Serva et al., 2005; Yakovleva et al., 2010) but many of those few studies are conducted in organizational and offline settings, thus not taking into account the online environment which is significantly different from a conventional brick-and-mortar business.