1. travel
2. vacation rentals

Understanding Repurchase Intention of Airbnb Consumers:
Perceived Authenticity, EWoM and Price Sensitivity
by
Lena Jingen Liang
A Thesis
presented to
The University of Guelph
In partial fulfilment of requirements
for the degree of
Master of Science
in
Tourism and Hospitality
Guelph, Ontario, Canada
© Lena Jingen Liang, May, 2015
ABSTRACT
UNDERSTANDING REPURCHASE INTENTION OF AIRBNB CONSUMERS:
PERCEIVED AUTHENTICITY, EWOM AND PRICE SENSITIVITY
Lena Jingen Liang
University of Guelph, 2015
Advisors:
Professor HS Chris Choi
Professor Marion Joppe
The main purpose of this paper is to extend the research on consumer repurchase
intention (RI), perceived value (PV) and perceived risk (PR) into the realm of the
peer-to-peer economy, specifically in the context of Airbnb. A series of research
propositions were proposed built on the prospect theory and means-end chain theory.
Three antecedents: perceived authenticity (PA), electronic word-of-mouth (eWoM) and
price sensitivity (PS) were identified through a content analysis, producing an extended
model. 395 surveys were collected via a panel based in North America. The results
showed that PR negatively impacts Airbnb consumers’ PV and RI while PV positively
enhances their RI. Interestingly, PS was found not to reduce customers’ PR but improve
their PV and promote the intention to repurchase. PA was found to have significant
effects in reducing Airbnb consumers’ PR and positively influences PV. Theoretical and
managerial implications are discussed and future study direction was offered.
Acknowledgements
To the University of Guelph, the College of Business and Economics, and the
School of Hospitality, Food and Tourism Management: without your provision of
space, funding, resources and help from all of you, my completion of this degree is
impossible. I have all of you to thank.
To my two advisors, Dr Chris Choi and Dr Marion Joppe: we would argue about a
research question, we would argue about a research method, but I know deep in my
heart, it is unarguable that you are my family, and will be so for all my life.
To my committee Dr Stephen Smith: thank you for always asking me numerous
questions. All those questions had made me see more about my research and always
give a second thought of every word I used.
To all my friends, Shuyue, Joe, Lenka, Jay, Bixian, Brittany, Chanel, Chi-wei,
Warren, Derek, Drew, Tammy and everyone in MINS 210: your supportiveness and
listening really help me survive. I will always remember the days we talked, we
hugged, we worked, we travelled, we played, we ate, we laughed and cried.
To my dearest families, dad Zhikun and brother Haixing, I always love you even
though you are thousand miles away; mum Lijuan in heaven, thank you for making
me strong and I will not forget all the things you taught me. And I wish all the best for
everyone in my family, especially my grandpa and grandma.
iii
Table of Contents
Abstract .................................................................................................................................... ii
Acknowledgements ................................................................................................................ iii
Table of Contents .................................................................................................................... iv
List of Tables, Figures and Appendices ................................................................................... v
CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION......................................................................................................1
CHAPTER 2: LITERATURE REVIEW..............................................................................................4
2.1 Online Repurchase Studies ............................................................................................... 4
2.2 Peer-to-Peer Economy ................................................................................................................ 9
2.3 Studies on Airbnb ................................................................................................................. 10
CHAPTER 3: THEORETICAL FRAMEWORK & MODEL DEVELOPMENT ....................................12
3.1 Theoretical Background ....................................................................................................... 12
3.2 Proposed Model ................................................................................................................... 15
3.3 Hypotheses Development .................................................................................................... 16
3.3.1 Perceived Value (PV) & Perceived Risk (PR) ................................................................. 16
3.3.2 Perceived Authenticity (PA) .......................................................................................... 19
3.3.3 Electronic Word of Mouth (eWoM) .............................................................................. 21
3.3.4 Price Sensitivity (PS) ...................................................................................................... 23
CHAPTER 4: METHODOLOGY ...................................................................................................26
4.1 Research Design & Sampling .................................................................................................... 26
4.2 Measurement of the Constructs .......................................................................................... 27
4.3 Data Analysis & Findings ...................................................................................................... 28
4.3.1 Demographics of the Respondents ............................................................................... 29
4.3.2 Scale Validity & Reliability............................................................................................. 29
4.3.3 Structural Model Analysis ............................................................................................. 34
CHAPTER 5: CONCLUSION ......................................................................................................37
5.1 Implications .......................................................................................................................... 38
5.2 Limitations & Future Study Direction .................................................................................. 40
CHAPTER 6: BIBLIOGRAPHY ........................................................................................................... 42
iv
List of Tables, Figures and Appendices
Table 1: Overview of reviewed online repurchase studies………………………..6
Table 2: Validity test………………………………………………………………30
Table 3: Confirmatory factor analysis for measurement model…………………..32
Table 4: Results of hypothesis tests…………………………………………….…36
Figure 1: Model of repurchase intention for Airbnb………..………………….…16
Figure 2: Structural path coefficients……………………………………………...35
Appendix: All items used in survey………………………………………………52
v
CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION
Web 2.0 has reshaped the way consumers buy products and services (Cheung,
Chan,& Limayem, 2005), not only in terms of how transactions are conducted, but
also the nature of the buyers and sellers. On the supply side, individuals can rent out
whatever they have, whether a tangible or intangible good or service, to someone they
might never have met before via various web 2.0 sites. On the demand side, buyers
can obtain what they need, whether a service or product, at a lower price. These ways
of doing business have attracted increasing attention around the world since 2010, and
are labeled as the ‗sharing economy‘, ‗collaborative consumption‘, or ‗peer-to-peer
consumption‘.
The platforms that offer the matching services for these buyers and sellers, have
quickly strengthened their positions in different markets, including the hospitality
industry. One of the most representative platforms occupying the hospitality market is
Airbnb,a peer-to-peer transaction-based online marketplace that matches hosts who
wish to share their spare space with travelers who are looking for accommodations
(The Economist, 2013). Millions of individuals participate in sharing their unused
places and roomsthrough fee-based transactions where travelers can rent private
rooms or entire places at lower rates for a short-term period, increasing the
opportunity for travelers to mingle with local people and experience locals‘ lives
(Sacks, 2011). However, to date, little research has been conducted on these fee-based
online communities in the hospitality context.
Ferocious debates have occurred as a result of the growing popularity of Airbnb
(e.g.Dickerson, 2015; Folger, 2014). Extreme opinions, either strongly supportive or
strongly opposed, were found in various media reports (e.g. New York Times; The
Economist), economists‘ blogs (e.g. Tom Slee), etc. Nevertheless, Airbnb continues to
1
gain popularity at an astonishing rate at the global level, with the total nights booked
increasing from 180 in 2008 to 10 million in 2012 (Airbnb, 2014). Unlike Bookswap1
or Lending Club2, Airbnb does not involve the ownershipexchange of a product.
Unlike Zipcar3 and Uber4, the transaction in Airbnb involves human gathering and
the sharing of the private sphere. Unlike Couchsurfing5 and HomeExchange6, it
involves a direct money transaction. Unlike hostels, hotels or bed and breakfast, the
trading in Airbnb involves more potential risks becauselisting a property on Airbnb
does not require government approval or inspections (Airbnb, 2014). Thus,
Airbnbshows a unique characteristic as it offers a transaction that contains
human-to-human gathering and the sharing of the private sphere, making this study of
the repurchase intention in the Airbnb context complicated but unique and important.
Furthermore, from a marketing perspective, understanding why tourists would
choose Airbnb again provides valuable information for the traditional hospitality
industry managers. Hotel managers can learn about the changes in tourists‘ demand
with respect to accommodation. For Airbnb and other similar network hospitality
exchange platforms, understanding what the consumers care about when using those
platforms is important for their marketing strategy as the cost of retaining a customer
is much less compared to the cost of obtaining a new one.
In addition, little attention has been paid to date to the tourism related factors
associated with online repurchasing behaviors such as perceived authenticity.
Therefore, this study proposes a research framework based on prospect theory and
means-end chain (MEC) theory on consumer repurchase intention (RI), perceived
1
Buys and sells books, www.bookswap.ca
Peer-to-peer lending platform, www.lendingclub.com
3
An alternative to car rental, www.zipcar.com
4
A mobile app that allows consumers to submit a trip request, which is routed to crowd-sourced taxi drivers
5
A hospitality exchange website, www.couchsurfing.com
6
A home exchange website, www.homeexchange.com
2
2
value (PV) and perceived risk (PR) in the realm of the peer-to-peer economy,
specifically in the context of Airbnb. Three antecedents —perceived authenticity (PA);
electronic word-of-mouth (eWoM) and price sensitivity (PS) — were identified based
on a content analysis (see Proposed Model page 14 for full details). Three main
objectives of the study are to 1) explore the effects of the three antecedents on PV, PR
and on consumers‘ RI; 2) examine the mediating roles of PV and PR on the
relationships between the extrinsic product cues and RI; and 3) investigate the
relationships between PV, PR and RI.
3
CHAPTER 2: LITERATURE REVIEW
2.1 Online Repurchase Studies
Wu, Chen, Chen and Cheng (2014) argue that empirical studies on examining
the value-RI or risk-RI linkage in the online context are scarce. Therefore, this study
explores online RI and defines it as Airbnb consumers‘ self-reported likelihood of
repeat purchasing accommodations on www.Airbnb.com. Several prior studies have
exploredRI in the online context, while various antecedents as well as research
models were examined (See Table 1 for a brief summary of theliterature).
Among the reviewed articles, satisfaction seems to dominate the online RI
studies. However, in the realm of the peer-to-peer economy, satisfaction alone may
not necessarily predict RI because there may be a need to differentiate between the
satisfaction with the website/platform and the satisfaction with the peer seller.
Moreover, satisfaction may be reflected by consumers in different forms. For example,
Chiu, Wang, Fang and Huang (2014) explored the relationships between utilitarian
value, hedonic value, PR and RI, finding that there are significant influences of
utilitarian value, hedonic value and PR on RI as well as powerful effects from PR on
those two values. This shows that value and risk may be effective in predicting RI.
Wu et al. (2014) also showed that satisfaction is not the only way to predict RI. They
examined the interactions between PV, transaction costs and RI. Positive influences of
PV on RI as well as the relative importance of the three types of costs on PV and RI
were found. Nevertheless, they designed the model only with customers buying
tangible products online in mind, whereas Airbnb products are intangible; therefore
their model is not suitable to be adopted for this study.
In other words, evidence from the literature suggests that satisfaction is not the
only way to predict intentions to repurchase in the online context. To better
4
understand the RI of Airbnb consumers, a model with PV, PR and RI can be built.
Moreover, researchers have to look at tourism related constructs when exploring this
model because Airbnb is a platform that offers accommodation searching services for
tourists. As shown in Table 1, no known tourism related constructs have been
investigated in the context of online RI. In an effort to enrich the extant literature, this
study incorporates effective antecedents in the field of tourism and consumer behavior,
to build a theoretical framework based on the initial model of the relationship between
PV, PR and RI.
5
Table 1
Study
Overview of reviewed online repurchase studies
Constructs
Theoretical
framework
Risk attitude, online
shopping experience, Adaptation-level
Wu & Chang
evaluation-based
theory; attribution
(2007)
SAT, emotion-based
theory
SAT, RI
Methodology
Pilot tested with 45
undergraduate
students, 7-point
scale
Sampling
Findings
Analytic
techniques
303/486
questionnaires
(Taiwan)
Risk attitude directly influence online
shopping experience, SAT and RI; SAT
would enhance RI when consumers are
characterized as having higher risk
preference
SEM /AMOS
5.0
Cluster analysis
/SPSS12.0
Perceived risk, travel
On sight
Performance risk most significantly
253/270
SAT, RI, 4 types of
questionnaire
influence SAT while political risk has no
Expectation-performa
international air
An, Lee, & risks: natural disaster
collection at a model
effects on SAT; Natural disaster risk affects T test, ANOVA,
nce inconsistency
routes
Noh, (2010) risk; physical risk;
global airline
RI most significantly while physical risk
Regression
theory
passengers
political risk;
company; 5-point
has no significant influence.Travel SAT
(South Korea)
performance risk
scale
positively influence RI.
SAT, trust, adjusted
Ha, Janda, &
expectation, positive
Muthaly (2010)
attitude, RI
SAT model;
attribution theory
In-depth discussion
with 42 online
514/1500paper
shoppers;a focus questionnaires via
group with 23 online
marketing
shoppers;
research firm
5-point scale
The mediating effects of adjusted
expectations, trust and positive attitude
were found between SAT and RI.
Armstrong &
Overton, 1977‘s
method of
non-response
bias, SEM /PLS
2 scholars verify
No direct relationship between trust and RI.
PEU, Confirmation,
TAM; Expectation- items; 6 PhD students
Direct relationship between SAT/ PU/
Wen, Prybutok, Trust, PU, SAT,
214/230 college
CFA, SEM /
Confirmation Model pretest; paper-based
Enjoyment and RI. Post-purchase stage,
& Xu (2011)
Perceived
students (U.S.)
LISREL 8.72
(ECM); Flow theory questionnaire, 5 point
utilitarian factors are more valuable in
enjoyment,RI
scale
predicting RI.
6
Psychological contract violation is
Psychological
Pilot tested with 20
Chiu, Fang,
Expectancy-disconfir
162 PChome
negativelyassociated with SAT and trust.
contract violation,
graduate students,
SEM, PLS
Cheng, &
mation model; equity
online customers SAT is positively associated with buyers‘
switching cost, SAT,
online surveyposted
/SmartPLS 2.0
Yen(2013)
theory
(Taiwan)
RI. A higher levelof switching cost
trust, RI
on BBS,7-point scale
diminished SAT‘s effect on RI.
Chiu,Wang,
utilitarian value,
Fang, & Huang hedonic value,
(2014)
perceived risk, RI
Perceived
effectiveness of
Fang, Qureshi,
e-commerce
Sun, McCole,
institutional
Ramsey, & Lim
mechanisms
(2014)
(PEEIM), trust, SAT,
RI
Lin &
Lekhawipat
(2014)
Online shopping
experience&habit,
customer SAT,
adjusted
expectations, RI
Prospect theory;
Means-end chain
(MEC) theory
Prospect theory;
Sociological and
organizational
theories of trust
Self-perception
theory, psychology,
attitude-behavior
model, contingency
theory
Pretest with 20
graduate students;
Pretest with 168
online customers,
7-point scale
Pilot test with 12
staff and 10 students;
two parts of the
survey: general
perceptions &recall
method;
Mailed survey,
7-point scale
782 Yahoo!Kimo
online shopping
customers. 40
random $10
incentive
(Taiwan)
No significant difference in terms of
gender, age or education; Utilitarian and
Z-test, PLS,
hedonic value have direct effects on RI.
SEM /SmartPLS
Perceived risk is a negative determinant of
2.0
RI. Perceived risk is a moderator between
hedonic as well as utilitarian value and RI.
362/865
University
personnel/
students
PEEIM negatively moderates the
relationship between trust in an online
Armstrong &
vendor and RI, as it decreases the
Overton, 1977‘s
importance of trust to promoting
method of
repurchase behavior; PEEIM positively
non-response
moderates the relationship between SAT
bias, EFA, PLS,
and trust as it enhances thecustomer‘s
SEM /AMOS7.0
reliance on past transaction experience with
the vendor to reevaluate trust in the vendor.
Online shopping habit acts as a moderator
of bothcustomers SAT and adjusted
204/1000
Harman‘s one
expectations, whereas online shopping
questionnaires(Tai
factor test, SEM
experience can be considereda key driver
wan)
/SmartPLS 2.0
for customer SAT. Direct effect from SAT
towards RI.
7
Purposive sampling
Perceived value; 3 Consumer behavior
on two websites;
types of transaction theory; elaboration
questionnaire
The relative importance of the three types
Wu, Chen,
costs: information likelihood model;
887/1016 online
developed in English
of costs on PV and RI is found and the
Chen, & Cheng searching cost; cognitive dissonance
consumer
then translate into
information searching cost has the greatest
(2014)
moral hazard cost;
theory; theory of
(Taiwan)
Chinese for
effect; PV positively influences online RI.
specific asset
psychological
distribution; 5-point
investment; RI
reactance
scale
CFA; SEM
/LISREL
Initial trust building Survey developed in
Trust in
Trust in intermediary has significant
Jia, Cegielski,
model; expectationEnglish then
242/255
intermediary, trust in
influence on trust in online sellers; Trust in CFA, SEM
& Zhang
confirmation theory;
translated into
university
online sellers, SAT,
intermediary, trust in online sellers and /SmartPLS 2.0
(2014)
D&M IS success
Chinese, 7-point
students (China)
RI, etc.
SAT significantly affect RI.
model
scale
8
2.2 Peer-to-peer Economy
Studies on the peer-to-peer economy can be found in many different disciplines
and are labeled by various names. Most typical are ‗collaborative consumption‘ and
‗sharing economy‘(Botsman & Rogers, 2010), but so far there is no clear distinction
between these terms. Many researchers discuss collaborative consumption together
with the sharing economy. However, these two concepts should be
distinguishedbecause their actors and transaction types are not necessarily the same.
In other words, actors in collaborative consumption can be an individual, a group of
people or a company with fee-based transactions, whereas the sharing economy refers
to individual peers and the emphasis is on sharing behaviors, originally with no fees.
Airbnb combines these two approaches and therefore the term, ‗peer-to-peer economy‘
was chosen, defined as the trading between individuals (normally strangers) via an
online matching platform that offers private room/apartment online match booking
service for a fee by a company that also charges a service fee, www.airbnb.com.
Felson and Speath (1978) defined the act of collaborative consumption as
individuals or groups interacting in consuming goods or services activities. However,
Belk (2013) critiques their definition as too broad and not reflecting the acquisition
and distribution of the resource. He offers his own as the acquisition and distribution
process of a resource by people for a fee or other compensation. Botsman and Rogers
(2010), on the other hand, define collaborative consumption as an activitythat includes
traditional sharing, bartering, lending, trading, renting, gifting, and swapping. Still,
these definitionsare also too vague and confound the concept of marketplace exchange,
gift giving, and sharing.Moreover, neither Belk nor Botsman and Rogers clarified
what the actors would be in this type of consumption.
Researchers had used other terms to define similar types of business models,
9
too. For example, Bardhi and Eckhardt (2012) used the term ‗access based
consumption‘, defined asmarket mediated transactions without any transfer of
ownership taking place.Nevertheless, this definition is too broad to be applied for
Airbnb as many transactions such as regular hotels and car rentals also do not transfer
ownership. Ikkala (2014) labeled Airbnb as ‗monetary network hospitality‘. While
this concept speaks directly to the characteristics of Airbnb, it is limited to hospitality
platforms only and therefore very narrow.
2.3 Studies on Airbnb
Research on the Airbnb concept is very limited and recent, addressing a variety
of issues. For example, Miller (2014) focused on the regulation alternatives of Airbnb,
proposing the concept of Transferable Sharing Rights (TSR) to set up the laws for
Airbnb‘s operation. Stern (2014) tried to interpret the phenomenon of people listing
their properties on Airbnb via social proof theory. In contrast, Ikkala (2014) used
social exchange theory to explore the reasons people rent out their properties, which
he labeled as monetary network hospitality in his Master‘s thesis. Using in-depth
interviews with Helsinki hosts, he found that two major reasons for doing so are for
the social interaction with guests from different places plus the financial gains.
Zervas, Proserpio and Byers (2014) explored the impact of Airbnb on the hotel
industry. They compared the data collected on Airbnb.com on the Texas listings with
quarterly hotel revenue tax data on over 4,000 Texas hotels from Smith Travel
Research (STR) in a 10 year period and found that the rise of Airbnb had a negative
impact on hotel revenue, especially at the lower end hotels without conference
facilities.
Zekanovic-Korona and Grzunov (2014) highlighted the impact of information
10
and communication technology (ICT) on the tourism business. They used descriptive
statistics based on an online survey to determine the user structure of Airbnb (sceptics,
36.44%; pioneers, 61.86% and researchers, 1.69%) and discussed its merits and
shortcomings.
Fradkin, Grewal, Holtz and Pearson (2014) conducted a field experiment on
Airbnb.com to determine an efficient way to decrease the bias of the online review
system. They suggested the establishment of a reputation system and the perceived
social distance between reviewer and reviewee should be not be neglected throughout
the operation.
Guttentag (2013) felt that Airbnb is a disruptive innovation and researched on
the legality issue and tax concerns of Airbnb. He found that low cost is the main draw
of people participating in Airbnb. Different from hotel services, the tourists may
obtain a feeling of home in their trip and useful local advice may also be offered. His
article provides general insights intoAirbnb as well as a review of some legal issues in
North America.However, there is no empirical data. He refers to Airbnb as an
internet-based marketplace for peer-to-peer accommodation.
Yannopoulou, Moufahim and Bian (2013) highlighted Couchsurfing and Airbnb
utilizing authenticity to build up their brand identities. Based on qualitative research,
they found that both companies attract customers by providing ―access to the private
sphere, human dimension and meaningful inter-personal discourses and authenticity‖
(p. 85).
To summarize, the studies on Airbnb have broadly touched on different areas,
but none so far have addressed what factors influence Airbnb consumers‘
repurchasing behavior. Furthermore, much of the work to date has been qualitative in
nature, whereas this study will take a quantitative approach.
11
CHAPTER 3: THEORETICAL FRAMEWORK
& MODEL DEVELOPMENT
3.1 Theoretical Background
When researchers discourse about the factors that influence RI, ‗satisfaction‘
seems to be their first choice as it has been recognized as an important antecedent of
consumers‘ loyalty and their repeat buying behaviors (Qureshi, Fang, Ramsy, McCole,
& Compeau, 2009). However, some studies argue that customer satisfaction alone
does not necessarily bring higher intention to repurchase (Pavlou, 2003; Guttentag,
2013). There may be other forms of interpretations of the satisfaction construct that
affect RI, or perhaps the so called satisfaction is not that important when consumers
are dealing with peer-to-peer arrangements. For example, when making a decision,
people are consciously or unconsciously comparing the statistical properties of the
perceived value and risk (Christopoulos, Tobler, Bossaerts, Dolan, &Schultz, 2009).
Generally, alternatives with higher value are preferred when all other things are equal.
Nevertheless, the introduction of risk will influence the expected value, modulating
the subjective evaluation of the decision, no matter whether it is satisfactory or not.
Pires, Stanton and Eckford (2004) suggested that the behavior intention of consumers
can be explored as a consequence of a decision-making process with evaluation of
value and risk. Since Airbnb is a third-party platform that offers online matching
services for accommodations between sellers and buyers, risk might be a very
important factor that influences their behavior intention. However, the Airbnb
consumers must also see value in this kind of peer-to-peer economy given Airbnb‘s
exponential growth. Therefore, the interaction between value and risk seems to be
important in terms of predicting RI in this context.
The most famous theory on risk would be the prospect theory, introduced by
12
Kahneman and Tversky (1979). It suggests thatattitudes towards PR will be different
because consumers are setting their reference points differently. In other words,
consumers‘ PV would be higher when the expected consequence is stated to be
reducing loss rather than keeping gains because most people are loss averse. For
example, when consumers are confronted with the possibility of high risk, their
perception of value diminishes more compared to the increase of risk perception when
they are facing a high value proposition. This interaction between risk and value
leading to behavior can be applied when Airbnbconsumers consider repurchasing
Airbnb accommodation. In this case, their PR would more likely affect the PV of this
transaction and therefore directly or indirectly result in different repurchasing
behaviors. Thus, PR was investigated in this study due to its relativelystrong
risk-value/intention mechanism suggested in the prospect theory.
According to the Means-End Chain (MEC) theory, consumers link and form
their cognition towards something through a combination of the attributes of the
object and their goals, which has been widely applied to explore consumer behaviors
in literature (Walker & Olson, 1991; Olson & Reynolds, 2001). It demonstrates that
there are hierarchical relationships from the means (extrinsic factors), the ends (PV) to
the outcomes (RI) (Gutman, 1982). Gutman also referred to the means as the
attributes, representing the perceptions of consumers of a product or service‘s
characteristics. The ends are related to how consumers choose to react, i.e. the modes
of conduct, being values consumers perceived in the transaction. The outcomes are
also termed consequences or benefits, referring to the physiological or psychological
response of a consumer. Values are the result of the cognition process that is
completed by a mental transformation with a functional consequence and a
psychosocial consequence, generating the estimated value of a product or service as
13
aguideto how consumers are expected to behave (Gutman, 1982; Parks & Guay, 2009).
In other words, values are the final goals that trigger behavior (Chiu et al., 2014).
Therefore, behavior intention can be revealed by certain attributes or values
(Reynolds & Gutman, 1988). That is to say, there is an attribute-value-intention
linkage according to this theory, on which the proposed model of this study is built.
The applications of MEC theory in the tourism field are popular (McIntosh &
Thyne, 2005; McDonald,Thyne, & McMorland, 2008). McIntosh and
Thyneaverredthat more applications of MEC theory to explore the tourist behavior in
tourism research are needed and that MEC theory can be very effective in terms of
understanding personal values. This is supported by previous studies such as
Klenosky, Gengler and Mulvey‘s (1993)research into the factors that affect consumers‘
ski destination choices.
Therefore, this study incorporatesGutman‘s (1982) MEC theory and Kahneman
and Tversky‘s (1979) prospect theory to build the theoretical model, proposing the
mediating effects of PV and PR between extrinsic factors and RI. The adoption of
these two theories to build a consumer behavior model has been shown to be reliable
in previous studies. For example, Chiuet al. (2014) bridged prospect theory and MEC
theory to explore the relationships between utilitarian value, hedonic value, PR and RI
and found that there were significant influences of utilitarian value, hedonic value and
PR on RI as well as powerful effects from PR on those two values.
In this study, RI was examined rather than repurchase behavior because based
on the Theory of Reasoned Action (TRA, Ajzen & Fishbein, 1977), intention is
considered as the best immediate antecedent in the relationship between attitude and
behavior. Therefore, it is appropriate to predict a consumer‘s behavior by measuring
his or her intention. Perceived behaviors or perceptions are widely accepted to have
14
significant influence on consumers‘ online repurchase behaviors.
3.2 Proposed Model
As illustrated in Figure 1, the proposed model consists of three dependent
variables, which are PV, PR and RI, with PR influencing PV and both resulting in RI.
Zeithaml (1988) suggested that various external cues would be used by
consumers to form the perceptions of the product‘s value, thereby affecting their
intentions to rebuy. Similarly, according to Baur (1960) and MEC theory, consumers
would also evaluate the risks of this transaction via external cues, which would affect
their behavior intentions as well as their perceptions of the product‘s value. Therefore,
there should be external cues that influence Airbnb consumers‘ PV and PR when they
consider to repurchase accommodations on the Airbnb website.
In order to identify those external cues, a content analysis was conducted on
Facebook, Twitter and Fodors7, using key words ―why you used Airbnb‖ or ―why you
don‘t/won‘t use Airbnb‖. The Leximancer8 results indicated that there were three
main themes among the collected discussions, identified as perceived authenticity
(PA), electronic word-of-mouth (eWoM) and price sensitivity (PS). Based on
Zeithaml (1988) and Baur‘s (1960) suggestions, external cues are expected to have
influence on PV,PR and RI, resulting in the proposed model shown in Figure 1.
7
www.fodors.com, a forum that offers tourism products/travel review discussions among its members.
Leximancer is an analyzing software that allows presenting the linkage between words and reveals themes of the
data.
15
8
H4a
Perceived
Authenticity
H4b
Perceived
Value
H4c
H1
H1
H5a
H1
EWoM
H1
H5c
H1
H3
H6a
Price
Sensitivity
H1H1
H6b
H1
H5b
H1
H2
H1
H1
H1
Perceived
Risk
H1H1H3
H1
Repurchase
Intention
H3
H1
H1
H6c
Figure 1
H1
H1 Intention for Airbnb
Model of Repurchase
H1
H1
3.3 Hypotheses Development
3.3.1 Perceived Value (PV) & Perceived Risk (PR)
Zeithaml (1988) definedPV as the overall assessment of consumersofthe utility
of service or product based on their perceptionsof gain and given. PV is also defined
as the overall evaluation of the net value (benefits) of a product or service based on
consumer perception(Bolton & Drew, 1991; Sweeney & Soutar, 2001). Kashyap and
Bojanic (2000) summarized that all definitions of PV refer to some form of tradeoff
between what the consumer gives up (price, sacrifice) and what the consumer receives
(utility, quality, benefits).PV is understood as a critical construct in consumer behavior
studies, not only because it is a key determinant influencing behavior intention
(Zeithaml, 1988; Zhuang, Cumiskey, Xiao, & Alford, 2010), but also because it is a
dependent variable that is affected by many other antecedents (Sheth, Newman, &
Gross, 1991a; 1991b). This study adopts the views of Sweeney and Soutar as well as
Sheth et al., defining PV as the consumers‘ overall assessment of the net values of
16
booking accommodations via Airbnb and their perceptions of value which are affected
by PR, PS, eWoM and PA.
The relationship between PV and RI has been studied and confirmed in various
consumer behavior studies (Grewal, Monroe, & Krishnan, 1998; Kuo, Wu, & Deng,
2009). Moreover, it was found that higher PV would lead to willingness to pay
(Dodds & Monroe, 1985). Within the repurchasing behavior studies, PV was found to
positively influence consumers‘RI in studies by Chiuet al. (2014) and Wuet al.
(2014).
PR is defined in terms of uncertainty and consequence, in that it increases with
higher levels of uncertainty and/or the chance of greater associated negative
consequences (Oglethorpe & Monroe, 1987). Similarly, Kim, Ferrin and Rao (2008)
viewed a consumer‘s PR as one‘s belief in possible negative results that would happen
from this transaction. Forsythe, Liu, Shannon and Gardner (2006), however,
highlighted that financial and product performance risks are two types of risks that are
highly associated with internet shopping. Two components of PR that have been
identified are uncertainty and consequences (Baur, 1960). Even though researchers
had defined PR in slightly different ways, its components have been consistently
described. In fact, Airbnb consumers have no choice but to estimate the risk of this
transaction from the available information and communications because they cannot
experience the actual service before arriving at the property. In this sense, the PR of
Airbnb consumers plays a crucial role in their repurchasing decision-making.
Therefore, Kim et al. (2008) and Forsythe et al.‘s definition on PR were adopted
because Airbnb includes the sharing of private sphere. PR in the Airbnb context is
referred as Airbnb consumers‘ beliefs in all possible negative results that may happen
after they book rooms via Airbnb.
17
PR occurs where there is uncertainty, information asymmetry and fear of
opportunism, as is the case in online shopping.However, there has been little effort to
empirically examine the impact of PR relative to that of PV in motivating repurchases
in the online environment. Higher risks have been shown to lead to lower intention to
repurchase (Wu & Chang, 2007; Vijayasarathy & Jones, 2000; An, Lee,& Noh, 2010).
Wu and Chang found that risk attitude directly influences online RI, identifying four
types of risks (natural disaster risk, physical risk, political risk and performance risk).
An, Lee and Noh exploredtourist‘s RI for travelling and found that natural disaster
risk affectedthis RI most. Vijayasarathy and Jones affirmed that the PRby consumers
would significantly affect their online behavior intention. Chiu et al. (2014) found that
PR is a negative determinant of RI. Regarding the relationship between PR and PV,
PR is perceived as an antecedent of PV by most of the previous consumer behavior
studies (Sweeney, Soutar,& Johnson, 1999; Agarwal & Teas, 2001;Chen & Dubinsky,
2003; Chang & Tseng, 2013). Sweeney et al.determined that PR affects consumers‘
PV of a product.Agarwal and Teas used two experimental designs to authenticate the
mediating relationship of PR on consumers‘ perceptions of the product value.Chiu et
al. confirmed that PR was a moderator between value and RI.
To summarize, PV is a positive determinant of RI, while PR is an antecedent
that influences PV and RI. As per the previous studies, the hypotheses between PV,
PR and RI were proposed as follows:
H1: There is a negative relationship between perceived risk and perceived value.
H2: There is a positive relationship between perceived value and repurchase
intention toward Airbnb.
H3: There is a negative relationship between perceived risk and repurchase
intention toward Airbnb.
18
3.3.2 Perceived Authenticity (PA)
Since MacCannell‘s (1973) seminal work on authenticity, the concept has been
widely investigated in tourism research (Chhabra, Healy, & Sills, 2003; Ramkissoon
& Uysal, 2011).Wang (1999) argued that the concept of authenticity is problematic.
He further clarified that in tourism studies, there are two main types of authenticity:
the objective-related authenticity (objective authenticity and constructive authenticity)
and activity-related authenticity (existential authenticity). In other
words,authenticityusually can be conveyed in two distinct concepts: objective
authenticity (genuineness or realness of things) and existential authenticity (human
nature)(Steiner &Reisinger, 2006). It is also regarded as a multidimensional construct
associated with perceptions of honesty, truth and sincerity (Blackshaw, 2008).
Grayson and Martinec (2004) elaborated that when something or someone is
perceived to be real, they are authentic. They further explained that authenticity
should not be viewed as an attribute, but as an assessment of a specific situation. That
is to say, authenticity is the perception of an individual‘s cognitive recognition of the
reality of something, someone or someplace. As previous studies on Airbnb suggested
that seeking local living experiences maybe a main attractive to Airbnb consumers
(Guttentag, 2013; Yannopoulouet al., 2013), this study focused on existential
authenticity, which emphasize on the human nature. Thus, this study adopts Grayson
and Martinec‘sdefinition, referring to PA as the perceptions of Airbnb consumers‘
cognitive recognition of ‗real‘ experiencesof staying in an Airbnb place.
Tourism studies, on the other hand, either define authenticity as a determinant
of customer satisfaction (Chhabra et al., 2003) or as a decisive factor of destination
choices (Ramkissoon & Uysal, 2011). Kolar and Zabkar (2009) focus on the concept
of PA, exploring its relationship with cultural tourism, motivation and customer
19
loyalty. Specifically in the Airbnb context, some Airbnb consumers highlighted
Airbnb as ‗real people with a real home‘ and they can ‗make real life friends‘ (Khan,
2011; Paul, 2013; Garrett-Price, 2014). PA seems to play an important role in the
process of consumers repurchasing Airbnb accommodation.
Ramkissoon and Uysal (2011) found that PA positively and significantly
influenced the cultural behavioral intentions of tourists in the island of Mauritius.
Authenticity is also used as a brand characteristic by Couchsurfing and Airbnb
(Yannopoulouet al.,2013). They found that consumers of both platforms are attracted
by the authentic experience they perceived to have by staying in Couchsurfing and
Airbnb accommodation. In a related study, Lunardo and Guerinet (2007) found that
the perceptions of authenticity influence the purchasing behaviors of young
consumers in wine consumption.
Kovács, Carroll and Lehman (2013) empirically tested the relationship between
consumers‘ PA of a restaurant and the corresponding value ratings. They found that
the more authentic consumers perceived it to be, the higher the value ratingassigned
even when they controlled for a lower quality of restaurant. Therefore, it is believed
that authenticity increases a consumer‘s value ratings. Chen (2009) made it clear that
―people seek out… authenticity… to validate worth‖ (p.65).
Cova and Cova (2002) mentioned that lack of product quality cues (e.g. origins,
materials, producing procedures) increases consumers‘ physical risks towards a
product. They summarized that consumers perceived those products to be not
authentic and thus buying those products is risky. Lunardo and Guerinet (2007) used
originality and projection as two dimensions of authenticity to measure its effects on
the PR, perceived price and purchase intentions of young consumers. Using a
combination of qualitative and quantitative methods, they found that authenticity
20
decreasesPR. Therefore, based on the above discussion, the following hypotheses are
proposed:
H4a: Perceived authenticity increases consumers’ repurchasing intention toward
Airbnb.
H4b: Perceived authenticity increases the consumers’ perceived value toward
Airbnb.
H4c: Perceived authenticity decreases the consumers’ perceived risk toward
Airbnb.
3.3.3 Electronic Word of Mouth (EWoM)
EWoM is defined as any statements made by future, present or former
customers about a product or enterprise, either positive or negative, and is accessible
by anyone online (Hennig-Thurau, Gwinner, Walsh, & Gremler, 2004). Litvin,
Goldsmith and Pan (2008) defined eWoM in the tourism context as every
internet-based communication about the usage or characteristics of something
(products, services or a company). In this study, the Litvin et al.’s (2008) definition is
adopted, referring to eWoM as all informal communications for Airbnb consumers
through the Internet related to the usage or characteristics of booking and living in
Airbnb accommodations.
EWoM is a construct that has been popularly examined regarding its
relationship with branding (Sandes & Urdan, 2013), purchase intention (Mauri
&Minazzi, 2013; See-To & Ho, 2014; Sandes & Urdan, 2013), perceived
credibility/trust (Mauri & Minazzi, 2013; See-To & Ho, 2014); value (See-To & Ho,
2014); and PR (Hung & Li, 2007; Schau, Muñiz, &Arnould, 2009; Wu, 2014). EWoM
is especially important in this context because the product/service researched is
intangible, i.e., its quality is hard to evaluate before consumption. Therefore,
consumers will try to seek references from eWoM before making decisions.
21
Several studies support that eWoM is positively related to PV. For example,
Gruen, Osmonbekov and Czaplewski (2006) explored the relationship between eWoM,
customer PV and customer loyalty intentions based on an online forum with 616
participants. They found a direct positive influence from eWoM on PV. Cheung, Luo,
Sia and Chen (2009) suggest that eWoM has informational and normative influences
on consumers‘ believes and conformity. In other words, eWoM can affect consumers‘
PV of products by strengthening consumers‘ believes and conformity. Keaveney and
Parthasarathy (2001) empirically supported the positive effect of eWoM on PV.
Evidence was also found to support the positive relationship between eWoM
and RI. Boulding,Kalra, Staelin and Zeithmal (1993) argued that positive WOM
predicts future behavior intentions. Mauri and Minazzi (2013) confirmed that there is
a positive correlation between the hotel purchasing intention and eWoM through an
online survey. An exploratory study conducted by Keaveney and Parthasarathy (2001)
indicated eWoM positively increases RI.
After selecting to repurchase accommodations on Airbnb, (or revisit the Airbnb
website to choose a property), certain PRs are likely to occur because they are
probably dealing with different properties and sellers. The advertisements and words
from the sellers alone will not be enough to convince the consumers of the actual
product value. As previous studies suggested (Hung & Li, 2007; Cheunget al., 2009;
Schauet al., 2009), eWoM is one of the most influential ways to decrease consumers‘
PR by providing advice from the online community. Hung and Li suggest that eWOM
can effectively strengthen brand knowledge, leading to a lower customer PR of the
product by decreasing the incident of being deceived. Schauet al.agree that eWoM has
significant effects on decreasing the perceived possibility to be deceived. Recently,
Wu (2014) found evidence on the relationship between eWoM and PR in her Master
22
thesis within the context of hospitality. She further explored how consumers use
eWoM when they try to book accommodations online to decrease the potential risk of
the transaction. Therefore, based on the findings of the previous studies, the
hypotheses of eWoM were proposed as follows:
H5a: EWoM increases consumers’ perceived value toward Airbnb.
H5b: EWoM increases consumers’ repurchase intention toward Airbnb.
H5c: EWoM decreases consumers’ perceived risk toward Airbnb.
3.3.4 Price Sensitivity (PS)
Price has been widely recognized as a determining factor that influences
consumers‘ behavior intentions (Chang & Wildt, 1994; Kim & Kim, 2004; Moon,
Chadee, & Tikoo, 2008; Yoon, 2002). However, the price differences between similar
products leads to various reconsiderations by consumers. For example, product A is
price X, which is relatively lower than its comparable market price. In this scenario,
the RI of consumers will be increased based on the normal price theories. However,
there is a product B at price Y, and price Y is much cheaper than price X. In this
scenario, there are many more factors to consider but consumers‘ RI is increased if
consumers are sensitive to price. This means, consumers will react differently to
different price levels,regardless of the other factors. This is supported by Masiero and
Nicolau‘s (2012) study in which they found that PS plays a complicated role in
affecting tourists to choose tourism products.
To define PS, Goldsmith and Newell (1997)argued it as a variable that measures
how consumers react differently to the price levels and the alteration of the price.
Erdem, Swait and Louviere (2002) explored the relationship between brand credibility
and consumer PS and found that brand credibility decreases consumer PS. They refer
to PS as a consumer‘s consideration of the price when evaluating something‘s value or
23
utility. Casado and Ferrer (2013) found that consumers have latitude of acceptance,
within which they are less sensitive to the change in price while beyond which they
are more sensitive. Since Airbnb stressesa ‗home‘ much more than a low price in their
marketing strategy, it would be interesting to see how consumers react to the price
differences compared to other types of accommodations. To achieve this goal, this
study adopts Erdem et al.‘s definition of PS, that is, it is viewed as the weight attached
to price in an Airbnb consumer‘s valuation of Airbnb accommodation‘s overall
attractiveness or utility.
Prior studies indicated that higher PS negatively influences the consumers‘ PV,
while lower PSis positively related to PV (Kashyap & Bojanic, 2000; Zeithaml, 1988).
In other words, when consumers are very sensitive to the price of their
accommodations, they tend to perceive more value in choosing Airbnb.
PS was found to influence consumers‘PRof a product as well. Bearden and
Shimp (1982) conducted two field experiments to examine the influence of different
price levels, reputation and warranty of a product on the PR associated with it. Two
aspects of risks, namely financial risk and performance risk, were found to have direct
effects on PR. Shimp & Bearden (1982) corroborated a significant relationship
between PS and PR.
There is little doubt that being sensitive to different prices will influence the
intention to repurchase. For example, Chen, Monroe and Lou (1998) suggested that
buyers would have stronger intentions to purchase something when the product is
cheaper than one with the same function at a higher price. These findings were
supported by Grewal et al.’s (1998) conceptual model on the effects of the (reference)
prices on PV and behavior intentions.
24
In summary, the following hypotheses proposed are all supported by previous
studies:
H6a: Consumers’ price sensitivity increases their perceived value toward Airbnb.
H6b: Consumers’ price sensitivity decreases their perceived risk toward Airbnb.
H6c: Consumers’ price sensitivity increases their repurchase intention toward
Airbnb.
25
CHAPTER 4: METHODOLOGY& RESULTS
4.1 Research Designand Sampling
Based on the initial model, a content analysis was conducted to identify the
antecedents that influence Airbnb consumers‘ PV, PR and RI. The key words ‗why use
Airbnb‘ and ‗why don‘t use Airbnb‘ were used to explore the websites like Facebook,
Twitter, and Fodors. A total of 50,495 words were captured and the software
Leximancer was used to analyze the result. Three major themes emerged as a result,
where frequently occurring words such as‗people‘, ‗real‘, ‗experience‘, and
‗host‘created a cluster that was categorized as PA; the‗money‘, ‗booking‘, ‗rent‘,
‗cheap/cheaper‘, ‗save‘ cluster was identified PS; and the cluster of ‗place‘,
‗review/reviews‘, ‗report‘ was called eWoM.
Airbnb consumers who had booked and stayed in Airbnb accommodation at
least once were selected for this study. A panel member database in North America
was chosen in cooperation with a research company as reaching Airbnb consumers
directly is very difficult and costly. Residing in Canada and the United States, these
panel members were mainly enrolled through the Internet. People are coming from all
walks of life. They would normally indicate the types of surveys they are interested
in,according to which the research company will send them corresponding invitations
when there are related projects. Panel members are rewarded with points when they
completed a survey. These can be convertedinto gift cards, donated to charity, or used
in other ways depending on the company‘s policy.
The main aim of this project is to explore the relationships between the
identified antecedents and dependent variables. To achieve this, a survey with items
measuring all of the proposed constructs and demographic questions was developed.
As the chosen constructs are relatively well examined in the prior studies, existing
26
scales of each construct are adopted with minor changes to suit the context for this
study.
Since convenience sampling was used for this study, potential systemic error
was taken into consideration. To increase the content validity of the study and the
reliability of the questionnaire, a pretest was carried out with 10 graduate students that
had used Airbnb prior to the distribution of the final survey link. Minor changes
including wording and questions sequencing were made as result of the pretest.
Invitation letters were sent to the panel members of the specified database to
obtain their agreement to participate in the study. Only participants who had
experiences with Airbnb were qualified to take part. Since participants are rewarded
by the research company, potential malice respondents were taken into consideration.
To reduce the possibility of disingenuous data, two identical but opposite questions
(Q12-1 ―I cannot trust Airbnb‖ and Q12-7 ―Airbnb is trustworthy‖) were integrated
into the survey.
A total of3,262 surveys were collected over a period of one month (mainly in
January, 2015). 2,678 were screened out because they indicated they had not use
Airbnb and a further 189 were eliminated because they either showed contradictions
in answering Q12-1 and Q12-7, answered all questions the same, or skipped too many
questions. Therefore, only 395 surveys were retained for the analysis of this study,
yielding a 12.11% response rate.
4.2 Measurement of the Constructs
The survey has a total of 24 questions, excluding demographic questions. All of
the items used a five-point Likert scale from 1 to 5, rating from strongly disagree to
strongly agree. Literature had supported that the reliability of the five-point scale
27
isstatistically significantly higher than that of the four-point scale. For instance, some
studies found that construct validity may not be influenced by the midpoints (Adelson
& McCoach, 2010; Kulas, Stachowski, & Haynes, 2008), whileothers suggest the
omission of the midpoints may impair the validity (Johns, 2005). Moreover, the
setting of midpoints allows participants to indicate that they do not care about this
question rather than forcing them to choose to agree or disagree. In the social sciences,
participants might not think the questions asked are important to them because
researchers develop surveys mainly based on their personal knowledge. Therefore,
based on the literature (Adelson & McCoach; Kulaset al.) and to reduce researcher
bias, a five-point scale was chosen.
The items were all adopted from the literature so as to be operationalized as this
study was undertaken within a specific context (Airbnb). RI is a construct that has
been frequently measured. Thus the measurement of RI was similar to the previous
studies. Four items from Ramkissoon and Uysal (2011) were chosen to measure PA
whilefive items to measure EWoM were adapted from Jalilvand and Samiei (2012).
The items from Irani and Hanzaee (2011) to measure PS were adapted in the context
of Airbnb. PV was measured using the items employed from Sweeney and Soutar
(2001) while the items to measure PR were adapted from Forsythe et al. (2006).To
increase the validity of the scales, both measurements of PV and PR only focused on
one dimension. All validated measuring items are available in Table 3 (See Appendix
for all items).
4.3 Data Analysis and Findings
Various statistical methods were used to examine the relationships among the
mentioned constructs. First, frequency analysis was conducted to summarize the
demographic information of the sample via SPSS 22.0. Gerbing and Anderson (1988)
28
proposed a two-step procedure to analyze a proposed model. To follow Gerbing and
Anderson‘s method, a confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) was employed to identify
the validity of the measuring items via Amos 21.0. Third, structural equation
modeling (SEM) was performed using Amos 21.0 to examine the model fit since it
was a theoretical model.CFA was performed for this study instead of exploratory
factor analysis (EFA) because all the latent constructs and the measurement items
were employed from prior studies where they were empirically shown to be
acceptable, reliable and valid.
4.3.1 Demographics of the Respondents
Among the respondents, 52.2% are female and 46.8% are male. The age of
respondents ranges from 18 to 75. More specifically, 31.9% are 46 years old and over,
17.7% are 35 to 45, 25.6% are 25 to 34, and 17.7% are under 25 years old. Most of
them have university or higher education, accounting for 58.9% of respondents. 26.6%
graduated from college/technical school, while 13.9% have high school or less. 42.8%
participants chose a private room on their most recent trip with a comparable 40%
choosing the whole house or apartment. 53.9% of Airbnb consumers stayed short term
(2-4 nights). The main purpose of trips is leisure (66.6%) and they were travelling
alone (21.8%) or with their partner (41%).
4.3.2 Scale Validity and Reliability
The reliability of constructs was examined using composite reliability (CR).
29
According to Nunnally (1978), to achieve reliability of a construct, the Cronbach‘s
Alpha should be greater than 0.7 for an existing scale(Nunnally & Berstein,
1994).However, Cronbach‘s Alphawas critiqued by Peterson and Kim (2013) as
beingexplored as ‗a lower bound‘ to reliabilityand hence may not be efficient
todemonstrate true reliability when this is a multi-factor model. They suggested CRas
a popular alternative coefficient alpha, which is usually calculated as part of SEM. A
CR value of 0.7 or higher suggests good reliability (Churchill, 1979; Hair, Anderson,
Tatham, & Black, 1998) (Table 3).
Among 28 scale items, 6 were found to have low loadings on their
corresponding construct and therefore were discarded to obtain a better model fit. The
CR values range from 0.664 to 0.836. Discriminant validity and convergent validity
were also tested (Table 2). According to Fornell and Larcker (1981), when the square
root of the AVE from a construct is larger than the correlations shared between the
construct and other constructs in the model, then they are discriminant from each
other. Convergent validity was achieved because all values of AVE are above 0.5
(Hairet al., 1998).
Table 2
Validity test
CR
0.836
PR
0.820
PA
EWOM 0.826
0.664
PS
0.813
PV
AVE
0.719
0.543
0.544
0.502
0.594
MSV
0.099
0.398
0.338
0.305
0.398
ASV
0.031
0.262
0.202
0.184
0.225
PR
0.848
-0.090
0.067
0.105
-0.315
PA
EWOM PS
PV
0.737
0.581
0.552
0.631
0.737
0.493
0.472
0.770
0.709
0.422
30
The CFA result indicated the research model is of adequate fit. According to
Bentler (1995), the rule that the chi square/degrees of freedom (2/df) ratio being
less than 5 (2/df = 1.911; 2=149.079; df = 78 were achieved for this model) is used
to justify the sensitivity of chi-square to a large sample size. The Root Mean Square
Error of Approximation (RMSEA) is 0.048, below the cutoff point of 0.08, indicating
a good model fit (Hairet al., 1998). The Normed Fit Index (NFI) and Comparative Fit
Index (CFI) revealed a goodness of model fit when they achieve higher than 0.90
where NFI = 0.941 and CFI = 0.971 were achieved in this model. Based on these
indices, the model is concluded to be adequate fit.
31
Table 3
Confirmatory factor analysis for measurement model
Items
Perceived Authenticity
Living in an Airbnb place represents local ways of life.
Living in an Airbnb place represents the local community.
An Airbnb place offers a feeling of real home for my trip.
Living in an Airbnb place allows for interaction with the local
community.
Electronic Word-of-Mouth
I often read other tourists‘ online reviews to know whether
Airbnb makes a good impression on others.
To make sure I choose the right Airbnb place, I often read other
tourists‘ online reviews
I often consult other tourists‘ online reviews to help choose a
good Airbnb place.
I frequently gather information from tourists‘ online reviews
before I choose to book an Airbnb place.
Price Sensitivity
I am more willing to purchase the Airbnb place if I think it is
cheaper than a hotel room.
In general, the price or cost of purchasing an Airbnb place is
important to me.
Perceived Value
Airbnb places are reasonably priced.
Factor
Loadings
Composite
Reliability
0.543 0.820
AVE
0.871
0.846
0.801
0.707
0.544 0.826
0.842
0.818
0.810
0.769
0.502 0.6649
0.861
0.861
0.594 0.813
0.883
9
Unpredictable factors may had affected the results of PS, however, evidence show that PS is a reliable construct and have significant effects on PV and RI. The overall CR is 0.664, just
below the standard cut point of 0.7, but considering all the other factors, e.g. the item such as “ In general, the price of purchasing Airbnb accommodations is important to me”, shows an
average score over 4 in the dataset, we consider this construct is acceptable and should not be deleted.
32
Airbnb places offer value for money.
Airbnb places are good products for the price.
Perceived Risk
I may not successfully get into the house.
I cannot examine the quality of the Airbnb place.
Repurchase Intention
I will purchase rooms via Airbnb again
0.842
0.829
0.719 0.836
0.91
0.79
0.70
33
4.3.3 Structural Model Analysis
This study set out to explore the relationships between the extrinsic factors, PV,
PR and RI. Therefore, the proposed model was examined using the SEM method after
a curve estimation was done for all the relationships. All were statisticallylineal to be
tested in the variances used in SEM. Common method bias was examined through a
common latent factor. No significant change of the loadings was found when a
common latent factor was added to the model, indicating that no obvious common
method bias existed in this study.
The result of the SEM analysis is shown in Figure 2. The RMSEA is 0.071,
below the cutoff point of 0.08, indicating a good model fit (Hairet al., 1998). The
2/df ratio of 2.976 (2=147.193; df=81), which is between 1 and 3, indicates a good
adjustment of the sensitivity of chi-square to a large sample size (Bentler, 1995). GFI
is 0.925, which is close to the suggested point of 0.95, and AGFI is 0.883.Therefore,
the measurement model showed satisfactory goodness-of-fit indices.
34
Notes: ***p<0.001; **p<0.01; *p<0.05; ns = not significant.
Figure 2
Structural path coefficients
In terms of the hypotheses tested, only H4a and H6b were not supported but all
of the remaining ten hypotheses were statistically significant. The hypothesis test
results are shown in Table 4. This indicates that the influence of PA on RI was fully
mediated by PV and PR. However, the mediating effect of PR between PS and RI was
not supported. This may because a lower price alone cannot alleviate the risks Airbnb
consumers perceived but can enhance their value perceptions towards the next Airbnb
transaction (Kwun & Oh, 2004).
The standardized estimates for the following mediating effects ranged from
0.019 to 0.129, and all p-values are significant (p<0.005), suggesting that the links of
35
extrinsic factorsPV/PRRI are true as theorized. Based on the results, it is
confirmed that there were mediating effects between the extrinsic factors and RI
except for PS through PR:
1)
2)
3)
4)
5)
PAPVRI;
EWOMPVRI;
PSPVRI;
PAPRRI; and
EWOMPRRI.
Table 4
Results of hypothesis tests
Standard
Regression weight
H1: PRPV
-0.318***
H2: PVRI
0.172*
H3: PR RI
-0.416***
H4a: PA RI
0.069
H4b: PA PV
0.406***
H4c: PAPR
-0.712***
H5a: EWOMPV
0.166***
H5b: EWOMRI
0.144**
H5c: EWOMPR
-0.148**
H6a: PSPV
0.153**
H6b: PSPR
0.023
H6c: PS RI
0.186**
Notes: ***p<0.001; **p<0.01; *p<0.05
Hypotheses
Support
Yes
Yes
Yes
No
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
No
Yes
36
CHAPTER 5: CONCLUSION
The main purposes of this study were to examine the proposed model as well as
the factors that influence Airbnb consumers‘ RI. In particular, this research focused on
identifying the effects from the extrinsic factors on PV, PR and RI.
The results of this study indicate that Airbnb consumers‘ sensitivity level to
price does not reduce their PR, but their PA and peers‘ comments do. PS was found to
not have significant effects on PR but on PV and RI. This makes sense because
consumers‘ sensitivity level to price may enhance PV therefore increase RI, but would
not necessarily significantly reduce their PR of repurchasing the Airbnb
products.Many other factors like the credibility of the sources would have influence
on the effects from PS on PR. As Grewal, Gotlieb, & Marmorstein (1994) suggested,
the significance level of the relationship between price and PR depends on how the
advertised information is communicated. In other words, a cheaper price alone may
not necessarily help to relieve Airbnb consumers‘ PR regarding the next transaction
with Airbnb. Moreover, according to the evidence provided by Aqueveque (2006),
although the abatement effect from price on PR is generally expected, there is
exception when the product was regarded as a private consumption, and was not
creditably recognized by the public. That is to say, it is possible to presume that PS is
to some extent irrelevant in terms of its effect on PR estimation as Airbnb is a
relatively new platform and transactions with Airbnb normally are private
consumptions. However, consumers‘ sensitivity level to price was found to
significantly improve their PV of Airbnb products. In accord with prior studies like
37
Guttentag (2013) who found low cost is the main draw for people participating in
Airbnb, this finding empirically proves that consumers‘ sensitivity of price is a critical
factor that enhance consumers‘ PV.
Another interesting finding is that PA seems to be a powerful way to enhance
PV as well as reduce PR of Airbnb consumers. One possible explanation for this
strong effect from PA is that, Airbnb consumers that repeatedly stay with Airbnb are
not just concerned about the price, but actually seek the authentic local experience
more. This result is in line with previous studies (Lunardo & Guerinet, 2007;
Ramkissoon & Uysal, 2011; Yannopoulouet al.,2013) and therefore, PA can be
considered the most important factor that affects the PV and PR of Airbnb consumers.
Finally, the initial model exploring the relationships between PV, PR and RI
was found to be statistically supported. The negative influences of PR were found not
only on PV, but also on RI. Therefore, finding a way to reduce customers‘ PR would
be effective because it would increase PV and RI at the same time.
In conclusion, the findings of this study can be valuable for tourism researchers
as well as the industry professionals in terms of understanding the Airbnb consumers‘
repurchasing behavior as well as changes in tourist demand regarding seeking
‗authentic‘ accommodations for their travels.
5.1 Implications
Airbnb is currently a hot topic in the hospitality industry and the peer-to-peer
economy because it has shown rapid growth since 2012. A major strength of this study
is that it researched current Airbnb consumers, offering a reliable explanation for the
38
main factors that influence their intention to keep choosing Airbnb. Both academic
implications and managerial implications are revealed.
Academically, this study extends the application of tourism related factors
(PA)to the analysis of online consumer behavior studies. The results indicate that PA
plays a critical role in enhancing Airbnb consumers‘RI by reducing their PR and
increasing their PV. Applying these constructs in a new setting also helps to enrich the
literature. Specifically, the exploration of the concept authenticity provides significant
insights for the tourism literature. Distinguished from objective authenticity, which
refers to the ‗genuineness or realness‘ of things (Steiner &Reisinger, 2006), this study
reveals the effects of existential authenticity on consumer behavior, which emphasize
the human nature. Therefore, it is shown that the essence of human individuality
should not be neglected in academic and market research.
Second, the findings show that PR negatively influences PV and RI but PV
positively influences RI. This proves that the relationships between PV, PR and RI are
as suggested in prospect theory and MEC theory, confirming the effectiveness of this
framework. This study proves the validity of the initial model and the relationships
between PV, PR and RI. Therefore, it may be utilized as an initial model when applied
into different context. Investigating the mediating role of PV and PR may provide a
relative comprehensive understanding of the factors that influence RI.
Several useful implications for practitioners who are interested in enhancing the
value of their accommodations by marketing the authentic experience are indicated
through the results of this study. First, tourists tend to seek an authentic
39
accommodation experience, and desire to connect to the locals by living in Airbnb
properties. This would be important for Airbnbas well as hotel managers asit shows
that tourists tend to seek local experiences by living in the local community, which
can significantly influence their PV and PR for the forthcoming rebuying behavior.
Industry managers can try to reconcile the elements of authenticity in their future
marketing strategy. At the same time, while offering great service to the customers,
hotel managers should also consider how to fulfill the customers‘ PA needs. Second,
consumers‘ sensitivity to price may not significantly reduce their PR according to our
findings but can improve their PV and intentions to repurchase. This can be valuable
to the industry professionals when dealing with price strategy. Last but not least,
eWoM plays a significant role in terms of its effects on all three constructs of the
initial model (PV, PR and RI). Therefore, keeping a good response to the online
reviews is recommended for industry managers.
5.2 Limitations and Future Research Direction
The sample is limited to consumers that used Airbnb before and who reside in
Canada or the United States. Individuals who have not stayed with Airbnb may have
different perceptions about the platform and they may have different experiences with
Airbnb, either with the hosts, or with the Airbnb company. Therefore, the results
should be interpreted as only explaining the majority of Airbnb consumers rather than
all individuals.
Second, the results may have been influenced by common method bias.
Although tests were conducted to examine for this bias, potential bias from the
40
researcher in developing the survey still exists. However, several methods like content
analysis and pretest were done to reduce it as much as possible.
Third, this study only focuses on one dimension of the construct PV and PR,
whereas they are regarded as multidimensional constructs. Future studies should try to
measure different dimensions and compare the differences with this model, as well as
other geographic areas to extend the generalizability of the model.
Finally, future studies should also consider whether there is a comparatively
higher rate of sharing accommodation experiences on social network sites for Airbnb
consumers. This can be compared to other consumer groups, e.g. five-diamond hotel
consumers within the same area. The reason why this study would be interesting is
that when people are having a unique experience, they tend to show off to their
network circles. Exploring these phenomena may provide significant references for
marketing professionals of the hospitality industry.
41
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51
Appendix
All items used in survey
Items
Perceived Authenticity
Living in an Airbnb place represents local ways of life.
Living in an Airbnb place represents the local community.
An Airbnb place offers a feeling of real home for my trip.
Living in an Airbnb place allows for interaction with the local
community.
Electronic Word-of-Mouth
I often read other tourists‘ online reviews to know whether
Airbnb makes a good impression on others.
To make sure I choose the right Airbnb place, I often read other
tourists‘ online reviews
I often consult other tourists‘ online reviews to help choose a
good Airbnb place.
I frequently gather information from tourists‘ online reviews
before I choose to book an Airbnb place.
If I don‘t read tourists‘ online reviews when purchasing an
Airbnb place, I worry about my decision.
Price Sensitivity
I don‘t mind paying more to try and stay in an Airbnb place.
I am less willing to purchase the Airbnb place if I think that it
will be expensive.
I am more willing to purchase the Airbnb place if I think it is
cheaper than a hotel room.
Factor
Loadings
Standard
deviation
Mean
0.871
0.846
0.801
0.835
0.798
0.785
4.02
4.06
4.10
0.707
0.770
4.02
0.842
0.883
4.17
0.818
0.806
4.34
0.810
0.99
3.99
0.769
0.816
4.08
0.532
1.224
3.61
0.540
0.941
3.36
0.746
0.949
3.67
0.861
0.849
4.05
52
A good lodging experience with Airbnb is worth paying a lot of
money for.
In general, the price or cost of purchasing an Airbnb place is
important to me.
Perceived Value
Airbnb places are reasonably priced.
Airbnb places offer value for money.
Airbnb places are good products for the price.
Airbnb places are economical.
I enjoy living in Airbnb places.
Airbnb places have a consistent quality.
Living in an Airbnb place would help me make more friends.
Perceived Risk
I cannot trust Airbnb.
I may not successfully get into the house.
I cannot examine the quality of the Airbnb place.
I may have problems when living in a stranger‘s house.
It‘s too complicated to use Airbnb.
Repurchase Intention
I will purchase rooms via Airbnb again
0.440
0.948
3.35
0.861
0.769
4.10
0.883
0.842
0.829
0.736
0.730
0.497
0.607
0.688
0.666
0.676
0.874
0.773
0.934
1.057
3.93
4.01
4.01
3.95
4.11
3.55
3.65
0.690
0.910
0.790
0.708
0.613
1.081
0.833
0.960
1.038
1.214
1.85
2.58
2.88
2.75
1.99
0.70
0.909
4.09
53