Determiners of Consumer Trust Towards Electronic Commerce: An Application to Puerto Rico

Abstract

Electronic commerce is the new technology that companies use to offer a variety of their products and services at low prices to consumers. Consumers exist that ask just how safe it is to give personal information at the time of making a commercial transaction. This research was geared towards determining possible factors that are most relevant and that affect the consumer’s trust when using electronic commerce and what their perception is related to this. Issues such as, security, privacy, risk, experience using Internet, and the website quality were explored and a Trust model was applied. Two hundred (200) questionnaires were collected a private university. The results showed that significant differences exist among consumers with high and low perceived security, perceived privacy, perceived risks, and the perception of website quality. However, the factor of experience using the Internet showed that no significant difference exists in consumer trust towards electronic commerce. The study suggests that virtual businesses should adopt innovative strategies in their infrastructure.

Keywords: Electronic Commerce, Perception, Trust, Privacy, Security

JEL Classification: L29, M30, M39, O39