The effect of perceived corporate social responsibility on purchase intention in mobile commerce: mediating roles of trusting beliefs and satisfaction

Abstract

Purpose

Corporate social responsibility (CSR) activities of companies have been reported to generate favorable consumer attitudes towards the business, which in turn, encourages positive consumer behavior. But the application of this conclusion in the mobile commerce domain remains limited. Drawing on social exchange theory, the authors examined the mediating role of trusting beliefs and satisfaction in the relationship between CSR and purchase intention in mobile commerce.

Design/methodology/approach

Using nonprobability convenience sampling, the authors administered a cross-sectional survey with 314 students from Keimyung University in Korea. Initially, SPSS-Amos was utilized to run confirmatory factor analysis. The proposed hypotheses were tested using structural equation modeling.

Findings

This study showed that two components of trusting beliefs, namely benevolence and competence, had a positive effect on the association between CSR and the purchase intention on mobile shopping applications. This relationship was partially mediated by trusting beliefs. Further findings demonstrated that the impact of CSR on purchase intention was also partially mediated by satisfaction.

Originality/value

The authors' contribution includes extending the social exchange theory to the mobile commerce setting by establishing mechanisms that explain the ways CSR influences purchase intention in the mobile commerce framework. The authors integrated trusting beliefs and satisfaction in the CRS chain link with purchase intention. Additionally, the authors examined the individual effects of three trusting beliefs components. Based on the results, the authors proposed suggestions for the mobile shopping application business on the methods they can implement to boost the outcomes of their CSR activities.

研究目的

:過去的研究結果、均顯示公司的企業社會責任行為會產生對公司良好的消費者態度,而這消費者態度,則進而促進積極的消費行為; 唯這結論的應用、在移動商務的領域內仍是有限的。我們利用社會交換理論、探討了信任的信念和滿意在移動商務裡的企業社會責任與購買意圖之間的關係上的中介角色。

研究設計/方法/理念

:透過使用非機率便利抽樣的研究法,我們對來自南韓啟明大學314名學生進行了一個橫向調查研究。最初,我們使用結構方程模型 (SPSS-AMOS) 來進行驗證性因素分析。又用結構方程模型 (SEM) 來為提出的假設進行測試。

研究結果

:研究結果顯示,信任的信念的兩個組成部分,即仁愛和能力,均於移動購物應用上對企業社會責任與購買意圖之間的關聯有積極正面的影響。這關聯部分上為信任的信念所調節。研究結果更表明了企業社會責任對購買意圖的影響、亦是部分上為滿意所調節的。

研究的原創性/價值

:本研究的貢獻、包括藉著建立一個可解釋企業社會責任、如何在移動商務的框架裡影響購買意圖的機制,去把社會交換理論擴展至移動商務的環境。我們在企業社會責任與購買意圖一連串的關聯裡、融入了信任的信念和滿意。而且,我們探討了三個信任的信念的組成部分各自所帶來的影響。我們根據研究的結果,為移動購物應用之商業機構,建議有效的方法,去增強其企業社會責任行為的效果。

Citation

Urinbaeva, G., Khasanova, D. and Clugston, C.J. (2023), "The effect of perceived corporate social responsibility on purchase intention in mobile commerce: mediating roles of trusting beliefs and satisfaction", European Journal of Management and Business Economics, Vol. ahead-of-print No. ahead-of-print. https://doi.org/10.1108/EJMBE-12-2022-0382

1. Introduction

Mobile commerce is a new subset of e-commerce (Siau and Lim, 2003) that facilitates monetary transactions via smartphones and other mobile devices. Mobile commerce made up nearly two-thirds (65.7%) of all worldwide e-commerce retail sales as of January 2022. Even though this trend is projected to continue growing, most of the academic research is confined to the e-commerce context and existing studies centered primarily on the adoption of mobile shopping applications (Chopdar and Balakrishnan, 2020).

A growing body of literature attempted to analyze the antecedents of purchase intention both online and offline. Consumers' corporate social responsibility (CSR) perceptions of companies have been consistently acknowledged to have a positive influence on purchase intention. A recent survey conducted by Certus Insights (2019), revealed that 51% of the US millennials consider CSR efforts of a business when making their purchase decisions. The same survey also reported that 70% of the consumers showed interest in learning about the CSR efforts of the businesses they buy services or products from. Despite the plethora of evidence on the associations between CSR and consumer purchase intention, its application in the scope of mobile commerce is highly limited.

Chopdar and Balakrishman (2020) advocated the importance of treating mobile shopping applications as a distinctive research domain from online and mobile websites. The authors indicate that a lack of face-to-face communication between customers and marketers in mobile shopping applications will affect consumers' purchase behavior. Thus, our research intends to examine the mechanisms regulating the relationship between perceived CSR and purchase intention on the mobile commerce context. We specifically looked at customer CSR perception of Korean top mobile shopping application named Coupang. This mobile shopping application provides the sales of millions of unique items with the same day delivery. Mobile Index, a Korean mobile analysis platform announced that the users of Coupang mobile shopping application reached a total of 11 million in 2019. Coupang's strength is not only their quick delivery, but also the recognition that the business treats its customers well, which is an important component of such success (Sang-Bong et al., 2020).

Businesses that implement social responsibility initiatives acquire credibility, which in turn, boosts consumer trust and satisfaction (Islam et al., 2021). Accordingly, trusting beliefs and satisfaction have been consistently studied in combination with CSR to explain purchase intention. Several studies researched the role of corporate social responsibility in improving purchase intentions and reported that trusting beliefs mediated the relationship between corporate social responsibility and purchase decisions (e.g. Semuel and Chandra, 2014; Hameed et al., 2018). Similarly, a growing body of literature demonstrated a mediating impact of satisfaction in the link between CSR and purchase intention (Bianchi et al., 2019; Rehman et al., 2019).

Nevertheless, very few studies integrated trusting beliefs and satisfaction in the association of CSR with purchase intention. Besides, most studies tended to focus on the combined effect of trusting beliefs in their frameworks. Yet, trusting beliefs is widely accepted to have three components, namely, benevolence, competence, and integrity (McKnight and Chervany, 2001). We propose a model that is intended to fill these gaps.

Based on this, the first goal of our research is to investigate the direct link between perceived CSR and the purchase intention in the context of mobile shopping applications. The second goal is to look at the individual mediating impact of three trusting beliefs between perceived CSR and purchase intention. The third goal is to analyze whether satisfaction plays a mediating role in the relationship between perceived CSR and purchase intention in mobile shopping applications.

The results from this research will contribute to literature in several ways. Theoretically, integrating trusting beliefs and satisfaction in the link between CRS and purchase intention will provide a broad view that will improve our understanding the causal chain that links CSR perception to the purchase intention within the mobile commerce context. In addition, studying three dimensions of trusting beliefs separately will yield different implications and contribute to a better theoretical understanding of them. At the practical level, providing evidence of the distinct impact of the three trusting beliefs will aid businesses to understand the specific role of each trust dimension. Overall, our study will help in a better understanding of how CSR activities of a business can get consumers to act as well as offer suggestions on how to boost the impact of CSR on consumer purchase decision making in the mobile commerce domain.

2. Literature review

2.1 Conceptual framework

Social exchange theory has been widely used to clarify the impact of CSR on the intention to purchase (Quang Tran et al., 2022). The theory proposes that people evaluate the potential benefits and costs of a social exchange, and if they believe they can obtain more of a reward from the relationship they choose to resume the social association. Contrarily, when people feel the costs outweigh the reward, the relationship will be suspended (Blau, 1964; Wong, 2003).

CSR activities provide an ability that the businesses can use as a type of socioeconomic resource that is deliberately “exchanged” with the hopes of reciprocation from the customer (Abd Rahim et al., 2011). Research suggests positive exchanges lead a customer to reciprocation and a desire to maintain the relationship by enacting positive behaviors (Hakimi et al., 2023). These positive interactions eventually increase the desire to maintain the relationship and the interdependency of the two exchange partners. Accordingly, our research investigates the consequences of consumer CSR perceptions in the company and consumer relationship and proposes that consumers' CSR perceptions of the mobile shopping application are reflected in their trusting beliefs and satisfaction with the business, which in turn, leads to purchase intention on the mobile shopping application platform.

2.2 CSR and intention to purchase through mobile shopping applications

There have been numerous conceptualizations of CSR since the mid-twentieth century when business community started directing its attention to the social sides of the company behavior (Rivera et al., 2019). Regardless of the variations in the conceptualization of CSR, at least two agreed conceptualizations exist in the literate, which are the company's responsibilities that transcend economic interests, and its accountability to its stakeholders like customers (Rivera et al., 2016). Furthermore, consumers consider a company socially responsible if it shows respect for human rights, or in other words, consumer rights (Bigné et al., 2006).

Thus, many researchers utilized customer-oriented CSR as a special dimension of CSR in their studies (e.g. Martínez et al., 2014; Úbeda-García et al., 2021). In parallel with these studies, our research approaches CSR from the perspective of CSR oriented to customers and defines it in line with Perez and Rodríguez del Bosque (2014, p. 225) as “the CSR oriented to customers basically includes the complete and honest communication of corporate products and services and the management of customer complaints”.

Many researchers have concluded that an individual's intention is an influence that leads to perform a follow-up behavior (e.g. Ajzen, 1985; Venkatesh and Davis, 1996). In line with the existing literature, we define the intention to purchase on mobile shopping applications as the consumer's willingness to engage in a financial transaction on mobile shopping applications that will translate into actual purchasing behavior.

Previous studies have shown that perceived CSR has a significantly positive effect on the purchase intention. Liu et al. (2018) conducted experiments that looked into how consumer's perception of CSR influences their decision to make a purchase. Their results reveal that consumers were more willing to buy high-CSR, compared to low-CSR, products (p. 1654). They also showed that customers who consider CSR when making purchases are more likely to be engaged in actual purchase behavior. Similarly, Dincer and Dincer (2012) report that when customers choose a particular company's product over another, they base their purchase decision on a product's CSR information. Another similar finding by Popa et al. (2022) examines the influence of CSR on consumer purchase intention in the context of cosmetic products on e-commerce and indicates that consumers tend to purchase more from cosmetic product companies engaged in CSR. Based on these works, our research proposes the following hypothesis:

H1.

CSR will have a positive effect on intention to purchase on mobile shopping applications.

2.3 Mediating role of trusting beliefs

Building and sustaining a long-term relationship between consumers and the business requires a high level of trust (Ghondaghsaz and Engesser, 2022). In the e-commerce literature, various definitions of trust can be found, as narrow conceptualizations of trust are developed by scholars to be line with the nature of each study (McKnight and Chervany, 2001). McKnight et al. (2002) stressed the need for conceptual clarity and proposed a multidimensional model of trust including five aspects: disposition to trust, institutional-based trust, trusting beliefs, trusting intention and trust-related behavior. For our study, the trusting beliefs component is adopted as a mediating variable.

Dimensions of trusting beliefs have periodically been recognized as vital mediating variables generating positive behavioral relationship effects (Krisch and Grabner-Kräuter, 2017). In our study, trusting beliefs are defined as the belief by mobile shopping application users that the mobile shopping application has beneficial characteristics to them (McKnight and Chervany, 2001).Those characteristics include the competence, benevolence, and integrity of the mobile shopping applications to act according to its customers' benefits. Competence is identified as the ability of the mobile commerce application business to perform a successful transaction (McKnight et al., 2002) and reflects the consumers' belief that goods and services are delivered in an efficient and proper manner by the mobile shopping application vendor. Benevolence indicates the extent to which mobile shopping application user attributes the mobile shopping vendor's response as benevolent (Simões Coelho et al., 2023). Integrity describes “the honesty and promise keeping” of the mobile shopping business (McKnight and Chervany, 2001).

As discussed earlier the reciprocity notion of the theory of social exchange can specify the link of CSR to trusting beliefs (Yadav et al., 2018). The SET postulates that relationships thrive only in the presence of reciprocity, which can take either attitudinal or behavioral shapes (Yadav et al., 2018). Thus, our study suggests that consumers reciprocate CSR activities of mobile shopping application businesses with increased levels of trusting beliefs, which consequently serves as a reward to the business. What is more, CSR serves as a manifestation that positively affects consumers' attitudes toward the mobile shopping application platform and their evaluation of its products and services (Yadav et al., 2018). Research examining the direct relationship between CSR and trusting beliefs proved that CSR activities substantially influenced consumer decisions to respond to CSR by boosting consumers' confidence in the competence, benevolence and integrity of the business (Park et al., 2017). For example, in their study with South Korean consumers, Park et al. (2014) verified that CSR initiatives of a company were positively related to all three dimensions of trusting beliefs. Consistent with this finding, a study by Puwirat and Tripopsakul (2019) found that corporate social responsibility significantly and positively predicted consumer trust in the domain of social commerce.

Trusting beliefs was an important antecedent of positive consumer behaviors such as consumer satisfaction, loyalty and, more importantly, consumer purchase intention (e.g. Sahi et al., 2016; Xu et al., 2016; Shaker et al., 2021). Because of the lack of direct encounters between a buyer and seller in e-commerce and m-commerce, consumers need to deal with uncertainties when engaging in online transactions (Hajli et al., 2017). Trusting beliefs are perceived to substantially minimize such confusion and skepticism, thereby fostering consumers' assurance in the reliability of mobile shopping application vendor's actions (McKnight et al., 2002; Hajli et al., 2017). Hence, consumers determine whether to engage in purchasing behavior with a mobile shopping application by assessing the competence, benevolence and integrity of the mobile shopping vendor (Hajli et al., 2017). Previous research has demonstrated that trusting beliefs significantly predict consumers' intention in the e-commerce domain. McKnight and Chervany (2001) substantiate that if the consumer “has high beliefs in the competence, integrity and benevolence” of the e-commerce vendor, then they would be more likely to rely on the mobile shopping application, which in turn strengthens their purchase related intention. Similarly, Lu et al. (2016) evinced the direct and partially indirect effect of trusting beliefs on intention to purchase in the context of social commerce. They specifically emphasize that consumers must have “a significant degree of trusting beliefs in sellers' traits of integrity, benevolence and competence” to engage in buying behavior.

Despite this plethora of research, few studies attempted to look at the influence of individual trusting beliefs in the relationship between CSR and purchase intention. Therefore, our research proposes that dimensions of trusting beliefs enhance purchase intention in the mobile shopping application domain. Building upon the literature review above, we suggest that CSR of mobile shopping application companies may establish consumers' trusting beliefs in terms of benevolence, competence, and integrity and these in turn will increase consumer's intention to purchase through the mobile shopping application platform. In line with the preceding literature, we propose the following hypotheses:

H2.

Benevolence will mediate the relationship between perceived CSR and intention to purchase on mobile shopping platforms.

H3.

Competence will mediate the relationship between perceived CSR and intention to purchase on mobile shopping platforms.

H4.

Integrity will mediate the relationship between perceived CSR and intention to purchase on mobile shopping platforms.

2.4 Mediating role of satisfaction

Satisfaction generally refers to the customer evaluation process of how effectively a business performance have met their needs and wants (Mili and Ferro-Soto, 2023), and it is considered a result of perceptions. Perception of CSR is well-documented as a source of satisfaction. Higher levels of CSR perceptions are reported to lead to stronger levels of satisfaction in many domains. Using two different studies, Rivera et al. (2016) found a positive direct relationship between CSR and satisfaction. Likewise, Shiau and Luo (2012) conclude that companies that are more well-liked for their CSR efforts gain higher consumer satisfaction.

Furthermore, consumer satisfaction is a vital resource for a company to cement long-term relationships with its customers and a leading indicator of consumers' positive attitude and behavior towards the business (Lee et al., 2008; Shiau and Luo, 2012). Several studies reported a positive influence of satisfaction on consumer purchase behavior. In a survey of 215 consumers, Shiau and Luo (2012) examined the interrelationships between satisfaction, trust, seller activity and online group buying. A high level of satisfaction was found to be the strongest predictor of intention to engage in online group buying. Similarly, that higher e-satisfaction resulted in higher consumer spending and higher levels of e-commerce loyalty in American based e-commerce platforms (Nisar and Prabhakar, 2017). In line with the previous literature, our study proposes the following conceptual framework as shown in Figure 1, and the following hypothesis:

H5.

Consumer satisfaction will mediate the relationship between perceived CSR and purchase intention on mobile shopping applications

3. Method

3.1 Participants and data collection

To examine our research hypotheses, we recruited students from Keimyung University (known as KMU) in South Korea by applying nonprobability sampling technique. South Korean students were selected because South Korea is one of the countries with highest mobile commerce share worldwide (IMARC, 2021) and 99% of the South Korean population aged 20 to 59 own smartphones (Statistica, 2021). Respondents answered the online questionnaire on a 7-point Likert scale ranging from 1 (Strongly Agree) to 7 (Strongly Disagree). The total number of completed surveys was 324, but due to the screening question to select the participants who use mobile shopping applications, 316 responses were qualified for our study. We utilized a total of 304 answers for the analyses after data cleaning.

The demographic section contained questions on gender, age, and level of education in addition to frequency of use of mobile shopping apps and mobile commerce credit card utilization. The proportion of female participants in our survey was 59% while male was 41%. In terms of age range, most of the participants fell in the age range between 20 and 29 (87.2%) years old. Accordingly, most respondents were undergraduate students (77.9%).

3.2 Measurements

To collect data for our study, we adopted measurement scales from previous studies. A group of four language experts translated the items from English to Korean utilizing a back translation method (Brislin, 1976). We slightly modified the items to be consistent with our study context. All items of measurement scales have been extensively utilized in prior literature and showed high reliability and validity (Table 3).

CSR was measured by 3 items adopted from Perez and Rodríguez del Bosque (2014) and Turker (2009). The measurement scale evaluates the perception of mobile shopping application users on the mobile shopping application's integrity, complaint responding procedure regarding social, environmental and ethical issues, and respect of consumer rights (e.g. “The mobile shopping application has established procedures to respond to all consumer social, environmental, ethical, etc. complaints).

To measure trusting beliefs, we used nine items developed by McKnight et al. (2002). The scale is composed of three dimensions, namely, perceived benevolence, perceived integrity, and perceived competence. Each dimension was measured by three items. One item was dropped from the perceived competence during the confirmation factor analysis due to low factor loading. Sample items are: “I believe that the mobile shopping application would act in my best interest”; “Promises made by the mobile shopping applications are likely to be reliable”; and “The mobile shopping applications are competent and effective”. Since our hypotheses focused on trusting beliefs from a general perspective, we combined three dimensions into an overall score of trusting beliefs. This is in line with existing studies (e.g. Coffey and Kabadayi, 2020; Whang and Im, 2018) and our confirmatory factor analysis perfectly proved that three dimensions were nested under a second-order factor.

Satisfaction was assessed using 3 items adopted from Oliver (1980) and Russell-Bennett et al. (2007). The scale features mobile shopping application users' overall satisfaction as well as satisfaction with the decision and experience of using the vendor. A sample item included is: “I am satisfied with my decision to use mobile shopping applications”.

We measured purchase intention in mobile shopping applications with 3 items adopted from Gefen and Straub (2004) and Lu et al. (2016). The scale weighs the degree of continuous engagement in buying through mobile shopping applications. A sample item is: “I will keep use of the mobile shopping applications in the future”.

3.3 Analysis method

To test our model, we analyzed our data in a two-step process as suggested by Anderson and Gerbing (1988). The first step involved conducting confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) in SPSS-Amos version 21.0 and reliability analysis in SPSS version 21.0 to test the measurement model which incorporated goodness of fit of the data along with convergent validity and discriminant validity as well as reliability. In the second step, we examined our hypothesis utilizing SEM.

To conduct CFA and SEM, each observed variable is suggested to have 10–20 participants for each observed variable (Kyriazos, 2018). The number of observed variables in our study were between 17 and 20 from the total of 304 respondents (after exclusion of unsuitable responses) participated. Therefore, the sample size was sufficient in order to conduct CFA and SEM.

4. Results

4.1 Common method bias

To assess the potential common method bias in our study, we conducted two statistical analyses. First, we performed Harman's single factor test by placing all the measurement items in an exploratory factor analysis. The results showed that a single factor accounted for 35.73% of the total variance, which is lower than 50%. Next, we conducted a CFA analysis with a single factor model which demonstrated less good model fit than the proposed model fit (χ²/df = 1056.177, GFI = 0.640, CFI = 0.630, NFI = 0.603, TLI = 0.580, RMSEA = 0.160). Thus, the common method bias did not pose a challenge to our study (Jiang et al., 2018; Nguyen and Pervan, 2020; Podsakoff et al., 2003; Song et al., 2019).

4.2 Descriptive statistics

Table 1 reports the descriptive statistics for the constructs in our study. The means of the constructs ranged between 4.60 and 5.71.

4.3 Measurement model

We conducted CFA using SPSS-Amos 21.0 to evaluate the overall model fit of our hypothesized model (Figure 2). It is important to note that the Chi Square test statistic is sensitive to sample size. Therefore, in addition to the χ²/df goodness-of-fit indicators such as CFI, NFI, TLI, and RMSEA were examined.

The absolute fit measures of our measurement model exceeded the recommended threshold values for goodness-of-fit indices, providing strong evidence for the acceptability of our hypothesized model. The model demonstrated a χ²/df ratio of 2.088 and a significant p-value of 0.000, indicating rejection of the null hypothesis. Additionally, the Comparative Fit Index (CFI) was 0.953, the Normed Fit Index (NFI) was 0.914, the Tucker–Lewis Index (TLI) was 0.941, and the Root Mean Square Error of Approximation (RMSEA) was 0.06. These results suggest a good fit between the proposed model and the observed data.

We employed the Master Validity Tool for CFA in Amos, which automatically generated key indicators such as Composite Reliability (CR), Average Variance Extracted (AVE), the square root of AVE, and correlations between the variables. These indicators were crucial in assessing convergent validity and discriminant validity of our model, providing a more comprehensive evaluation beyond the significance test. Furthermore, to ensure the reliability of our measurement instruments, we conducted Cronbach's alpha analysis. This allowed us to determine the internal consistency of the instruments.

Table 2 and Table 3 show validity and reliability statistics. We measured the discriminant validity by comparing the squared correlation to AVE values. Cheung et al. (2023) suggest that “for construct X and construct Y, discriminant validity is established when AVEs associated with both constructs are greater than the shared variance (i.e. squared correlation; SV)” (p). In addition, we checked the confidence intervals of correlation values. It is suggested that intervals should not contain a value of 1. As can be seen from Table 2, AVE values are greater than the squared correlations of the constructs and a value of 1 is not observed in any of the correlation intervals, indicating discriminant validity.

Table 3 presents standardized estimates (factor loadings) along with the values of CR, AVE, and Cronbach's alpha. As can be observed, Cronbach's alpha demonstrated satisfactory internal consistency and reliability by surpassing the acceptable value of 0.700 (Nunally and Bernstein, 1978). Similarly, CR scores were higher than the suggested threshold limits of 0.7. The values for AVE also were all above the recommended level of 0.5. This supports the evidence for high-convergent validity. In other words, the issues of validity and reliability were fulfilled in our study (Hair et al., 2010).

4.4 Hypothesis testing

To examine our propositions, we conducted SEM in SPSS-Amos using maximum likelihood estimation and bootstrapping procedure with 5000 bootstrap samples (Tables 4 and 5 and Figure 3). As can be observed from the direct effects, significant relationships exist between all the variables except for the path from integrity to purchase intention (β = −0.786, p-value = 0.770). Hypothesis 1 predicted that perceived CSR would positively affect purchase intention on mobile shopping applications. H1 was supported because the direct path from perceived CSR to purchase intention was significant (β = 0.0478, p-value = 0.021).

In terms of indirect effects, all mediating variables except for Integrity partially mediated the relationship between perceived CSR and Purchase Intention. Specifically, benevolence (β = 0.316, p-value = 0.00), competence (β = 0.168, p-value = 0.028) and satisfaction (β = 0.306, p-value = 0.00) partially mediated the relationship between perceived CSR and Purchase Intention. In other words, Hypothesis 2, Hypothesis 4, and Hypothesis 5 were supported. As mentioned above, no mediation effect was found between the relationship perceived CSR and purchase intention through Integrity (β = −0.003, p-value = 0.851). Thus, Hypothesis 3 was rejected.

5. Discussion

Our study developed a model for the investigation of the processes that regulate the relation of perceived CSR and purchase intention in the scope of mobile shopping applications. In particular, we examined the direct link between perceived CSR and purchase intention. Additionally, we studied the mediating effects of each dimension of trusting beliefs along with satisfaction in the association of perceived CSR with purchase intention. Our findings are as follows.

In terms of the direct link between perceived CSR and purchase intention, our findings demonstrated a positive effect of CSR on purchase intention in mobile shopping applications. This finding is in-line with previous results in the literature. The main reason may be due to the fact that CSR activities of the mobile shopping application can influence consumers' mindset in the direction of the mobile shopping business, which will result in increased buying intention.

Regarding indirect results, the findings on the mediating effect of trusting beliefs, we found that two of the trusting beliefs dimensions, namely, benevolence and competence partially mediated the relationship between perceived CSR and purchase intention. This finding is consistent with the existing literature on the mediating role of trust between CSR and its outcomes. Specifically, Fatma and Khan (2015) found the mediating role of overall trusting beliefs between CSR and its outcomes by measuring trusting beliefs with the benevolence and competence. One explanation for this result can be consumers' judgment whether mobile shopping application is concerned about their welfare can be more significant in influencing their intention to engage in transactional interactions. In terms of competence, since consumers are driven to gain monetary benefit, they prioritize the performance of the businesses compared to the elements of its moral character.

Mediation effect of integrity in the link between perceived CSR and purchase intention was not observed. Specifically, integrity was not significantly related to purchase intention. This is in-line with the findings of Xu et al. (2015). Truth-bias can be a possible explanation for this result (Xu et al., 2015). It refers to the tendency to believe others without questioning. Given the truth bias presumption that messages sent between people should represent reality, it is conceivable that consumers would anticipate a business to adhere to a professional code of conduct. Hence, integrity of the business might not play a special role in influencing consumers' purchase decisions.

Finally, regarding satisfaction, our study established a partial mediation of satisfaction on impact of perceived CSR on purchase intention. This aligns with consistent findings in the literature (e. g. Hameed et al., 2018; Bianchi et al., 2019).

5.1 Theoretical implications

Our research has made several academic contributions to business literature. We extended the theory of social exchange through perceived CSR and purchase intention to the context of mobile shopping applications. To our knowledge, this association has been tested in different study settings such as online and offline shopping, but not in the context of mobile shopping applications. Additionally, integrating the mediating role of three components of trusting beliefs and satisfaction in the causal chain that associates perceived CSR with purchase intention in mobile shopping applications contributes to increasing the understanding of the link between perceived CSR and purchase intention. Moreover, our study confirms the essential role of the individual effect of the trusting beliefs dimensions and satisfaction in this relationship. And we demonstrate incorporating trusting beliefs and satisfaction in the study of CSR and purchase intention.

Another notable contribution is that unlike most preceding research that focused on the overall impact of trusting beliefs, our research examined the role of each dimension of trusting beliefs in the relationship between perceived CSR and purchase intention. The fact that trust facilitates exchange and also aids trustees and trustors to transmit their exchange into future is well-established. Notwithstanding, the degree to which trusting views in a seller's goodness, competence, and integrity can be influenced by perceived CSR as well as which individual trusting beliefs can influence a consumer's purchasing decisions have not been studied in the existing literature. Our study bridges this gap by shedding light on different effects of trusting beliefs. Taken together, our research contributes to a broader understanding of the theoretical process of how CSR influences purchase intention on mobile shopping applications.

5.2 Practical implications

Our study found that perceived CSR significantly influenced consumers' purchase intention on mobile shopping applications both directly and through trusting beliefs and satisfaction. Our results indicate that CSR activities of a mobile shopping application business are crucial in gaining consumer trust and satisfaction, which in turn result in intention to purchase. Based on our findings, we strongly suggest that mobile shopping application vendors reinforce their customers' perception of the CSR by putting more effort into socially responsible activities. Since information transparency determines consumers' behavior (Zhou et al., 2018) in mobile commerce, mobile shopping applications should establish clear transparency policies for their retailers.

Furthermore, mobile commerce businesses should be aware that consumers place different importance on the different aspects of trust. Based on our results, benevolence and competence of a mobile commerce business play more important roles in affecting purchase intentions compared to integrity. Therefore, we suggest that the mobile shopping applications should communicate their benevolence to consumers by providing a high-quality customer support. For example, the mobile shopping application may develop on-page customer support where customers will be able to find immediate answers to their questions without having to leave the mobile shopping application to contact the business with phone calls or emails. Chat support is another option that can facilitate talk in real-time with the customer support agent by utilizing texts or voice calls. In addition, we also suggest mobile commerce businesses try to earn consumer trust in their competence through, for example, presenting a thorough description of the attributes of their products.

5.3 Limitations and future research

Our study bears some limitations that need to be addressed in future works. First, we examined CSR in the mobile shopping application context from a general perspective. Thus, a more detailed picture will be derived if CSR is implemented as a multidimensional construct and the effects of different subcontracts of CSR on purchase intention with mobile shopping applications is explored.

Moreover, given that our study surveyed a student sample, the age range of respondents may be restricted. Future research can validate our model with different age groups. Finally, we collected our data in South Korea, and thus the findings may differ in other nations. Future research may examine these results across different countries.

Figures

Figure 1

Conceptual framework

Figure 2

Confirmatory factor analysis

Figure 3

Structural equation model

Table 1

Descriptive statistics

Constructs	Mean	SD
PCSR	4.60	1.04
Benevolence	5.12	1.06
Integrity	4.56	1.03
Competence	4.94	0.93
SAT	5.47	0.87
INT	5.71	0.93

Note(s): n = 304, PCSR: perceived corporal social responsibility

Source(s): Table by authors

Table 2

Discriminant validity

Construct	PCSR	BEN	INTEG	COMP	SAT	P_Intention
PCSR	0.670	[0.327, 0.589]	[0.668, 0.768]	[0.520, 0.619]	[0.432, 0.525]	[0.049, 0.250]
Benevolence	0.212***	0.537	[0.590, 0.717]	[0.540, 0.654]	[0.573, 0.665]	[0.518, 0.683]
Integrity	0.516***	0.436***	0.646	[0.617, 0.748]	[0.588, 0.726]	[0.468, 0.572]
Competence	0.271***	0.358***	0.540***	0.556	[0.511, 0.642]	[0.403, 0.566]
Satisfaction	0.191***	0.389***	0.270***	0.336***	0.671	[0.558, 0.696]
P_Intention	0.023*	0.368***	0.094***	0.190***	0.401	0.760

Note(s): *p < 0.05, **p < 0.01, ***p < 0.001

Above diagonal: values (in underline) represent AVE, values in brackets represent intervals for correlation

Below diagonal: squared correlation values

Source(s): Table by authors

Table 3

Measurement model

Construct	Items	SE	CR	AVE	Cronbach's alpha
PCSR	The mobile shopping app has established procedures to respond to all consumer social, environmental, ethical, etc. complaints	0.773	0.859	0.670	0.855
	The mobile shopping app respects consumer rights beyond the legal requirement	0.854
	The mobile shopping app provides full and accurate information about its products to its customers	0.828
TBLF	Benevolence		0.701	0.537	0.711
	If I required help, mobile shopping app would do his/her best to help me	0.800
	The mobile shopping app is interested in my well-being	0.658
	Integrity		0.845	0.646	0.845
	Promises made by the mobile shopping apps are likely to be reliable	0.802
	I believe these mobile shopping app is honest to its customers	0.807
	The mobile shopping app is sincere and genuine	0.801
	Competence		0.787	0.556	0.768
	The mobile shopping apps know about its products	0.760
	The mobile shopping apps know how to provide excellent service	0.848
	I believe this mobile shopping app has sufficient expertise to do business on the Internet	0.610
Satisfaction	Overall, I am satisfied with shopping on the mobile shopping apps	0.774	0.859	0.671	0.855
	I am satisfied with my decision to use mobile shopping apps	0.860
	Using mobile shopping apps is a good experience	0.821
Purchase intention	I will keep use of the mobile shopping apps in the future	0.684	0.760	0.514	0.760
	I will use the mobile shopping apps rather than online shopping malls for purchasing products	0.681
	My intention to engage purchase on mobile shopping apps is very high	0.781

Note(s): PCSR: perceived corporal social responsibility; TBLF: trusting beliefs

Source(s): Table by authors

Table 4

Direct effects

Path	Estimate	SE	t-value	p-value
CSR→Benevolence	0.656	0.082	8.019	0.000
CSR→Integrity	0.786	0.076	10.393	0.000
CSR→Competence	0.706	0.079	8.927	0.000
CSR→Satisfaction	0.503	0.065	7.732	0.000
CSR→P_Intention	0.356	0.154	2.316	0.021
Benevolence→P_Intention	0.360	0.085	4.243	0.000
Integrity→P_Intention	−0.031	0.106	−0.293	0.770
Competence→P_Intention	0.177	0.073	2.430	0.015
Satisfaction→P_Intention	0.455	0.078	5.821	0.000

Source(s): Table by authors

Table 5

Indirect effects

Path	Estimate	SE	t-value	CI		p-value
				Lower	Upper
CSR→Benevolence→P_Intention	0.079	0.023	3.216	0.035	0.132	0.000
CSR→Integrity→P_Intention	−0.053	0.042	1.276	−0.133	0.032	0.851
CSR→Competence→P_Intention	0.070	0.032	2.208	0.005	0.132	0.028
CSR→Satisfaction→P_Intention	0.138	0.030	4.631	0.093	0.215	0.000

Source(s): Table by authors