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APJML 25,4

Global consumer innovativeness and consumer electronic product adoption

614 Received 5 February 2013 Revised 16 April 2013 Accepted 16 April 2013

Chih-Wei Chao Newcastle Business School, The University of Newcastle, Callaghan, Australia

Mike Reid Marketing, RMIT University, Melbourne, Australia, and

Felix Mavondo Marketing, Monash University, Melbourne, Australia Abstract Purpose – Despite the importance of the diffusion of new products, there is not yet a single scale to measure consumer innovativeness and new product adoption behavior efficiently and effectively across countries. The purpose of this study is to examine the relationship between consumer innate innovativeness, vicarious innovativeness, domain specific innovativeness, the desire for unique consumer products, and the adoption of consumer electronic products across three countries in the Asia-Pacific region: Australia, China, and Taiwan. Design/methodology/approach – Data were collected through a survey in Melbourne, Australia, Shanghai, China and Taipei, Taiwan. The conceptual model was tested using structural equation modeling. Findings – This study finds that domain specific innovativeness primarily influences the adoption of such products across the three countries. The study further suggests that vicarious innovativeness affects Australians’ new product adoption behavior. In contrast, the desire for unique consumer products is a predictor of new product adoption for customers with a Chinese cultural background. Surprisingly, the authors find that consumer innate innovativeness has a negative effect on vicarious innovativeness. Research limitations/implications – This study provides further insights into relationships between consumer innovativeness measures. Practical implications – This study enhances marketers’ capabilities to develop various launching strategies in different countries and providing further insights into relationships between consumer innovativeness measures. Originality/value – This study highlights the importance of relationships among various types of consumer innovativeness in order to expand our understanding of relationships and approaches to measure innovativeness and adoption. Keywords Consumer innovativeness, New product adoption, Diffusion of product innovation, Consumers, New products, Product innovation Paper type Research paper

Asia Pacific Journal of Marketing and Logistics Vol. 25 No. 4, 2013 pp. 614-630 q Emerald Group Publishing Limited 1355-5855 DOI 10.1108/APJML-02-2013-0025

Introduction Product innovation is a key strategy for most consumer electronics companies whose competitive advantages are highly related to the emergence of new technologies The authors would like to thank the Editor, Associate Editor, and the anonymous reviewers for their invaluable feedback during the review process.

(Chandy and Tellis, 2000; Wind and Mahajan, 1997). To help minimize the risk of failure, firms need to address consumer factors that influence new product success, including understanding the role of consumer innovativeness and its influence on new product adoption behaviour (Hauser et al., 2006; Goldsmith and Hofacker, 1991; Gourville, 2006; Kirton, 1976; Raju, 1980; Rogers, 2003). Although various forms of consumer innovativeness, such as consumer innate innovativeness (Midgley and Dowling, 1978), domain specific innovativeness (Goldsmith and Hofacker, 1991) and vicarious innovativeness (Hirschman, 1980) have been examined. The results lack a degree of clarity and consensus. Further, the strength of the relationship between scales of measuring consumer innovativeness and adoption behavior has been mixed (Roehrich, 2004). Consumer innate innovativeness for example has been shown to have a positive but weak influence on the adoption of new products (Goldsmith et al., 1995; Im et al., 2003) and suggests that other forms of consumer innovativeness may have a more significant influence on new product adoption (Goldsmith et al., 1995; Im et al., 2007; Ruvio et al., 2008). It is surmised that consumer innate innovativeness as a higher order personality trait may have an indirect rather than direct influence on new product adoption via other forms of consumer innovativeness (Handa and Gupta, 2009; Im et al., 2007; Klink and Athaide, 2010). To date no academic research appears to have considered consumer innate innovativeness, domain specific innovativeness, vicarious innovativeness, and the desire for unique consumer products together. Further, as most new product diffusion studies are mainly conducted in the USA and Europe few have validated consumer innovativeness scales in cross-cultural contexts, including the Asia-Pacific region. As a result, this research addresses three research objectives. The first objective is to develop a theoretically derived conceptual framework to investigate the relationship between consumer innate innovativeness, domain specific innovativeness, vicarious innovativeness, and the desire for unique consumer products in a cultural context other than the USA or Europe (Figure 1). The second objective is to test the role of various forms of consumer innovativeness and their influence on the adoption of new consumer electronic products. The third objective is to examine the mediating effect of domain

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Consumer Innate Innovativeness

The Desire for Unique Consumer Products

Vicarious Innovativeness

Really New Product Adoption

Domain Specific Innovativeness

Figure 1. Conceptual model

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specific innovativeness, vicarious innovativeness and the desire for unique consumer products on the relationship between consumer innate innovativeness and consumer electronic product adoption. The remainder of this paper is organized as follows: The next section provides the theoretical background for the proposed research framework and review of previous empirical work. Then hypotheses for the relationships between consumer innate innovativeness and other forms of consumer innovativeness, and their influences on new product adoption are derived. The final sections then address the empirical results before the contributions and practical implications are discussed. Theoretical background Really new products Many empirical studies categorize product innovations by considering the level of technological changes in the products and the degree of newness to the market and consumers (Reid and de Brentani, 2004). In general, researchers often use radical and incremental product innovations as a dichotomous classification for identifying the types of product innovations (Garcia and Calantone, 2002; Sood and Tellis, 2005). Incremental product innovations require less technological change and make it easier for organizations to anticipate and analyze the success of such type of product innovations (Reid and de Brentani, 2004). On the other hand, radical product innovation often that involve the highest degree of technology change and create the most uncertainty for both customers and companies (Urban et al., 1996; Veryzer, 2005). However, radical innovations are rare and represent less than 12 percent of all innovations in the marketplace (Garcia and Calantone, 2002). As a result of the difficulties in classifying types of new product a, a third category of product innovation has been developed; “really new products” (Garcia and Calantone, 2002). Really new products include either a market discontinuity or a technological discontinuity to both customers and companies, and are suggested to represent around 50 percent of all new products in the marketplace (Garcia and Calantone, 2002). The study examines really new products in the context of consumer electronics category as it is considered to have a greater number of really new products being developed and launched than other areas of the market (Im et al., 2007). Consumer innovativeness Previous research suggests that consumer innovativeness plays a major role in influencing consumer acceptance of new products (Im et al., 2003, 2007; Roehrich, 2004; Rogers, 2003). However, there is a lack of consensus regarding the definition and measurement of consumer innovativeness (Hauser et al., 2006; Roehrich, 2004). Various scales for measuring consumer innovativeness exist in prior studies (Goldsmith and Hofacker, 1991; Kirton, 1976; Raju, 1980; Roehrich, 2004). Roehrich et al. (2003) classify these existing consumer innovativeness scales into three categories, namely life innovativeness, consumer innovativeness, and domain-specific innovativeness. As discussed earlier, the current research considers consumer innate innovativeness a predisposition of individuals. As a result, the existing scales in the first category are appropriate for the study to evaluate consumer innate innovativeness. Several empirical researchers consider consumer innovativeness a generalized personality trait, and they define it as consumer innate innovativeness (Clark and

Goldsmith, 2006; Im et al., 2003; Midgley and Dowling, 1993; Steenkamp et al., 1999). Midgley and Dowling (1978) consider consumer innate innovativeness an innovative predisposition, which is the degree to which the individual adopts an innovation without communicating with others’ previous purchasing experiences. Conceptually, researchers suggest that consumer innate innovativeness has a significant effect on the adoption of a product innovation (Citrin et al., 2000; Im et al., 2003; Lassar et al., 2005; Rogers, 2003). Nevertheless, the strength of the relationship between consumer innate innovativeness and the adoption of product innovations is inconsistent in literature (Im et al., 2007) and lacks consensus (Hauser et al., 2006; Roehrich, 2004). This suggests that consumer innate innovativeness may require further investigation into its influences on new product adoption. In addition to consumer innate innovativeness, it is important for the study to include and assess other forms of consumer innovativeness, such as domain specific innovativeness and vicarious innovativeness (Goldsmith et al., 1995; Im et al., 2007; Roehrich et al., 2003). Prior research suggests that considering consumer innovativeness to be general across domains can be problematic (Goldsmith et al., 2003; Goldsmith and Hofacker, 1991; Handa and Gupta, 2009; Klink and Athaide, 2010). Goldsmith and Hofacker (1991, p. 210) suggest domain specific innovativeness as another approach to measuring consumer innovativeness, defining it as “the tendency to learn about and adopt product innovations (new products) within a specific domain of interest”. A number of prior studies using domain specific innovativeness extend to a variety of products and illustrate its usefulness for consumer research (Flynn and Goldsmith, 1993; Goldsmith et al., 1998; Handa and Gupta, 2009; Xie, 2008). Empirical studies use domain specific innovativeness in countries such as the USA, Germany, and France, and it is argued as the most useful scale to measure consumer innovativeness in a specific product category (Chakrabarti and Baisya, 2009; Handa and Gupta, 2009; Hynes and Lo, 2006; Klink and Athaide, 2010). This research extends domain specific innovativeness to Australia, China, and Taiwan. Hirschman (1980) defines the communication process of new product information through mass media (advertising) and word of mouth as vicarious innovativeness, which is “the acquisition of information regarding a new product. Through vicarious innovativeness the individual can, in essence, adopt the product concept without adopting the product itself” (Hirschman, 1980, p. 285). In addition to advertising and word of mouth, Im et al. (2007) consider modeling to be the third component of vicarious innovativeness. Although few researchers specifically use vicarious innovativeness, research exists showing that word of mouth (Byun and Sternquist, 2010; Mahajan et al., 1984; Verleye and Marez, 2005) and mass media communication (Lee et al., 2002; Prins and Verhoef, 2007) play an important role in influencing new product adoption. Im et al. (2007) suggest that vicarious innovativeness has some degree of effect on new product adoption. The desire for unique consumer products (Lynn and Harris, 1997) has been proposed as an alternative approach to assessing adoption of new products and is associated with consumer innovativeness (Ruvio et al., 2008). The desire for unique consumer products is associated with the degree to which consumers differ in their personal and self-expressive goals, their acquisition and possession of consumer goods, services, and the desire for experiences that few others possess (Lynn and Harris, 1997, p. 602). Prior research cross-culturally supports the role of the desire for unique consumer products on new product adoption (Ruvio et al., 2008) and it has been

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to investigate new product adoption behavior among different sexual orientations and demonstrate a positive relationship (Vandecasteele and Geuens, 2009). Thus, the present paper adds the desire for unique consumer products to the conceptual model. In summary, prior research suggests that consumer innate innovativeness has little or no direct association with new product adoption (Citrin et al., 2000; Im et al., 2007) but may have an indirect association. Domain specific innovativeness however plays an important role in the relationship and is likely to mediate consumer innate innovativeness and new product adoption (Goldsmith et al., 1995; Roehrich, 2004). In relation to vicarious innovativeness, Im et al. (2007) find a mediating role of vicarious innovativeness between innate innovativeness and new product adoption and Harris and Lynn (1996) found a positive relationship between the desire for unique consumer products and new product adoption behavior. Further, Vandecasteele and Geuens (2009) suggest that consumer innovativeness is a possible antecedent of the desire for consumer products and needs to be cross-validated in further research. Measuring new product adoption In most new product research the adoption of new products is commonly measured in two ways; the rate of adoption and the number of new products owned. Rogers and Shoemaker (1971, p. 28) define the rate of adoption as: [. . .] the relative speed with which an innovation is adopted by members of a social system. This rate of adoption is usually measured by the length of time required for a certain percentage of the members of a system to adopt an innovation.

Further, various empirical studies have used new product adoption, in particular the number of products adopted from a particular category over a period of time, to measure consumer innovativeness, suggesting that new product adoption level captures consumer innovativeness elements (Fell et al., 2003; Im et al., 2003, 2007; Rogers, 2003; Tellis et al., 2005). Both methods are suggested to be reliable by prior research (Im et al., 2007; Tellis et al., 2005) and are subsequently used in this research. Hypotheses Figure 1 highlights the key relationships under investigation and the associated hypotheses. It is expected that there will be a degree of association among various forms of consumer innovativeness. Domain specific innovativeness and vicarious innovativeness are positively correlated with antecedents of consumer innate innovativeness (Goldsmith et al., 2003; Im et al., 2007). Further, Harris and Lynn (1996) found a positive relationship between the desire for unique consumer products and the tendency to be a consumer innovator. It suggests that: H1. Consumer innate innovativeness is positively and directly associated with (a) domain specific innovativeness, (b) vicarious innovativeness, and (c) the desire for unique consumer products. Prior studies have suggested that consumer innovativeness varies across product categories (Citrin et al., 2000; Labay and Kinnear, 1981; Gatignon and Robertson, 1985). The domain specific innovativeness scale, which is considered appropriate for measuring the adoption of specific types of new products, has been validated by empirical research (Citrin et al., 2000; Goldsmith et al., 1998; Hynes and Lo, 2006). The second hypothesis is:

H2. Domain specific innovativeness has a positive and direct influence on (a) ownership and (b) relative time of adoption. Vicarious innovativeness, which includes consumer exposure to advertising, modeling and word of mouth about new products, is suggested to have a significant relationship with new product adoption (Im et al., 2007). Empirical studies support the fact that these communication factors have a significant effect on consumers’ decision making in categories such as consumer electronics (Bass, 1969; Prins and Verhoef, 2007; Rogers, 2003). The third hypothesis is: H3. Vicarious innovativeness has a positive and direct influence on (a) ownership and (b) relative time of adoption. Flynn and Harris (1996) suggest that the desire for unique consumer products is associated with consumer innovativeness and can act as a surrogate measure for measuring innovativeness and its association with consumer’s new product adoption behavior. The hypothesis is presented as follows: H4. The desire for unique consumer products has a positive and direct influence on (a) ownership and (b) relative time of adoption. Prior studies suggest that consumer innate innovativeness only influences new product adoption indirectly through domain specific innovativeness, vicarious innovativeness, and/or the desire for unique consumer products (Im et al., 2007; Roehrich et al., 2003). Thus, the following hypotheses are presented: H5. Domain specific innovativeness mediates the relationship between consumer innate innovativeness and (a) ownership and (b) relative time of adoption. H6. Vicarious innovativeness mediates the relationship between consumer innate innovativeness and (a) ownership and (b) relative time of adoption. H7. he desire for unique consumer products mediates the relationship between consumer innate innovativeness and (a) ownership and (b) relative time of adoption. In summary, by focusing on “really new” consumer electronic products, the aim of this research is to examine the relationship between consumer innate innovativeness, domain specific innovativeness, vicarious innovativeness, the desire for unique consumer products. Further, we do so by considering the cross-cultural influence of these factors on the adoption of consumer electronic products in Australia, China, and Taiwan. The present research contributes to new product diffusion literature by examining more broadly the relationship between various representation of consumer innovativeness and commercial success of new products in order to gain a deeper understanding of the underlying effects. Method Research design The study follows a descriptive research design and uses an online survey and mall intercepts to collect data. The questionnaire comprises existing and modified measurement items that are designed to obtain information about consumer

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innovativeness and consumer electronic products adoption. The questionnaire was translated into two Chinese versions – traditional and simplified – by the researcher. It was reviewed by a qualified bilingual translator and then translated back into English by two qualified bilingual translators. A pre-test of the questionnaire was completed by Australian and Taiwanese student samples in their home countries before the final data collection proceeded. The survey utilizes seven-point Likert-type scales to measure the key variables. The reason for choosing consumer electronic products is that this type of product category introduces more really new products into the marketplace each year. The study selects Australian participants from among individuals who voluntarily join a research database of a qualified Australian market research company that was contracted to undertake the fieldwork component of the study. Chinese and Taiwanese participants are selected randomly from individuals in front of shopping centers in two major cities: Taipei, Taiwan and Shanghai, China. The only limitation related to participants is that they need to be over 18 years of age and permanent residents of Australia, China or Taiwan. The final sample size comprises 256 useable questionnaires for Australia, 207 useable questionnaires for China, and 209 useable questionnaires for Taiwan. The demographics for the current study reveal that gender is distributed equally for the three countries (Male: n ¼ 132, 51.5 percent Australia; n ¼ 106, 48.8 percent China; n ¼ 109, 47.8 percent Taiwan). Respondents aged between 26 and 35 years and between 36 and 45 years are the predominant groups in Australia (n ¼ 130, 50.8 percent). Half of the respondents are aged between 26 and 35 years in China (n ¼ 104, 50.2 percent) and Taiwan (n ¼ 104, 49.8 percent). In Australia, 44.9 percent (n ¼ 115) of respondents have a secondary school degree. More than half of the respondents have an undergraduate degree in China (n ¼ 116, 56 percent) and Taiwan (n ¼ 161, 77 percent). The average household income for Australia samples is in the range of less than US$2,000 per month (n ¼ 77, 30.1 percent), the average household income in China samples is in the range of less than $150 per month (n ¼ 74, 37.4 percent), and the average household income in Taiwan samples is in the range of $1,000-$2,600 per month (n ¼ 104, 49.8 percent). Measures To measure consumer innate innovativeness, this study adopts an 11-item Hurt et al. (1977) scale, and all items are coded so that high scores indicate high levels of consumer innate innovativeness. Originally Hurt et al. (1977) reported a 20-item scale with a reliability of 0.94 but this was revised by Hurt et al. (1977) and Pallister and Foxall (1998) who both proposed a shortened version of the scale, which exhibits high and acceptable levels of reliability and discriminant validity (Goldsmith et al., 1995; Pallister and Foxall, 1998). Prior research suggests that consumer innovativeness likely varies across product categories or domains (Goldsmith and Hofacker, 1991; Roehrich et al., 2003). The current study looks specifically to high-tech consumer electronic products. To measure domain specific innovativeness, this study adapts the six-item domain specific innovativeness scale developed originally by Goldsmith and Hofacker (1991). The scale has been proved to be one-dimensional, highly reliable, and valid in measuring domain specific innovativeness in a specific product category (Chakrabarti and Baisya, 2009; Hoffmann and Soyez, 2010; Klink and Athaide, 2010).

To measure vicarious innovativeness, this study adopts the approach of Im et al. (2007), and includes three factors, namely exposure to advertising, modeling by significant others, and word of mouth. The study measures exposure to advertising by asking respondents to report whether they have seen the selected consumer electronic products in the mass media. It measures modeling by asking respondents to report whether they have seen individuals in their social networks owning the selected consumer electronic products prior to the respondents adopting the technology. Finally, the study measures word of mouth by asking respondents to report whether they have had personal conversations about the selected consumer electronic products with another individual prior to their own adoption. Harris and Lynn (1996) developed a new scale, namely the desire for unique consumer products, to measure individual differences and explain the importance of consumer disposition. They found a positive relationship between the desire for unique consumer products and the tendency to be a consumer innovator. Franke and Schreier (2008) indicate that the desire for unique consumer products is a reliable and valid scale. This study uses two methods to measure consumer electronic products adoption behavior: cross-section method/ownership and relative time of adoption. This study defines consumer electronic products ownership as the number of products owned from selected consumer electronics products that are considered really new at the time of the study. This method is suggested to be a practical measure of new product adoption behavior, and it has less recall bias (Midgley and Dowling, 1978). This study also uses the relative time of adoption to measure consumer electronic products adoption behavior. Although prior research criticizes the relative time of adoption as susceptible to recall biases (Midgley and Dowling, 1978), studies suggest that it helps to assess the convergent validity with the cross-sectional method discussed earlier (Midgley and Dowling, 1978; Im et al., 2007). By following the approach of Im et al. (2007), the relative time of adoption is a weighted average of the length of ownership of new products (i.e. number of years or months since adoption). The calculation is as follows: Relative Time of Adoption for Consumer Electronic Products X pffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffi ¼ ðproduct owned021 Þx months owned

Analysis and results All scales were subject to an exploratory and confirmatory factor analysis. The exploratory factor analysis suggested that consumer innate innovativeness and vicarious innovativeness do not have a one-dimensional structure, apart from domain specific innovativeness and the desire for unique consumer products. This study adopts Hurt et al. (1977) to measure consumer innate innovativeness, and prior research suggests that this scale can be interpreted as a unique measure of consumer innate innovativeness (Goldsmith et al., 1995). The study treats Hurt et al. (1977) scale as a single construct scale. In the aspect of vicarious innovativeness items, they split into three factors. The three factors explained 30.7, 18.7 and 8.6 percent of the total variance, respectively. The three factors were formed by advertising, modeling and

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Table I. Internal consistency, square root of average variance extracted and correlation matrix

word of mouth. This split is an artifact. Consequently, we summed the items of vicarious innovativeness as a single scale for further confirmatory factor analysis. This study used Amos v20 to evaluate the final measurement model. As illustrated in Table I, the reliability of constructs and factors ranged from 0.64 to 0.87, indicating that all factors had good internal consistency. This study assessed convergent validity by computing the average variance extracted score, and the results showed that the average scores were all greater than 0.50, which indicated good convergent validity. We further assessed discriminant validity by comparing the minimum variance extracted for each pair of constructs with the square of the correlation between them. In most cases, the squares of the correlations were less than the average variance-extracted score. However, there were a couple of exceptions; in the Australia data, the average variance-extracted score of word of mouth (0.73) was only 0.01 less than the square of the correlation between modeling and word of mouth (0.74). The goodness of fit requirements indicates an acceptable fit for all scales across the three countries. This shows support for the assumption of convergent validity. Before to compare distinct cultural groups of customers on their level of consumer innovativeness, we must first establish that the measurement instruments are cross-nationally equivalent (Steenkamp and Baumgartner, 1998). We adopt the factor analytic models used by Widaman and Riese (1997) to test the cross-national invariance of the measurement instruments of consumer innovativeness. Measurement equivalence is generally supported. No studies in the previous literature have considered vicarious innovativeness, domain specific innovativeness and the desire for unique consumer products at the same time. The current analysis uses structural equation modeling because it is capable of examining the interrelationships among observed and unobserved variables at the same time, and it can also calculate direct, indirect and total effects between predictors, mediators and dependent variables. The study proposes three mediators. To test the mediating effects, the structural equation modeling analysis is run separately for each mediator within the model. The analysis measures indirect effects by using the product of coefficients test, which tests the significance of the mediating effect by dividing the estimate of the indirect effect by its standard error. The study estimates the standard error for the indirect effects by setting the bootstrap at 200 and a confidence level of 95 percent. All measures of global fit indicate an adequate fit (Table II). Tables III presents the beta coefficients from the relationships between the antecedent variables and really new product adoption, along with the t-value and

Consumer innate innovativeness (CII) Domain specific innovativeness (DSI) Vicarious innovativeness (VI) The desire for unique consumer products (DUCP)

Internal consistency Aus Cn Tw

Australia validity

China validity

Taiwan validity

0.81 0.76 0.73 0.85 0.64 0.73 0.87 0.82 0.82

0.69 0.81 0.82

0.59 0.61 0.66

0.60 0.69 0.79

0.84 0.79 0.83

0.65

0.59

0.57

Notes: Aus – Australia; Cn – China; Tw – Taiwan

Goodness of fit measure Model fit x2 Degrees of freedom p-value Cmin/df Goodness of Fit Index Adjusted goodness of fit RMSEA Model comparison Tucker-Lewis Index (TLI) Normed Fit Index (NFI) Comparative Fit Index (CFI)

Hypothesis

Ownership Australia China

Taiwan

Relative time of adoption Australia China Taiwan

90.23 43 0.000 2.10 0.95 0.90 0.07

80.28 44 0.001 1.83 0.94 0.90 0.06

78.06 42 0.001 1.86 0.94 0.90 0.06

100.00 45 0.000 2.22 0.94 0.90 0.07

88.70 45 0.000 1.97 0.93 0.90 0.07

76.26 41 0.001 1.86 0.95 0.90 0.06

0.94 0.93 0.96

0.91 0.90 0.94

0.92 0.90 0.95

0.93 0.92 0.95

0.90 0.90 0.93

0.92 0.90 0.95

Australia

Consumer innate innovativeness (CII) H1a. CII ! DSI 0.77 * * *(8.97) H1b. CII ! VI 2 0.30 * * *(24.02) H1c. CII ! DUCP 0.025 (0.372) Domain specific innovativeness (DSI) H2a. DSI ! ownership 0.20 * * *(2.80) H2b. DSI ! RTA 0.22 * * *(2.99) Vicarious innovativeness (VI) H3a. VI ! ownership 0.20 * * *(2.65) H3b. VI ! RTA 0.19 * *(2.45) The desire for unique consumer products (DUCP) H4a. DUCP ! ownership 2 0.08 (21.08) H4b. DUCP ! RTA 2 0.14 (21.66)

Ownership and RTA Regression coefficient (t-value) China

Taiwan

0.80 * * *(8.65) 2 0.24 * * *(22.63) 2 0.12 (2 1.55)

0.70 * * *(5.70) 20.39 * * *(2 4.19) 20.17 (2 1.57)

0.34 * * *(4.16) 0.41 * * *(4.92)

0.34 * * *(4.12) 0.31 * * *(3.73)

0.08 (0.99) 0.18 (1.49) 0.15 *(2.18) 0.13 *(1.97)

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Table II. Goodness of fit analysis

20.01 (2 0.13) 20.05 (2 0.71) 0.21 * * *(2.93) 0.12 *(1.98)

Note: Significant at: *p , 0.05, * *p , 0.01 and * * *p , 0.001

respective levels of significance. The results support H1a, which demonstrates that consumer innate innovativeness has a positive influence on domain specific innovativeness across the three countries (Australia: b ¼ 0.77, t ¼ 8.97, p , 0.001; China: b ¼ 0.80, t ¼ 8.65, p , 0.001; Taiwan: b ¼ 0.70, t ¼ 5.70, p , 0.001). Conversely, for H1b, the study finds a negative influence between consumer innate innovativeness and vicarious innovativeness across the three countries (Australia: b ¼ 2 0.30, t ¼ 2 4.02, p , 0.001; China: b ¼ 2 0.24, t ¼ 2 2.63, p , 0.001; Taiwan: b ¼ 2 0.39, t ¼ 2 4.19, p , 0.001). Further, the analysis provides no support for H1c; that is, consumer innate innovativeness has no association with the desire for unique consumer products. The path from domain specific innovativeness to really new product adoption – ownership and relative time of adoption (RTA) is significant in Australia (b ¼ 0.20, t ¼ 2.80, p , 0.001 for ownership; b ¼ 0.22, t ¼ 2.99, p , 0.001 for RTA), China (b ¼ 0.34, t ¼ 4.16, p , 0.001 for ownership; b ¼ 0.41, t ¼ 4.92, p , 0.001

Table III. Direct effect on really new product adoption

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for RTA) and Taiwan (b ¼ 0.34, t ¼ 4.12, p , 0.001 for ownership; b ¼ 0.31, t ¼ 3.73, p , 0.001 for RTA). The results support H2a and H2b. In terms of vicarious innovativeness, the analysis supports H4a (b ¼ 0.20, t ¼ 2.65, p , 0.001) and H4b (b ¼ 0.19, t ¼ 2.45, p , 0.001) in Australia only. Regarding the desire for unique consumer products (H6a and H6b), it has a positive and direct relationship with consumer electronic products adoption in China (b ¼ 0.15, t ¼ 2.18, p , 0.05 for ownership; b ¼ 0.13, t ¼ 1.97, p , 0.05 for RTA) and Taiwan (b ¼ 0.21, t ¼ 2.93, p , 0.001 for ownership; b ¼ 0.12, t ¼ 1.98, p , 0.05 for RTA). In addition, the calculation of the mediating effects (Table IV) of domain specific innovativeness, vicarious innovativeness and the desire for unique consumer products only supports H3a and H3b across the three countries (Australia: b ¼ 0.12, t ¼ 2.00, p , 0.05 for ownership; b ¼ 0.11, t ¼ 1.98, p , 0.05 for RTA; China: b ¼ 0.34, t ¼ 4.16, p , 0.001 for ownership; b ¼ 0.41, t ¼ 4.92, p , 0.001 for RTA and Taiwan b ¼ 0.30, t ¼ 3.91, p , 0.001 for ownership; b ¼ 0.30, t ¼ 3.91, p , 0.001 for RTA). This suggests that only domain specific innovativeness mediates the relationship between consumer innate innovativeness and the adoption of consumer electronic products. General discussion The study shows a significant and positive relationship between consumer innate innovativeness and domain specific innovativeness across the three countries. The results are thus consistent with the findings of Goldsmith et al. (2003). Further, the results suggest that consumer innate innovativeness negatively influences vicarious innovativeness across the three countries. This finding is inconsistent with Im et al. (2007) study. Hirschman (1980) defines the concept of vicarious innovativeness as the acquisition of information about new products, and she identifies a measurement by asking individuals to report how they learned about the new product within a given timeframe before they adopted it. The study adopts Im et al. (2007) approach by measuring vicarious innovativeness ostensibly through exposure to advertising, word of mouth and watching their family members, colleagues or friends using a new product. The study argues that, when an individual adopts a new product after he or she talks to others’ or watches others’ adoption behavior, he or she is not an innovator,

Hypothesis Ownership H5a. CII ! DSI ! ownership H6a. CII ! VI ! ownership H7a. CII ! DUCP ! ownership Relative time of adoption H5b. CII ! DSI ! RTA H6b. CII ! VI ! RTA H7b. CII ! DUCP ! RTA Table IV. Mediating effect on really new product adoption

Australia

Mediating effect Regression coefficient (t-value) China

0.12 *(2.00) 20.04 (2 1.44) 20.01 (2 1.88)

0.25 * * *(3.27) 20.01 (0.39) 20.01 ( – .86)

0.30 * * *(3.91) 0.01 (0.21) 2 0.08 (21.54)

0.11 *(1.98) 20.02 (2 0.91) 0.01 (0.08)

0.30 * * *(5.03) 20.02 (2 0.65) 20.01 (2 1)

0.30 * * *(3.91) 0.05 (0.94) 2 0.05 (21.38)

Taiwan

Notes: Significant at: *p , 0.05, * *p , 0.01 and * * *p , 0.001; CII – consumer innate innovativeness, DSI – domain specific innovativeness, VI – vicarious innovativeness, DUCP – the desire for unique consumer products

because innovators adopt a product innovation independently from others’ previous purchase experiences (Midgley and Dowling, 1978). That is, only imitators rely on others’ opinions before making their purchase decision. Thus, this scale could be measuring only imitators’ vicarious innovativeness rather than that of innovators, which may become more evident with further research. Further, the study finds no relationship between consumer innate innovativeness and the desire for consumer products. This suggests that the desire for consumer products would be an independent predictor of new product adoption behavior rather than a consumer innovativeness measurement. More importantly, the study finds a positive and significant relationship between domain specific innovativeness and consumer electronic products adoption. This suggests that consumers who have a high level of domain specific innovativeness tend to own more consumer electronic products and adopt earlier than others. This is in agreement with previous studies (Citrin et al., 2000; Goldsmith and Hofacker, 1991). Surprisingly, vicarious innovativeness influences consumer electronic products adoption only in Australia. This suggests that Australians seek information from mass media and other forms of interpersonal communication before they adopt consumer electronic products. The results from the Australian data are consistent with the findings of Im et al. (2007). In customers with a Chinese cultural background, the reason for the insignificant relationship could be that Chinese and Taiwanese people may consider ownership of consumer electronic products to be private and thus make their decisions independently. Further, Chinese and Taiwanese customers might tend to believe the new products they see rather than rely on personal and impersonal communications. The desire for unique consumer products has a significant relationship with consumer electronic products adoption in China and Taiwan. The results in the study are consistent with those by Vandecasteele and Geuens (2006) who, in studying consumer innovativeness in gays, lesbians and bisexuals, found that these groups express a higher level of the desire for unique consumer products and adopt more innovative products than heterosexuals. The results of the study suggest that further investigation is needed to cross-validate the desire for unique consumer products in different groups of customers and product categories. Finally, the results of mediation analysis suggest that only domain specific innovativeness mediates the relationship between consumer innate innovativeness and consumer electronic products adoption. The results confirm Roehrich’s (2004) finding that domain specific innovativeness enhances really new product adoption behavior. Theoretical implications In previous literature, there is a lack of consensus regarding the definition and measurement of consumer innovativeness in empirical studies. This study adopts an approach similar to earlier consumer innovativeness research in order to cross-validate various forms of consumer innovativeness measurements in other cultural contexts. The study suggests that consumer innate innovativeness has a negative effect with vicarious innovativeness. Consequently, the antecedents of vicarious innovativeness should be further investigated to gain a complete understanding of this specific information acquisition behavior and develop a better measurement of vicarious innovativeness. Importantly, this study shows that consumer innate innovativeness influences domain

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specific innovativeness, and it further demonstrates that domain specific innovativeness is adequate to predict adoption behavior for really new electronic products. A further contribution of this study is that no previous research has considered consumer innate innovativeness, domain specific innovativeness, vicarious innovativeness and the desire for unique consumer products together in a cross-cultural context. This study has filled that gap. Moreover, the literature has not fully tested the mediating roles of domain specific innovativeness, vicarious innovativeness and the desire for unique consumer products. As mediating variables, domain specific innovativeness mediates the relationship between consumer innate innovativeness and consumer electronic products adoption across the three countries. Conversely, vicarious innovativeness and the desire for unique consumer products may have a moderating effect rather than mediating, which requires further investigation. Further, the study adds support for scales drawn from previous research and responds to the need for empirical international validation of the growing body of theoretical work. This study undertakes a rigorous statistical validation for the four measurement scales across the three countries. Managerial implications The results of measuring the relationships between consumer innovativeness and really new consumer electronic products adoption indicate a lack of consensus. Marketers and market researchers need to recognize that there is not yet a single scale that measures new products adoption behavior efficiently and effectively. Marketers should keep the following in mind when they attempt to identify innovators and predict new consumer electronic products behavior internationally. First, consumer innate innovativeness has no relationship with new consumer electronic products adoption. To introduce new consumer electronic products, marketers should use domain specific innovativeness to best identify innovators and predict consumers’ adoption behaviors in a specific product category. Second, the study shows mixed results for scales utilized across the three countries. Marketers need to be aware that customers with various cultural backgrounds differ systematically in consumer innovativeness and specific product categories. Australian customers seek new product information in special interest mass media and interpersonal communication. Thus, marketers should promote new electronic products in special interest mass media and word of mouth in Australia. Conversely, measuring new product adoption behavior using only vicarious innovativeness in China and Taiwan will be problematic. Customers with a Chinese background tend to question the benefit of an innovation. The desire for unique consumer products is more efficient than vicarious innovativeness in predicting new product adoption for customers with a Chinese cultural background. Marketers who know these differences are able to identify the most innovative segments. Limitations and directions for future research The study has several limitations. First, the present paper collects data from the major cities of Melbourne, Australia; Shanghai, China; and Taipei, Taiwan. Respondents who live in these large cities might have more chances to obtain new consumer electronic products information and thus have different perspectives from people who live in other, smaller cities. Second, the use of an online questionnaire can reduce human

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