A Mediation Model of Trust in Chatbot Interactions: The Role of Responsiveness and Emotional Cues in Shaping Behavioral Intentions

Customer trust plays a significant role in Chatbot interactions for e-commerce and industry. It is the trust that mediates certain factors to have ultimate influence on certain behavioral intentions like repurchase intentions, electronic words of mouth intentions and brand loyalty. The chatbot having capabilities of prompt response and emotional cues displayed by the chatbot enhance trust. Consistency of responses have also been checked for direct or indirect influence of aforementioned behavioral intentions but its results were insignificant. The study has contributed to theory of Stimulus Organism Response wherein stimulus like, responsiveness and emotional cues encourage organism (users/customer) by developing trust in AI that eventually produce desired response like repurchase intentions, brand loyalty and electronic words of mouth intentions. The study results are also in support to adoption of technology as per TAM model theory as the usefulness of chatbots and their ease in conversation has been determined and results also support the technology adoption. The present research study is beneficial for industry and practice as it has stressed on significance of AI Chatbots features and design elements that enhance customer relationships and customer service quality. The growing online market and e-commerce platform can be best served by the use of AI chatbots and by enhancing customer trust ability in chatbots recommendations and interactions. The quantitative research method and survey through self-administered questionnaire have been used. The study respondents were individuals having experience of e-commerce shopping and interacting with chatbots. The study respondents were recruited through convenience sampling method. This study employed Smart PLS 4 for analysis through structural equation modeling. It is recommended for future studies to use study framework and propositions for a broader sample of respondents and conduct a longitudinal study for further enhancement in the literature.