The impact of homophily and herd size on decision confidence in the social commerce context

Abstract

Online shopping creates uncertainty in consumers, negatively impacting their decision confidence. Social commerce is a new variant of e-commerce, fitted with social media technologies that allow users to observe how others are behaving in the online shopping space. These observations may drive herd behaviour, a tendency of people to imitate others in an effort to reduce uncertainty. Various characteristics of a herd can result in the propagation of herd behaviour. This work-in-progress paper hones in on how homophily and herd size, as characteristics of a herd, can drive herd behaviour and ultimately impact a consumer’s decision confidence in the social commerce context. A research model is proposed and an experimental methodology is outlined. Potential contributions to both theory and practice are discussed.