Conversion products continue to change and evolve, on the basis of creative idea and innovation technology. Convergence refers to the concept to unite functions of unique products in a specific direction, which can be changed by technology development ...
Conversion products continue to change and evolve, on the basis of creative idea and innovation technology. Convergence refers to the concept to unite functions of unique products in a specific direction, which can be changed by technology development, circumstance and a specific point of view. Recently, the concept is understood as free combination of several products and services built or coded on the digital technology base without limitations imposed by a terminal, a service provider and a network. The convergence concept is evolving to sophisticate existing industries and create new business opportunities by grafting IT technology onto existing industries, together with organic combination between products and services.
Under the circumstance, an enterprise makes a variety of efforts to occupy the market in advance and secure competitive advantages by launching better quality products before its competitors. However, the market response to convergence products is not always positive in spite of their usefulness and technological superiority. This factor implies that distributing innovative products to the major market is difficult and there is always resistance in the adoption and diffusion process of innovation, irrespective of its seriousness (Ram, 1987). Therefore, focus shall be on identification of causes of resistance as well as understanding adoption process in order to successful diffusion of innovative products including convergence productions. Therefore, this study proposes the necessity of factor development that allows more direct explanation of resistance and investigates psychological process of consumers that is expressed as resistance, focusing on pace of technology change perceived by consumers.
Generally, it is described that psychological factors such as fear, uncertainty and doubt can contribute to hesitation or rejection in adopting innovative products (Moore, 2006). Particularly, uncertainty can make concerns and expectations bigger, with regard to adoption of innovative products, when they are new products or cutting-edge products that have never existed before (Holak et al., 1987). As seen above, most people under uncertainty identify necessity of a product, based on their subjective expectations, and may reject or delay adoption decision until the optimized environment is created (Mahajan et al., 1990). Noticeable studies on consumer’s behaviors suggest that an expectation of potential consumers shall be integrated into discussion about adoption of new products (e.g., Holak et al., 1987; Horsky, 1990; Mahajan et al., 1990).
Specifically speaking, people consider various elements in evaluation or selection process of a certain product, including the price and the brand of a product, as well as its quality. The price refers to an exchange value of a product in the market, as a value allocated to the efficacy obtained from use of a product. In other words, the price is a strong element that direct stimulates consumer’s behaviors such as purchase of a product (Zaltman and Wallendorf, 1979; Spreng et al., 1996). In addition, as a comprehensive concept of unique characteristics consisting of a product, quality is also an important factor on which the market suitability is depending on, together with the price. Perceived quality has a close relationship with purchase decision, as a key factor affecting selection of a certain product (Oliver, 1980).
This study has the following important implications. First, existing studies focus on adoption and diffusion factors while the current study concentrates on adoption resistance and demonstrates a determinant by classifying the types of resistance into rejection and postponement. Second, the previous studies of innovation adoption and resistance neglect the relationship between the pace of technology change and innovation although they emphasize several factors such as user’s convenience, behavioral control, complexity and user’s capability according to technology change. The current study is differentiated from them to the extent that it suggests perceived technology change as a new factor to predict innovation resistance. Third, the current study empirically proves a structural casual relationship between a price and quality expectation, which are key elements for product selection, and adoption resistance in a brief way. Particularly, the current study tries to understand the psychological process of how an individual consumer depends on his/her subjective expectation.
This study has the following important implications. First, existing studies focus on adoption and diffusion factors while the current study concentrates on adoption resistance and demonstrates a determinant by classifying the types of resistance into rejection and postponement. Second, the previous studies of innovation adoption and resistance neglect the relationship between the pace of technology change and innovation although they emphasize several factors such as user’s convenience, behavioral control, complexity and user’s capability according to technology change. The current study is differentiated from them to the extent that it suggests perceived technology change as a new factor to predict innovation resistance. Third, the current study empirically proves a structural casual relationship between a price and quality expectation, which are key elements for product selection, and adoption resistance in a brief way. Particularly, the current study tries to understand the psychological process of how an individual consumer depends on his/her subjective expectation under the circumstance with high uncertainty relating to technology change. Moreover, as the current study is a snapshot research that focuses on a certain time using questionnaires, a time-series future study is required to identify dynamics of resistance according to the pace of technology change. It is expected that there will be a discussion to improve the validity of findings and accommodate useful constructs.