Social Commerce Dynamics and Consumer Behavior

Social commerce has emerged at the intersection of social media and e-commerce, transforming passive browsing into interactive buying experiences. Central to this field is the study of how consumer trust and perceived risk shape attitudes, intentions and actual purchases on platforms that enable peer interactions, shared reviews and direct communication with brands. Research has explored the interplay between utilitarian motivations—such as convenience and product selection—and hedonic drivers, including enjoyment and social connectedness. Both user-generated content, from product reviews to live streaming, and marketer-generated content, such as targeted promotions, exert cognitive and emotional influences on decision pathways. Platform characteristics—interactivity, rating systems, interface design and community features—further modulate consumer engagement, fostering psychological contracts that underpin loyalty and repurchase. Methodologies span structural equation modelling, eye-tracking and meta-analysis, reflecting the field’s growing methodological rigour. Insights from diverse global markets highlight cultural moderation of trust and risk, the role of social presence in community engagement, and emerging payment technologies that reduce friction. The practical significance lies in guiding practitioners on building trust mechanisms, optimising content strategies and harnessing social connectivity to drive sustainable commerce.

Research from Nature Portfolio

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Research from all publishers

Recent studies have deepened understanding of how trust and perceived risk govern purchase decisions on social commerce platforms. One investigation demonstrated that process-based and characteristics-based trust mitigate perceived risk and emerge as the strongest predictors of intention to use mobile payment features in social settings. An interdisciplinary study using eye-tracking techniques revealed that consumers allocate more visual attention to user-generated content when evaluating products, whereas marketer-generated advertisements elicit distinct cognitive processing and persuasive effects. A comprehensive meta-analysis synthesised results across numerous studies, confirming a robust positive association between trust and purchase intention, with trust in sellers and community forums exerting particularly large effects. Collectively, these works underscore the importance of content origin, trust objects and advanced methods for elucidating the cognitive mechanisms underpinning social commerce behaviour.

Social Commerce Dynamics and Consumer Behavior publication trend

The graph below shows the total number of articles in social commerce dynamics and consumer behavior across all publications each year (not limited to Nature Index journals).

Technical terms

Social commerce: Integration of social media features with online retail to facilitate peer interaction and transactions.

Perceived risk: Consumer’s subjective assessment of potential negative outcomes when making an online purchase.

Trust: Consumer’s belief in the reliability and integrity of a seller, platform or community.

User-generated content (UGC): Information about products or services produced and shared by consumers themselves.

Marketer-generated content (MGC): Promotional material created and distributed by businesses to influence consumer behaviour.

Meta-analysis: Statistical technique that combines results from multiple empirical studies to derive overall conclusions.

References

1. Examining the influence of trust and perceived risk on customers intention to use NFC mobile payment system. Journal of Open Innovation: Technology, Market, and Complexity (2023).
2. How Social Interaction Affects Purchase Intention in Social Commerce: A Cultural Perspective. Sustainability (2019).
3. Seeking Information on Social Commerce: An Examination of the Impact of User- and Marketer-generated Content Through an Eye-tracking Study. Information Systems Frontiers (2020).
4. Influence of Platform Characteristics on Purchase Intention in Social Commerce: Mechanism of Psychological Contracts. Journal of Theoretical and Applied Electronic Commerce Research (2021).
5. The effect of social connectedness on consumer adoption of social commerce in apparel shopping. Fashion and Textiles (2019).
6. Trust and Consumers’ Purchase Intention in a Social Commerce Platform: A Meta-Analytic Approach. SAGE Open (2022).