Value Perception and Consumer Behavior in Digital Services

In digital environments consumers evaluate services on multiple value dimensions—functional utility, emotional resonance and social influence—balancing perceived benefits against monetary and non-monetary costs. This interplay shapes adoption, satisfaction and loyalty across a spectrum of services including streaming media, mobile financial platforms, e-learning and health applications. Empirical studies have adapted consumption values theory, expectancy–confirmation and cognitive–affective–conation frameworks to capture how factors such as quality of experience, customisation, trust and emotional engagement drive both initial uptake and continuance intention. The proliferation of subscription and freemium models has heightened competition on perceived value propositions, prompting providers to refine trialability, personalisation and content quality to secure lasting consumer relationships. Globally, this body of work informs service design, pricing strategies and policy considerations for enhancing digital inclusion and sustainable consumer engagement.

Research from Nature Portfolio

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Research from all publishers

Over the last two years, studies in multiple journals have advanced our understanding of how perceived value shapes consumer behaviour in digital health services. A 2024 investigation extended cognitive–affective–conation and expectation–confirmation models to health science popularisation videos, revealing that content quality and expectancy confirmation jointly drive users’ perceived value, which in turn enhances satisfaction, emotional engagement and sustained usage intention. Building on this, a 2023 empirical study applied the cognition–affect–conation framework to mobile health science information among Chinese residents, finding that perceived value directly influences emotional arousal, pleasure and trust, each of which elevates satisfaction and promotes continuance intention. Earlier, a 2022 cross-sectional analysis of mHealth apps during the pandemic identified relative advantage, compatibility, complexity and observability as key antecedents of trialability, with trialability and compatibility significantly predicting behavioural intention to adopt mobile health tools. These works collectively underscore the interplay of functional, emotional and cognitive dimensions of value perception in fostering acceptance and sustained use of digital services across diverse contexts.

Value Perception and Consumer Behavior in Digital Services publication trend

The graph below shows the total number of articles in value perception and consumer behavior in digital services across all publications each year (not limited to Nature Index journals).

Technical terms

Perceived value: the consumer’s overall assessment of a service’s net benefit based on perceived benefits and costs.

Continuance intention: the user’s intent to keep using a digital service after initial adoption.

Trialability: the degree to which a new digital service can be experimented with on a limited basis before full adoption.

Expectancy–confirmation model: a framework positing that satisfaction and continuance intention arise when performance meets or exceeds initial expectations, shaping perceived value.

Cognitive–affective–conation model: a three-stage approach in which beliefs (cognition) shape emotions (affect), which in turn drive behavioural intentions (conation).

Consumption values theory: a framework categorising perceived value into functional, social, emotional, conditional and epistemic dimensions.

References

1. Impact of health science popularization videos on user perceived value and continuous usage intention: based on the C-A-C and ECM model framework. Frontiers in Public Health (2024).
2. The impact of perceived value and affection on Chinese residents' continuous use intention of mobile health science information: An empirical study. Frontiers in Public Health (2023).
3. Strengthening the Trialability for the Intention to Use of mHealth Apps Amidst Pandemic: A Cross-Sectional Study. International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health (2022).