Structural Assurance versus Privacy Concerns: A Trust-Extended TAM Model of Online Purchase Intention in an Emerging Market

Andrew Tarwirei Kaondera Shava

doi:10.54097/ezk5hs73

Authors

Andrew Tarwirei Kaondera Shava

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.54097/ezk5hs73

Keywords:

E-commerce, Purchase Intention, Trust, Privacy Concerns, Structural Assurance, TAM, PLS-SEM

Abstract

The rapid expansion of e-commerce continues to be constrained by consumers’ privacy concerns and uncertainty about online sellers, frequently resulting in shopping cart abandonment. This study examines the psychological and institutional mechanisms underlying online purchase intention by proposing and testing an extended Technology Acceptance Model (TAM). Specifically, Privacy Concerns (PC) and Structural Assurance (SA) are positioned as key institutional antecedents that influence Trust (TR), which in turn affects Perceived Ease of Use (PEOU), Perceived Usefulness (PU), and Purchase Intention. The model further explores whether PEOU exerts only an indirect effect on Purchase Intention when trust and usefulness perceptions are present. Data was collected online through a structured and reliable questionnaire, yielding 162 valid responses from university students in South Africa. Some of the preliminary tests and analysis on the data were conducted using IBM SPSS Statistics 23. The hypothesized relationships were analyzed using Partial Least Squares Structural Equation Modeling (PLS-SEM) with SmartPLS 4, employing 5,000 bootstrap subsamples to assess path significance and mediation effects. The results confirm that privacy concerns negatively impact trust while structural assurance significantly strengthens it. Trust positively predicts PEOU, PU, and Purchase Intention, whereas PEOU strongly drives PU but exhibits no significant direct effect on Purchase Intention, indicating full mediation through PU and Trust. The model explains 43.2% of the variance in Perceived Usefulness and 32.4% in Purchase Intention. Findings highlight the central mediating role of consumer trust in the online seller and the critical importance of structural assurance mechanisms in overcoming privacy barriers, thereby contributing to TAM-based e-commerce literature and offering actionable implications for online retailers aiming to enhance consumer confidence and purchase conversion rates.

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