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Margherita Pagani – IP 08.02.18

Margherita Pagani – IP 08.02.18

Touch Vs combined voice-touch: The effect on personal engagement and brand trust

Consumers can now use several new, alternative methods to interact with or access a brand through their mobile devices. For example, one can type a response using a touchscreen keyboard (i.e. touch interaction) or use voice response while holding the mobile device, which converts the voice commands using voice recognition limiting the use of the touchscreen (i.e. combined voice and touch interaction).

In this research we begin to look at the impact of the type of interaction (touch vs combined voice-touch interaction) on personal engagement and the effect on brand trust as relevant concerns to managers in the digital, mediated context.  In our research, using the framework of the naturalness theory (Kock 2004), we conducted two one-way between-subjects experiments with a two-level interface interaction (touch only vs. combined voice-touch interaction) considering an hedonic an utilitarian product. Findings show that the connection between the physical response format and brand trust is carried by personal engagement. We also found that personal engagement mediates the relation between the sensory modality and brand trust in the case of touch interaction only meaning that electronic media that enable the exchange of significantly more communication stimuli (voice+touch) have a lower degree of naturalness and cause higher cognitive efforts (information overload). Privacy concerns have not a moderating effect on the relationship between personal engagement and brand trust, but the manner in which they come into play is moderated by the response format. Results provide novel insights into the role of touch in the online context when it comes to consumer’s decision-making.