A firm's post-adoption behavior: loyalty or switching costs?

Date04 March 2014
Pages258-275
DOIhttps://doi.org/10.1108/IMDS-06-2013-0259
Published date04 March 2014
AuthorJun-Gi Park,Kijun Park,Jungwoo Lee
Subject MatterInformation & knowledge management,Information systems,Data management systems
A firm’s post-adoption behavior:
loyalty or switching costs?
Jun-Gi Park
IT Policy & Strategy Research Institute, Yonsei University, Seoul,
Republic of Korea, and
Kijun Park and Jungwoo Lee
Graduate School of Information, Yonsei University, Seoul,
Republic of Korea
Abstract
Purpose – This study aims to investigate the influences of loyalty and switching costs toward a
firm’s overall post-adoption behavior in using information system.
Design/methodology/approach – A research model is developed around two constructs found in
the literature – loyalty and switching costs – that are most critical in firms’ decisions on continued use
of the same IS service providing company. It is empirically tested using a survey of IT decision makers
in total 102 companies in South Korea. Partial least squares method is used to assess the relationships
specified in research model.
Findings – The findings suggest that both loyalty and switching costs have positive influences on
the continuous intention to use and the inattentiveness of alternatives.
Research limitations/implications Findings are based on a single point cross-sectional survey.
To further investigate the continuance of specific IT service firms, triangulation will be necessary with
longitudinal and qualitative data concerning the process of decision-making, including political and
contractual situation.
Originality/value – The study fills the research gap in studying post-adoption behavior at the firm
level by empirically testing the duality of loyalty and switching costs.
Keywords Switching costs,Continued use, Information system service,Information system usage,
Post-adoptionbehavior
Paper type Research paper
1. Introduction
Organizations have been making continuous investments in building and maintaining
their information system (IS). As the IS have been utilized more than decades, research
on post-adoption issues are now giving into more focus. According to Jasperson et al.
(2005), the post-adoption behavior is:
[...] myriad of feature adoption decisions, feature use behaviors, and feature extension
behaviors made by an individual user after an IS application has been installed, made
accessible to the user, and applied by the user in accomplishing his/her work activities.
Individual user’s post-adoption behavior is different from the behavior in pre-adoption
stages since user’s perceptions on the IS are formulated from direct experience and
interaction with the adopted IS and its provider. Such differentiation is illuminated
from the innovation diffusion theory (Cooper and Zmud, 1990).
The current issue and full text archive of this journal is available at
www.emeraldinsight.com/0263-5577.htm
Received 13 June 2013
Revised 20 August 2013
Accepted 31 August 2013
Industrial Management & Data
Systems
Vol. 114 No. 2, 2014
pp. 258-275
qEmerald Group Publishing Limited
0263-5577
DOI 10.1108/IMDS-06-2013-0259
IMDS
114,2
258
On user’s behavior after the IS adoption, most of prior research have largely focused
on the factors that impact individual user’s cognitive intention to use the IS continually
(Vatanasombut et al., 2008; Chiu and Wang, 2008) since the continued use is a
fundamental condition to judge whether the IS adoption is successful or not. Hence,
these studies on post-adoption behavior largely focused on the interaction between
individual users and system. Thus, their concerns were concentrated on the IS
characteristics which may influence on user’s continued use. However, post-ad option
behavior is also influenced by users’ accumulated experience. Some researchers
emphasized the changes of users’ post-adoption behavior from their accumulated
experience in investigating the factors which determine users’ post-adoption be havior
(Saeed and Abdinnour, 2013; Chang and Chou, 2011).
Meanwhile, most of prior studies on post-adoption behavior were focused on the
individual cognition level. It may be because the actual users of the information
systems are individuals although a firm decides to adopt the enterprise system.
However, the continued use of IS in the firm does not only depend on the individual
usage. Ultimately, it is a firm that decides whether to use current IS continually or
switch to another IS service. Thus, it is very important to study post-adoption behavior
in focusing on the firm’s level of analysis but prior studies overlooked this.
According to theory of relationship maintenance, certain features have repeatedly
been found to be important in building quality relationships (Bendapudi and Berry,
1997). Specifically, loyalty and switching costs on the IS service are central factors in
motivating to participate or engage in successful and mutually beneficial exchang e
relationships (Kim and Son, 2009). Kim and Son (2009) consider that loyalty and
switching costs can play a (important) role in determining IS user’s post-adoption
behavior. These authors propose that switching costs will determine the stability of the
relationship, whereas loyalty determines the quality of the relationship. In order to
study post-adoption behavior, a number of previous research have been focused on
loyalty and switching costs (Li et al., 2007; Kim and Son, 2009). Yet, the mutual
mechanism between these two constructs in IS service was not fully examined because
most of studies are focused particularly on online services context. Besides, previous
studies are focused on the individual level of analysis. Therefore, the present study will
mainly focus on these two constructs to see the impacts on the firm’s post-adoption
behavior by analyzing the relationship between a firm and an IS service provider.
This study has three objectives: to investigate how loyalty and switching costs
influence a firm’s overall post-adoption behavior in using IS service; to examine the
primary factors which influence on loyalty and switching costs; and to explor e the
outcomes of firm’s post-adoption behavior in using IS service, and how loyalty and
switching costs will influence on these outcomes.
2. Literature review
2.1 Post-adoption behavior: user’s loyalty and switching costs
Most literature on post-adoption behavior of IS users have focused on continued use
after their initial adoption of a specific IS (Bhattacherjee, 2001; Hong et al., 2006;
Thong et al., 2006; Vatanasombut et al., 2008). The adopted IS should be continually
used in order to receive its sufficient benefits. Since an enormous investment is needed
in adopting a new IS, the discontinued use means a big loss to the firm. Many
researches have studied the continued use of IS in post-adoption stage but most
Firm’s
post-adoption
behavior
259

To continue reading

Request your trial

VLEX uses login cookies to provide you with a better browsing experience. If you click on 'Accept' or continue browsing this site we consider that you accept our cookie policy. ACCEPT