readings n links

# readings n links ###### tags: `egirl` paper backlog: ~80 papers ## Why do people buy virtual goods? Attitude toward virtual good purchases versus game enjoyment (Juho Hamari) doi: 10.1016/j.ijinfomgt.2015.01.007 links: - https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0268401215000080 - https://sci-hub.se/10.1016/j.ijinfomgt.2015.01.007 ### notes: - focus on whether people want to buy goods because they enjoy a game and want to keep playing or becaause their attitudes towards virtual goods are favorable and accepted by their peers - surveyed users of a social virtual world (Habbo Hotel), an FPS games, and social networking games (Facebook games) - in the context of the free-to-play paradigm and the negative attitudes towards the pay-to-win model - **doesn't distinguish between functional and non-functional goods** - in previous studies, the relationship between enjoyment and purchase intention was left unclear - on the other hand, the relationhip between enjoyment and continuance is more straightforward - the free-to-play model has suffered from negative attitudes towards it, which may negatively impact purchase intention - breaks "magic circle" & skews competition - **this study breaks from the others in investigating attitudes in that it explores attitude towards the virtual goods themselves as opposed to the core service as well as opinions of others towards the business model** - previous studies investigating whether social influence or subjective norm having positive associations with purchase intentions were inconclusive, so this study aims to clear thing up - peer opinions and attitude are of interest because (1) online games have strong newtwork effects and high user exposire to normative info (2) typically used by a younger demographic that is more strongly affected by normative beliefs - **factors: attitudinal and normative beliefs towards and regarding virtual goods** - method: survey active players from 3 f2p games - collected w/ raffle incentive. 7-point Likert scale. path model ![](https://i.imgur.com/nx2ypbI.png) - hyptheses supported: - perceived enjoyment positively associated with continuous ise intention - subjective norm positively associated with attitude n purchase intention - attitude positively associated w/ purchase intention - (small but significant) perceived enjoyment negatively associated with purchase intention - moderating role of game type: path model accounted for roughly the same amount of variance in all games, but the negative relationship bewteen percieved enjoyment and purchase intention seem to only exist for social media and FPS game, not social virtual worlds. - moderating roles of friends: the number of friends and social activity might influence the effects of subjective norm and social influence on purchase intention. moderation analysis revealed that for people with more friends, subjective norms were a stronger predictor or of attitude and purchase behavior - results pointed towards: - higher enjoyment leads to decreased purchase intention, but increased willingness to play game. however, continued use positively predicts purchase intention. - attitudes towards virtual goods and beliefs about peer attitudes towards virtual goods stongly predict purchase intention. - free-to-play games may require developers to balance retention and monetization - whereas previous studies reported inconclusive relationships between attitude towards platform and purchase intention, this study found a strong relationship between attitude towards virtual goods and purchase intention. this was strongest in FPS games, perhaps due to the competitive nature and notions of fairness ### references: - Building customer relationships through game mechanics in social games (Hamari & Jarvinen, 2011) - doi: 10.4018/978-1-60960-567-4.ch021 - https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=2145990 - meeting the willingness-to-pay spectrum - (Hamari & Lehdonvirta, 2010) Game design as marketing: How game mechanics create demand for virtual goods - https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=1443907 - balancing act between making games enjoyable and, tryign to make caveats that make players more likely to purchase virtual goods (note: funcional goods). if a player enjoys a game enough they might not be incentivized to purchase augmenting virtual goods. artificial obstacles can incentivize purchases. - (Alha, Koskinen, Paavilainen, Hamari & Kinnunen, 2014) Free-to-play games: Professionals' perspectives - https://www.researchgate.net/publication/262685168_Free-to-Play_Games_Professionals%27_Perspectives - **transactions could decrease engagement, immersion, and flow** - (Davis, 1989) Perceived usefulness, perceived ease of use, and user acceptance of information technology - enjoyment and game continuance is straightforward - (Venkatesh & Agarwal, 2006) Turning vistors into customers: A usability cetnric perspective on purchase behavior in electronic channels - the purchase of augmenting products is preceded by the adoption of the core service and the customer's evaluation of how long the will use the service in the future - time spent and purchase intention in electronic channels is positively correlated - (Jarboe & McDaniel, 1897) A profile of browsers in regional shopping malls; (Rosen, 2001) Sticky website is key to success - **the greater amount of time customers spend in a space where related products are being sold, the more likely they are to purchase them** - (Mantymaki & Salo, 2013) Purchasing behavior in social virtual worlds - doi: 10.1016/j.ijinfomgt.2012.12.002 - https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0268401212001715 - https://sci-hub.se/10.1016/j.ijinfomgt.2012.12.002 - **positive correlation between time spent in social virtual world and purchase intention** - (Lin & Sun, 2007, 2011) Cash trade within the magic circle: Free-to -play game challenges and massively multiplayer online game player responses; Cash trade in free-to-play online games - doi: 10.1177/1555412010364981 - https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/1555412010364981 - https://sci-hub.se/10.1177/1555412010364981 - studied the relationship between attitude towards the free-to-play model - **the possibility to trade was the only reason for supporting the free-to-play model** - **this feels very familiar in the nft space** - perceived game quality, fairness, reduction in immersion (breaking the "magic circle") were reasons to detest the free-to-play model - (Shin, 2008) Understanding purchasing behaviors in a virtual economy: Consumer behavior involving virtual currency - the one study they could find that investigated the relationship between the attitude towards buying content and virtual currency - **positive association between subjective norm and social influence and purchase intention in second life (inconclusive when measured against other studies)** - (Guo & Barnes, 2011) Purchase behavior in virtual worlds: An empirical investigation in Second Life - no significant association between subjective norm and social influence and purchase intention in Second Life (inconclusive when measured against other studies) - (Guo & Barnes, 2012) Explaining purchase behavior within World of Warcraft - no significant association between subjective norm and social influence and purchase intention in WoW (inconclusive when measured against other studies) - (Visser & Krosnick, 1988) Development of attitude strength over the life cycle: Surge and decline - younger demographics are more strongly affected by normative beliefs ### thots: - are there methods of implementing transactions that do not break "flow" in a game or virtual world? - there is the possibility that its an implementation problem - the break in ui, ux - i recall reading about high corr. between flow and purchase intention with regards to both games and social virtual worlds. flow was a better indicator than enjoyment, since games, as opposed to social virtual worlds, could set up obstacles in gameplay - intentionally frustrate players - to encourage purchases. this seems to address the lack of negative correlation between perceived enjoyment and purchase intention in social virtual worlds in this paper. - source for the above: - **(Hamari & Keronen, 2017) Why do people buy virtual goods: A meta-analysis** - https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0747563217300547 https://sci-hub.se/10.1016/j.chb.2017.01.042 - oh looks it's juho hamari again dis mf and his 60 h-index is everywhere i swear - **dis is actually probably a better place to start. probs has more developed ideas, updated sources, etc.** - how does the **aesthetic goods only** model fair in terms of play/consumer attitude? - feels intuitive that it would fair better in terms of game quality, fairness, and immersion - this said, games like candy crush make beeg profits with a augmenting goods model - with the importance of the number of friends influence on subjective norms in mind, which factors contribute most to the number of friends and quality of relationships people make within games? - we know facebook games exhibited greater association between subjective norms and purchase intention - pondering the potential benefits of building a game or social virtual world on a sophisticated social graph - relevant paper to explore: - Gaming On and Off the Social Graph: The Social Structure of Facebook Games (Kirman, Lawson & Linehan, 2009) - https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/5283807 - https://sci-hub.se/10.1109/CSE.2009.266 - this one proposes as socially aware matchmaking engine (which is kind of what i was thinking about): - Socializing by Gaming: Revealing Social relationships in Multiplayer Online Games (Jai, shen, Bovenkamp, Iosup, Kuipers & Epema, 2015) - https://dl.acm.org/doi/abs/10.1145/2736698?casa_token=7jR9X0vzbUAAAAAA:cgk0U9CYZe39Nwqsg9cq6Tc4PpEaCK6yaacbAJ5dfPQSR8Vgu9J6_gncKmxrs6_qZy7Ro3aPwu9g - https://sci-hub.se/10.1145/2736698 - also would like a good hard look at how game-catalyzed friendships form - recent update to the Free-to-Play Games: Professionals' Perspective: - Free-to-Play Games: Paying Players' Perspective (Alha, Kinnun, Koskinen, Paavilainen, 2018) - https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1145/3275116.3275133 ## What Drives Social Commerce: The Role of Social Support and Relationship Quality doi: 10.2307/23106394 links: - https://www.jstor.org/stable/23106394?searchText=what+drives+social+commerce&searchUri=%2Faction%2FdoBasicSearch%3FQuery%3Dwhat%2Bdrives%2Bsocial%2Bcommerce%26so%3Drel&ab_segments=0%2FSYC-6451%2Fcontrol&refreqid=fastly-default%3A4fd609289971c4d3fff52cbb389430f7#metadata_info_tab_contents - https://sci-hub.se/10.2307/23106394 ### notes: - primer: social commerce is the buying a nd selling of goods of services directly within a social media platform - conducted an empirical study on poular microblogs to investigate how social support and relationship quality affect intentions to participate in social commerce - dynamics are different - info about shopping is shared with friends as opposed to anons and info shared by friends is treated as more valuable - so its important to understand the factors that affect the social media users' willingness to share and receive commercial information. - **ok not quite what I was expecting - thought it would more of an indirect effect** - but this does bring up the possiblity of - results: - social support and website qualirt hava a positive relationship with a user's intention to use social commerce and continue using a social networking site - ^ these effects are mediated by the quality of relationship between and user and a social networking site - previous research on ecommerce was limited when applied to social shopping models since they did not include the social relationship constructs in their models - given that relationship has known significant effects on human behavior in marketing and social psych literatres, this study - thot: these papers are likely to be broadly applicable - just have to account for dynamics changes resulting from the introduction of web tech - there is a specific focus on the role of social support - social support directly enhances relationsihp quality (an important construct in **relationship marketing** which can lead to higher customer loyalty) - 3 questions - does percieved social support in a social networking site affect the user's intention to continue using a site and conduct social commerce there? - which factors (social or web design) are more important in determining the user's intention to continue to use and conduct social commerce? - does relationship quality between use and the website mediate the effects of social suport and web site quality on customer loyalty? - empirical study done on plurk.com a microblog site - thot: never heard of this - feel like audience might be a bit self-selecting with how niche the site is - social relationship studies typically center on social influence, which is commonly measured thru social norm - this study looks as the similarly significant but relatively understudied element of social support , which play an important rol is relationship building and consumer behavior in online communities - in the context of the internet being a vehicle for building close relationships as enhancing well-being - thot: commerce from an swb angle - may be conducive to an altruistic spin - *social support - an individual's experiences of being cared for, being responded to, and being helped by people in that individual's social group* - notes that the design factors of a social networking site are expected to have a significant influence on social sharing and shopping behavior - they assessed website quality on the axes of system quality and service quality (as per previous studies) but ommitted information quality since the info on social networking sites is user generated - *relationship quality - user's evaluation of a service provider as opposed to the delivery mechanism (web site quality). consists of trust, commitment, and satisfaction* ![](https://i.imgur.com/ZmMaG7o.png) - 2 stages of relationships - effect of social support and web site quality on relationship quality - affect of relationship quality on social commerce intention - questionnaire with 5 contructs : - independent: social support, web site quality - mediating: relationship quality - dependent: continuance use and social commerce intention - survey conducted in Taiwan on Plurk - social support and web site quality have significant effects on social commerce and continuance intention - direct effect of social support greater than web site quality on social commerce and continuance intention - social commerce: .326 vs. .218 - continuance: .159 vs. .120 - relationship quality effects social commerce and continuance intention - continuance: .412 - social commerce: .132 - social support is the most important factor affecting social commerce - relationship quality is primarily determined by website quality, rather than by social support - website quality: .564 - social support: .26 - social support does positively influence relationship quality, though - social support -> being comfortable sharing information ### references - Ahn - studied the effect of web site quality and playfulness on user acceptance of online retailing - DeLone and McLean - propose e-commerce success model by measuring the web site design, content, and service quality - Motivation and personality (Maslow, 1954) - human beings need social interactions ot satisfy their social needs for belongings and support - good starting point ### thots: - is this applicable to embodied social spaces? - **think levels of perceived social support could be significantly higher in embodied space** - should dive a little deeper - would like to see what social support levels look like relative to 2d sites - elements that enhance perceived social support? - will people be inclined to share their purchasing experiences and product info/recommendations in further embodies interactions? how impactful are these activities in real life on purchase intention? - perhaps dive into studies on social factors' impact on purchase intention in real-world spaces - if so, having shopping experiences integrated into social spaces, or having them be social space adjacent seems like something worth exploring - what factors encourage social support? - group size, embodiment, similar interests, demographic construction, environment, etc... - are there negative returns after a certain point? (over socializing) - what about the relationship between long-term use (continuance) and commerce intention (not strictly social)? - thinking sumn like: factors (i.e. website quality) -> relationship quality -> continuance -> commerce - *ive read other papers showing strong relationships between time spent/invested in virtual worlds and the intention to purchase virtual goods* - there may be a longer time frame indirect effect - perhaps a better way to put it would be: what social factors influence purchase intention (not restricted to the context of social commerce and preferably in the context of virtual worlds) - perhaps insightful paper: - Customers' purchase intention and decision making progrss through social networking sits: a social commerce construct - doi: 10.1080/0144929x.2020.1846790 - https://sci-hub.se/10.1080/0144929x.2020.1846790 - paper throws it back to human desires and needs with Maslow - widely generalizable/applicable - going forwards, a good reference point - what is relationship marketing? - maintaining a long-term relationship with the customer is beneficial to the seller - uses customer loyalty as a measure of marketing effectiveness - cont. paper: - jj *gonna start doing summaries with gpt-3 and marking only the interesting stuff, references, n thots for efficiency ## Enhancing Brand Equity Through Flow and Telepresence: A Comparison of 2D and 3D Virtual Worlds doi: 10.2307/23042806 links: - https://sci-hub.se/10.2307/23042806 ### notes n thots: - the tone of the intro seems indicative of the time and attitude. there's quite a bit of optimism: cherry-picked research and speculation papers pointing towards the potential of brands marketing in virtual worlds. ir refers to papers like Haenlein and Kaplan 2009 for positive correlation between virtual stores and real-world purchase intention and Ives and Junglas' 2008 paper predicting virtual worlds being the dominant platform for businesses applications. also coincides with when brands recently set up shop in second life (mentionied by the authors in no negative light) - preceding the failure of those strategies. - there's a mention of the importance of business sites in building customer loyalty and brand equity. while i have been - from whta i gather, these older stratgeies were simply a means of encouraging purchase behavior in the new world - despite the potential afforded by telepresence and interactivity - why did marketing strats fail? was it the fault of the medium? premature push into a premature space? - i think that in a lot of these older papers, the meta was very much treating virtual worlds as marketing spaces rather than as the platforms for markets. even the dell computer sales in second life seem to be more of a lowreturn marketing stunt than anything significant. you aimed to increase brand equity in the real world by means of the virtual world instead of within the virtual one. - also, the list of brands that implemented the second life marketing strat seem like ill fits: american apparel, intel, dell, verizon, cisco systems, warner brothers, ibm, unilever, telecom, nissan. nearly all sell low purchase frequency (per customer) products for which require a good deal of customer thought. a single non-repeating virtual experience seems low impact in the context of all the ads people would be inundated with outside of second life and real product testing experiences. most are also highly functional goods, rather than aesthetic ones. - also, i get that these ads were designed as novelty one-time experiences rather than experiences designed to be revisited - all the above is a bit of an aside from the rest of the paper, but I think giving a bit of thought as to the contexts from which the paper (and alike papers) emerged gives us clues as to how seriously to take them and the sort of attitude that drove the first wave of brands pushing into virtual worlds to failure - paper even mentions that it is pivotal for businesses to acknowledge that 3DVWs (#D Virtual Worlds) "are more than just another marketing channel" but i have a sneaking suspicion that no major brand really took thito heart, likely because of the costs associated with doing so and the lack of knowhow. besides second life had its own flaws. whether we can attribute the failure of the brands to this, i'm not sure, but the relatively greeater success of homegrown creators seems to suggest otherwise. - one thing i'd like to note is that i suspect that people approaching the topic of flow in virtual worlds would likely first conflate high immersion/telepresence with high flow, as if existing within a virtual world is a sigular task in and of its own. flow, as its defined here, requires an activity to focus on. - that said, the papers points towards literature suggesting that telepresence either precedes (Hoffman and Novak, 1996) or is a component of flow (Chen, 2006). - *will note that flow positively affects attitudes*. note the importance of attitude in virutal goods purchases in freemium games (Hamari) - will also note that i remember an excerpt cat set: positive relationship between control of environement and social presence. wonder if it has anything to do with this:![](https://i.imgur.com/ibFJqs2.png) - the authors hypothesize that higher levels of brand learning and persuasion in a 3d environement may help increase brand equity. wonder the relative importance of content and method - both with and without regards to the environment - unlike the other paper i've read up til now, this paper notes how flow impacts brand image - through the hedonic experience that results from flow. i wonder if emerging virtual world based brand would benefit from association with high flow activities within virtual worlds (games and whatnot) to take advantage of the hedonic experience amplifying qualities of 3d worlds. this assumes that the hedonic experience of buying and using a branded product (im leaning luxury & identity-related) is not independent of environment. - im a little sussed out as to the highly structured nature of the scripted virtual hospital experience. think there should have been a plethora of experiences with verying levels of freedom, interactivity, social experiences. suspect that the type of experience could significantly alter the impact of an additional dimension - paper finds that 3d has higher telepresence than 2d, telepresence positively influences enjoyment, and that telepresence affects behavioral intention. - **despite the strong positive indirect effect of 3DVW on brand equity, the 3DVW has a direct negative effect on brand equity** - while 3DVW has higher potential to positively impact brand equity through increased telepresence and enjoyment, its suffers from potentially being too rich a medium and ultimate detracts from the main message trying to be communicated. subjects noted the urge to explore drowning out their listening to the audio presentation - paper concludes that increasing brand equity lies in reducing distractions and increasing telepresence - ^ it's not exactly the conclusion i would come too. perhaps it's the fault of only conducting trials with a rigid, structured learning experience. there was no attempt to provide learning experiences built around freedom and discovery. reminds me of a paper which mentioned mystery as a significant variable affecting people's investment in virtual worlds. - *caution: generalizing undergraduate to general population* ## Examining the effect of flow experience on online purchases links: - https://sci-hub.se/10.1016/j.jretconser.2017.04.001 ### notes & thots: - the talk of unidimensional models demonstrating a positive relationship between flow and consumer behavior and multi dimensioal models demonstrating positive, negative, and insignificant relationships reminds me of 'Enhancing Brand Equity Through Flow and Telepresence: A Comparison of 2D and 3D Virtual Worlds' and its conclusions. - authors split purchases into utilitarian (planned) and hedonic (impulsive). interested in seeing how clear the planned vs impulsive distinction is, given that some hedonic purchases (i.e. luxury goods) tend to take some degree of planning and saving. - quicc aside: does social interaction (or certain forms of social interaction) provide the antecedents to induce flow? can there be a balance of challenge and skill? goal clarity? feedback? - **found dis paper: Experiencing flow: Is doing it together better than doing it alone?** - doi: 10.1080/17439760903271116 - link: https://sci-hub.se/10.1080/17439760903271116 - dis paper would suggest that social flow is more enjoyable than solitary flow. seems like it can be an augmenting variable - think there's a sensible splitting of flow into its sub-dimensions. it allows us to spot relationships between antecedents and components. i suspect this info should aid in dialing in and balancing the antecedents to maximize flow - positive effect: perceived control (strongest), enjoyment, merging of action and awareness - interesting that skill doesn't have as big an efect as expected - challenge and feedback had significant effects across the board - note that this is an assessment of e-commerce websites.. - **note: perhaps focus on challenge and feedback - esp since they're the easiest dials to turn** - perceived skill can be determined by the complexity of the task, ability of the target audience, ease of achieving mastery ### references: - Hoffman and Novak 1996 is referred to as the seminal paper proposing flow as a framework for understanding consumer behavior ## From Space to Place: Predicting Users' Intentions to Return to Virtual Worlds links: - https://sci-hub.se/10.2307/23042807 ### notes & thots: - another 2011 paper with mentions of optimism - many corporate efforts in second life - questions whether virtual worlds can retain patrons - many organizations abandoned their efforts as patronage wanes - seems like it'll end with an outline for how organizations can create vw's that retain users - its focus on considering the notion of place (as opposed to space) reminds me of the paper on Gorean societies in Second Life - **places are spaces ascribed with meaning** - use experiences need to be tied to it - **human brain responds to the symbolic as it does to the real (Finke 1979, 1980)** - says attachment result from having meaningful interactions within a places boundaries and activities and experiences having been shaped, constrained, and influences by the space - reminds me of people flocking to defined social areas in vrchat: smaller rooms and lounges with the obvious purrpose of being a setting for interaction as opposed to open spaces that are overly flexible - seems like there needs to be careful consideration as to the objects that fill a space and the layout so that sociability is encouraged - according to ITPA (interactionist theory of place attachment), the meaningfulness of experiences is socially constructed - note: importance of social, location, and task awareness - there's a hypothesis here about cognitive absorption having a positive relationship with user retainment. the meention about cognitive absoption being associated with a loss of time passing reminds me of the "Examining the effect of flow experience on online purchases" paper and its finding that the loss of time awareness (an aspect of flow) was associated with decreased purchase intention - other elements of this paper remind me more of the paper on Gorean societies - there was a sort of ordered flow oberved ther in terms of awareness. location awareness was the initial draw, task awareness as defined by the rules and landscape was the second, and social awareness was the last and longest lasting. one element built up to the next but the relationships encouraged by the setting and activities became the most important elements to longtime users - ## Experiencing flow: Is doing it together better than doing it alone? doi: 10.1080/17439760903271116 link: https://sci-hub.se/10.1080/17439760903271116 ### notes & thots: - Older material on flow focused on flow in isolation. Newer research discovered the existence of social flow and distuished it from solitary flow. - There's still a a lack of basic research on the conditions under which social flow forms and the forms in which it comes. - While social flow and solitary flow share many of the same activation conditions, it maight be distinguished by more than social context. - "Classic research in social psychology has amply demonstrated that people act, think, and feel qualitatively differently within a group than by themselves **(Allport, 1954; Asch, 1956; Latane & Darley, 1968; Lewin, 1952; Milgram, 1965; Zimbardo, 1969)**. Social contexts introduce additional variables that may inhibit, facilitate, or transform flow experiences." - Social and solitary flow levels may differ depending on the form of social context - mere presence, constant interaction, etc. - Social flow was generally more likely to be **reported** as a joyous experience (Csikszentmihalyi & Larson, 1987). Doesn't mean it **was** a more joyous experience. - Perhaps higher levels of emotion is due to emotional contagion **(Totterdell, 2000)**. Or maybe just due to social tasks generally being more difficult than solitary tasks. - Study 1 set out to identify co-active and interactive flow. Also, to test if social flow is more enjoyable than solitary flow. - Self-evaluation + trained (student) judges sorting the flow experiences. - Social flow rated as significantly more enjoyable than solitary flow - Interactive flow rated as more njoyable than co-active flow (not significant) - High conversation co-active rated as significantly more enjoyable than low conversation co-active. Conversation is an interactive task, however. - Thus, Social interdependence highly influenced the reported level of enjoyment. - Study 2 set out to see if social flow was still more enjoyable when the task challenges and skill requirements were controlled for. - Volleying a paddleball alone and with a partner. Feels a little limited ngl. Only 30 subjects total... - The intensity of flow was reported as equal but there was a higher level of reoprted joy for the social situation. - Study 3 set out to measure the effect of interdepedence on the onjoyment of social tasks - Team pickleball with outside observers rating displayed enjoyment - High interdependence wand low interdependence cases test - High interdependence case was rated as seeming significantly more enjoyable - **I wonder what this would look like with established teams. Is part of the enjoyability in these social settings attributable to the establishment of new social connections?** - High social interdependence associated wit ha higher level of challenge. May be attributable to partners' emotive behaviors influencing judgements or riskier activities (behind-the-back and under-the-legs) undertaking while on a team. - "Groups are known to take more risks than individuals (Moscovici & Zavalloni, 1969). Broaden-and-build theory (Fredrickson, 2001) predicts that joy and creative play are bi-causally related."" ## Possession and the extended Self doi: 10.1086/209154 link: https://sci-hub.se/10.1086/209154 ### notes & thots: - the basis of understanding consumer behavior is accepting that we humans regard possessions to be a part of ourselves - A new lens: try to reason why and how consumer bheavior contributes to our broader existence as human beings - Includes persons, places, and group possessions, as well as body parts, and organs - **How underdeveloped is the avatar market atm? - **an aside: just remembered optimal distinctiveness theory - Four stages are identified: (1) the infant distinguishes self from environment, (2) the infant distinguishes self from others, (3) posses- sions help adolescents and adults manage their identi- ties, and (4) possessions help the old achie~e a sense of continuity and preparation for death - Belk suggests that possession are far more a part of self than older literature (Sirgy 1982) suggests it to be. - Extending self concept can occuer w/out the identification with certain characteristics of a given object - ![](https://i.imgur.com/HInNHct.png) - **^ such post-acquisition binding reminds me of a paper elaboratingon how simple ownership can influence a person's perception of that object as being more valuable than its respective peers** - Mclelland say control over possessions tied to closeness. Falls in line with work on primitive possession and ownership instincts. Knowing that yyou've completed the requirement of having control of something is enough to satusfy primitive possession rules (no acknowledgement from other needed). - ## How fashion influencers contribute to consumers' purchase intention doi: 10.1108/jfmm-08-2019-0157 link: https://sci-hubtw.hkvisa.net/10.1108/jfmm-08-2019-0157 ### notes & thots: - ![](https://i.imgur.com/tSSFRfn.png) - this + the section on socila word of mouth reminds me of social commerce but on steroids - where certain voices have higher importane - theory of planned behavior seen in the attitudes towards virtual goods paper - subjective norms influence decisions - people tend to follow those with whom they perceive to share similar personality traits - **note: early on, the authors mention that few studies have explored such phenomena in emerging countries. demographic differences may not make this applicable to other regions** - also we're not told which brands were used in the study - dynamics of fast fashion v luxury brands are likely to be very different - rank known: credibility, expertise, trust, --- , subjective norms - new: influence attitudes towards brands + influence purchase intention - explains more purchase intention variance than brand (sus) - feel like they should reassess with price relative to income as a factor ## The impacts of technological environments and co-creation experiences on customer participation ## Why users purchase virtual products in MMORPG? An integrative perspective of social presence and user engagement ## Buying the Unreal: Drivers of Virtual Item Purchase in Video Games ## Impacts of real-world need satisfaction on online gamer loyalty ## Building Customer Relationship through Game Mechanics in Social Games ## Virtual item sales as a revenue model: identifying attributes that drive purchase decisions ## Why do people buy virtual goods: a meta-analysis ## Interactive effects of individual and group levek variables on virtual purchase behavior in online communities ## Impact of avatar identification on online gamer loyalty: Perspectives of social identity and social capital theories ## How do avatar characteristics affect avatar friendliness and online gamer loyalty? Perspective of the theory of embodied cognition ## Role of authenticity in massively multiplayer online role playing games (MMORPGs): Determinants of virtual item purchase intention ## Why do players buy in-game content? An empirical study on concrete purchase motivations ## "Why pay premium in freemium services?" A study on perceived value, continued use and purchase intentions in free-to-play games ## Customization, immersion satisfaction, and online gamer loyalty ## Online experiences and virtual goods purchase intention ## Exploringc Social Influence on Hedonic Buying of Digital Goods - Online Games' Virtual Items ## Influence of consumers' perceived risk on consumers' online purchase intention ## From virtual community members to C2C e-commerce buyers: Trust in virtual communities and its effect on consumers' purchase intention ## Using Virtual Reality to Demonstrate and Promote Products: The Effect of Gender, product Contextualization and Presence on Purchase ## Do Augmented and Virtuak Raality Technologies Increase Purchase Intention?: The Role of Cognitive Elaboration and Shopping Modes ## The impact of self-congruity and virtual interactivity on online celebrity brand equity and fans' purchase intention ## Mere Virtual Presence with Product Experience Affects brnd Attitude and Purchase Intention ## Attitudinal and Behavioral Loyalty Toward Virtual Goods ## Optimal Pricing of Virtual Goods with Conspicuous Features in a Freemium Model ## Are Consumers More Willing to Pay for Digital Items in Mobile Applications? Consumer Attitudes toward Virtual Goods ## Telepresence, Flow, and Behavior in the Virtual Environment ## Understanding the Flow of Sense of Presence and Perceived Autonomy in Users' Conitued Use of Social Virtual Worlds ## What if Your Avatar Looks Like You? Dual-Congruity Perspectives for Avatar Use ## Impact of Flow and Brand Equity in 3D Virtual Worlds ## Stepping into the internet: new ventures in virtual worlds ## Predicting users' return to virtual worlds: a social perspective ## A Grounded Theory of Online Shopping Flow ## The Concept of Flow in Online Consumer Behavior ## Examining the effect of flow experience on online purchase: A novel approach to flow theory based on hedonic and utilitarian value ## How Do Online Game Communities Retain Gamers? Social Presence and Social Capital Perspectives ## Consumer behavior in social commerce: A literature review ## What motivates customers to participate in social commerce? The impact of technological environments and virtual customer experiences ## An Odyssey into Virtual Worlds: Exploring the Impacts of Technological and Spatial Environments ## The Study of Antecedents of Consumer Engagement and Purchase Intention in Social Commerce ## Virtual item purchase behavior in virtual worlds: an exploratory investigation ## Purchase behavior in virtual worlds: An empirical investigation in Second Life ## Social tie strength virtual goods purchase decisions of online game players ## An Empirical research on Consumers' Purchasing Behavior of Virtual Products in SNS ## A study on the influence of interaction of virtual reality consumption pattern on consumers' purchase intention under the background of VR technology ## Being Present in a Virtual World ## What is a virtual world? Definition and classification ## Being Present in a Virtual World ## Use of Seconf Life in Socail Work Education: Virtual World Experiences and Their Effect on the Students ## Exploring virtual worlds: success factors in virtual world marketing ## Neuroscience of Virtual Reality: From Virtual Exposure to Embodied Machine ## Usability Design and Psychological Ownership of a Virtual World ## Attracted of Locked In? Predicting Continuance Intention in Social Virtual World Services ## The VR Book: Human-Centered Design for Virtual Reality ## Knowledge Sharing in Virtual Communities: A Study of Citizenship Behavior and Its Social Relational Antecedents ## A Hierarchical Model of Virtual Experience and Its Influences on the Perceived Value and Loyalty of Customers ## Giving too much social support: social overload on social networking sites ## Technologies for Social Augmentations in User-Embodied Virtual Reality ## Body, Avatae, and Me: The Presentation and Perception of Self in Social Virtual Reality ## Working Together Apart through Embodiment: Engaging in everyday Collaborative Activities in Social Virtual Reality ## Hugging from A Distance: Building Interpersonal Relationships in Social Virtual Reality ## Presence in Virtual Reality and Everyday Life: Immersion within a World of Representation ## Real-World Persuasion From Virtual-World Campaigns ## Working consumers: Co-creation of brand identity, consumer identity and brand community identity ## Building brand identity in competitive markets: A conceptual model ## The corporate brand identity matrix ## Reconceptualizing brand identity in dynamic environment ## A Study if the Relationship among Brand Experiences, Self-Concepy Congruence, Customer Satisfaction, and BRand Preference ## Power BRand Defense Up, My Friend! Stimulating Brand Defence Through Digital Content Marketing ## When a Threat to the Brand Is a Threat to the Self ## Drivers of consumer-brand identification ## The role consumer-brand identification in building brand relationships ## Customer relationship building: The role of brand attractiveness and consumer-brand identification ## Exploring the dynamics of antecedents to consumer-brand identification with a new brand doi: 10.1007/S11747-012-0301-X link: https://sci-hub.se/10.1007/S11747-012-0301-X ### notes & thots: - consumer-brand identification (CBI) driving factors: - perceived quality - self-brand congruity - consumer innate innovativeness - consumer innovativeness hasa fleeting effect - company-controlled drivers can contribute to deep-structure CBI that grows with time - consumer-brand-congruity and consumer-brand-identification are NOT equivalent. CBC is an antecedent of CBI - the description of CBI as a psychological oneness with the brand rly triggers "self-extension" in my brain - CBI has inverse U shaped growth - high perceived quality enhances identification at beginning since people feel that it will serve their purposes - congruity lit: mainly on person-organization fit influencing employee-company identification - people want contuinuity, not necessarily constancy - otherwise dissasociate - innovativeness is the predisposition to buy new and different products. higher innovativeness -> higher initial identification - also provides symbolic meaning. contributes to their innovative self concept (if they see themselves as such). we should measure the kkondaeness of the audience - also take a look at the frontiers along which people are feeling innovative or like kkondaes - this derivative stuff is making me a bit eh on this paper - again maslow + herzberg & wolf about hierarchy of needs - basic and then those that motivate goal pursuit - theorize that antecedent effects differ depending on whether they are expected to serve lower or higher order needs and the likelihood that there are substitute brands - quality as a need-fulfilling mechanism, but likelihood that other brands can meet these needs becomes higher over time - brands must do as humans do (but more strategically): find a balance of unique and relatable. this makes them less substitutable (self brand congruity) but still relevant - innovativeness of brand can be paradox: ignite interest but also become vulnerable to other disruptive brands. also innovative people tend to move on pretty quickly - how much of a factor was apple brand image/presence/equity? - hmm fitting model to info feels ERREER - what works at the initial stage likely fizzes out, has no longevity - todo: invest in activities that enhance perceived quality abd self-brand congruity - these factors do not interfere with growth over time - quality plays and important role in setting the stage but NOT growth. it helps establish a floor - high initial self-brand congruid helps CBI grow more quickly - innovativeness is a rug. slows CBI growth - brand manager whould shift investment from instrumental to symbolic drivers, quality to congruity - we should be wary of the mercenary consumer i wonder if lower n higher order needs is realy the right way to think abt things. at least in the way it is applied. does quality really satisfy the need for hygiene? is the base level instinct driving the need for quality (function, i guess, but this is at a higher level) really that much stronger than the instincts behind self-extension (property, etc.) ## Purchase behavior in virtual worlds: An empirical investigation in Second Life ## overall thots despite all the talk about secondary markets being a reason to adopt nfts, pure focus on it seems unsustainable and generally poorly received. don't think the "possibility to trade" should be the single and end purpose of virtual goods quite a bit of focus goes towards the specifics of building virtual environment to affect purchase intention. should shape and/or select environments conducive to social commerce. build adjacent or on top of sophisticated social networks/graphs. focus on operating within high flow experience environments (assoc. with purchase intention). observed in games and social virtual worlds. should observe tradeoffs between 2d and 3d. *telepresence is a specific aspect of flow* balance immersion and rich environment (distractions) - can't take for granted that immersion = flow ->-> brand equity there's more nuance and pitfalls in a 3d space, though the potential may be higher ample social support -> social commerce quality website/ -> relationship building -> continuance/time invested -> psychological ownership should develop a monetization model that draws positive attitudes/subjective norms. need ample "display space" and a focus on visible and malleable features. in terms of servicing hoomans: provide the means to explore prismatic and disinhibited identity ## tangents how do you construct a useful social graph for synchronous communications? bit of a tech problem innit.