"What you say, I buy!": Information Diagnosticity and the Impact of Electronic Word-of-Mouth (eWOM) Consumer Reviews on Purchase Intention

With the increase of online sales, the understanding of online purchase intention formation is of direct economic interest in a global economy. Identifying and predicting ecommerce diagnostic criteria gives further insight into consumer behavior. Information Diagnosticity accounts for the utilization of criteria differentiation within the decision formation process [1, 4]. In a cross-sectional study of 218 English-speaking Amazon.com customers, recruited on Amazon's MTurk, who were exposed to five online consumer reviews survey stimuli, this research explored the impact of information diagnosticity on consumer purchase intentions. The findings of this study reveal that constructs representing trust and valence in the new model improve fit in ecommerce applications and offer increased power in predicting factors influencing purchase intention behaviors, while taking into account exiting ecommerce use acceptance. The results from 218 survey participants examine the research model identifying diagnostic aspects in ecommerce influencing purchase intentions.