Online trust through humanized website design: research model and empirical study

Abstract

<p>Trust is an essential component for any business transaction, and is particularly critical and challenging in the online environment, which is characterized by de-humanized business transactions. If online vendors are not able to establish trust with their customers, business-to-consumer electronic commerce will not realize its full potential. This paper presents an online trust model which distinguishes between product, company and referee trust. This model can help further our understanding of online trust, provide online vendors with approaches to help build customer trust, and direct research in this emerging economy. The concept of humanized website design is introduced as a potential trust instiller along the product, company and trust dimensions. Subsequently, an empirical study is outlined, and results are analyzed to determine the effects of website humanization. Results from this study are shown to be significant, indicating that there is a connection between human elements in design and trust in an online environment. Conclusions from this research are discussed and areas for future research are proposed.</p>