YOUNGSTER’S ADDICTION TOWARDS ONLINE SHOPPING

YOUNGSTER’S ADDICTION TOWARDS ONLINE SHOPPING

KHUSHANDRA SHARMA

ASSISTANT PROFESSOR

LOTUS INSTITUTE OF MANAGEMENT

RAJAO POST, LUCKNOW ROAD, BAREILLY (U.P.), INDIA

k.sharma@lotus.edu.in

ABSTRACT

The aim of this paper is to contribute to the literature emerging in the space where youth are savvy of originating technology and innovative towards their lifestyle.  In current scenario, the youth generally dislikes to travel for the market, fight for a parking spot and brave the scorching heat when they can find everything online. Surprisingly, online shopping has become much easier since fashion brands have started displaying their designs on phone applications. The youngsters, now a days like to pass their free time by surfing here & there on online shopping sites. For many respondents, the online shopping has almost become an addiction.  To this end, I tried to explore the extent to which the online shopping is preferred by the youngster and the factors which motivate them to go for online. In this exploratory research, I specifically put an emphasis to identify the factors which influence them to go for the online shopping. This research also investigates the impact of such addiction in their lifestyle. Findings indicates that youngsters like to spend their time in acquisition of information about those products which have direct concern to their lifestyle, cloths, electronic items, gadgets & book/CD are few categories of items in their preference list for online shopping. The study also revealed important facts that information search, time saving, products availability &easy price comparisons are the main determinants persuade youngster’s to go for online shopping.

Keywords: Online Shopping, Preferred Factors, Shopping Addiction, Emerging Lifestyle, Shopping Determinants

INTRODUCTION

The changing lifestyle & emerging technology brought a revolutionary change in our society. In today’s world, the youngsters are found to be more aggressive & comfortable towards the use of internet & electronics devices. Uses of internet & advanced mobile phone are now considered as a prominent contributor in youngster’s lifestyle. Since the emergence of the World Wide Web, merchants have sought to sell their products to people who spend time online. Over the last decade, the concept of internet addiction has grown in terms of its acceptance as a legitimate clinical disorder often requiring treatment (Kimberly Young, 2007). Surprisingly, the youngsters are in the top of the list of internet users. Extensive use of internet & advancement in the technology has popularized the online shopping among the young generation.  The online shopping is now become a unique platform to search & purchase of various ranged goods & services. Online shopping is being usual for youngsters of India, because it has lots of added benefits like time saving, fuel saving, quality control; people have the added privilege of being able to compare prices easily and enjoy discounts. This is the reason the youngster’s behavior is changing drastically towards the shopping. Online shopping is rising fast not only in the metros but also becoming a trend in the small cities, as there are lots of categories such as clothes, books/CD, gadgets, furniture, cosmetics, jewellery, watches, electronic products and fitness equipment available on various sites.

PROBLEM STATEMENT

It has been observed by various organizations running the online shopping sites that the numbers of buyers on their online sites are very less among the numbers of those who visit the sites. It sounds that youngsters are being addicted towards the surfing on online shopping sites. This serious issue has raised a question & directed the study to identify the determinants/factors which initiate the youth to surf & shop online. It is also felt to be a considerable issue to diagnose that which gender is more involved towards such addiction i.e. male or female.

OBJECTIVES OF STUDY

From the problem statement, it is ascertained that following are the objectives of conducting this study:

·         Analysis the behavior of youngsters towards the online shopping

·         Determination of factors which influence & persuade the youngsters to visit online shopping sites

·         Identification of impact of online shopping on gender specific i.e. male vs. female.

                   

LITRATURE REVIEW

It was found that numbers of studies have been done at national as well as at international level on behavioral aspect of customers’ behavior in the context of online shopping and intranet addiction. “Due to the rapid growth of Internet, came the emergence of online retailing, where users purchase goods and services in a website through online. Thus, it has created a vast range of product categories that can be found, besides creating choices for users, it also created opportunities for marketers to expand their business. So as the internet transforms, consumers among teenage youth have more options and preferences. Now they have another way in buying goods, not just relying on the conventional method. By using online retailing they can retrieve information faster, more choices, time and money saving. A variety of services are available in online retailing world, not just buying goods, consumers can book or buy tickets online, pay the bills virtually” (Khairudin Murad and Shahnon Mohd Salleh, January 2014).

An Intern of ‘The Hindu’ paper done a research in 2014, according to study, in the technology-driven world that we live in, the recent rage of online stores has changed the way youngsters shop. Why go to a market, fight for a parking spot and brave the scorching heat when you can find everything online. Little wonder then that gen-next prefers this way of shopping. “This is my first year of college and I want to look good. I spend about Rs.8,000 per month on clothes and also get great deals online,” (Vashita Madan, a student of the Delhi College of Arts and Commerce), who is glued to online shopping. For many like Vashita, online shopping has almost become an addiction. “I think I have become a bigger shopaholic since the onset of online shopping. It is really convenient and most websites have a 30-day return policy. The biggest advantage is that these sites offer great discounts most of the time!” she says. Srishty Chaudhry, a student of Ambedkar University, feels there is more to choose from online. Add to that, you do not have to pester a salesman to show you things because everything is just a click away. “Online shopping has made me an impulsive buyer. It definitely saves time and energy.”Surprisingly, online shopping has become much easier since fashion brands have started displaying their designs on Instagram — a phone application that started as a medium to showcase photographs. “I like scanning Instagram. There is so much interesting stuff to buy from — from footwear to neckpieces. All you need to do is send a message on WhatsApp to place the order. Most labels have the option of cash on delivery, so one can try the product before buying it,” says Shivangi Suri, a student of Apeejay School of Management (The Hindu, New Delhi, 24 August 2014).

Researchers have found that following are the signs of online shopping addiction:

·         You always have a tab open in your web browser with a full shopping cart waiting for you to click purchase.

·         You have a daily routine that consists of cycling through online retailers to see what's new and what's on sale.

·         You get more promotional emails than real emails.

·         Your heart skips a beat when you get an email from a store announcing a sale.

·         You secretly online shop at work.

·         You get packages in the mail that you forgot you even ordered.

·         You've worked from home -- or just missed work entirely -- to sign for that thing you ordered last week.

·         Your recycling bin is perpetually overflowing with large cardboard boxes.

·         You are disgusted every time something arrives that isn't what you expected.

·         You've accidentally bought the same thing twice.

·         You fly into an uncontrollable rage when the item you want is "sold out."

·         You end up finally buying that item in that open tab because you do, in fact, really need it.

A researcher well said. “Many of us might joke about our shopping addictions or be quick to call someone a “shopaholic”, but to the truly afflicted, the issue is no laughing matter. Oniomania is the technical term for the compulsive desire to shop, which manifests itself as a preoccupation with buying and engaging in shopping despite the negative consequences. Shopping addicts are no different from other addicts in that they experience extreme highs followed by severe lows – feelings of depression, anger, stress, disappointment and guilt. The addiction is a dangerous threat to a person's physical and emotional health, personal relationships, financial status and professional life” (Morgan Quinn, December, 2014)

HYPOTHESIS FORMULATION

Ho: Youngsters are not addicted towards online shopping.

H1: Youngsters are addicted towards online shopping.

Ho: Female and male teenagers both are not addicted towards online shopping.

H2: Female and male teenagers both are addicted towards online shopping.

RESEARCH METHODOLOGY

Research Design

The study basically initiated to get the ideas & insights about the behavior of youngsters towards the extensive online shopping. To accomplish this purpose, the exploratory research has been considered & found to be best suited for the same. As it has been observed by many organization that youngsters often visit at online shopping sites but the sales turnover doesn’t reap accordingly. Therefore, to analyze the situation & identifying the factors of such issue, the study has targeted 200 youngsters who are undergraduate / postgraduate students or job professionals during the academic session 2014-15. The age bracket of the youngsters considered for this research was 18-30. Non-random convenient sampling technique has been used to target the respondents.

Data Collection

Both primary and secondary data have been collected for conducting the research. For collecting the primary data, the structured questionnaire has been filled by 200 respondents containing various questions needed for the accomplishment of the research objective such as awareness about online shopping, frequency of internet use, frequency of visiting online shopping sites, information search (digital window shopping), commodity preference for online shopping & online shopping’s feedback etc. The adopted scaling technique in questionnaire is 5 point Likert scale (strongly agree to strongly disagree).

The secondary data has been collected from the renowned national & international journals, magazines, online research database and so on. The secondary data was basically used for concept development & literature survey.

ANALYSIS, INTERPRETATION AND RESULTS

Data analysis has revealed various facts that were found crucial to reach at research destination. Numbers of male & female respondents in the study were 200 (100+100). It has been found that 88.5%respondents were aware about online shopping in which majority of awareness has been found in female (See Table 1).

Table 1: Youngster’s Awareness about Online Shopping

Gender / Response	Yes	No
Male	79	21
Female	98	02
%	88.5%	11.5%

Surprisingly, it has been found that 17 % respondents didn’t try online shopping till now. Here the majority has been found in male respondents (See Table 2).

Table 2: Youngster who did the Online Shopping

Gender / Response	Yes	No
Male	72	28
Female	94	6
%	83%	17%

Internet Addiction, otherwise known as computer addiction, online addiction, or Internet addiction disorder (IAD), covers a variety of issues. The online shopping is also a part of this serious issue.

Therefore, for working on a right track, it is important to analyze the time duration youngsters like to spend daily on internet.  The analysis shows that 36 % respondents daily spend more than four hours on internet (See Table- 3). This analysis somewhere or other indicates that the youngsters are now gradually moving towards the compulsive use of internet for online gaming, gambling, stock trading, or compulsive use of internet for surfing online shopping sites, often  resulting in financial and job-related problems. 

Table 3:  Daily Internet Surfing by Youngsters

Gender /Time Slot	Below 1 Hour	1-2 Hours	2-4 Hours	Above 4 Hours
Male	33	5	27	35
Female	25	25	13	37
%	29%	15%	20%	36%

This study is basically conducted to analyze the addiction of youngsters towards online shopping. Therefore, estimating the youngster’s frequency of surfing at online shopping sites is important element to be considered. Interestingly, 50.5% respondents said the statement that sometimes they use the internet to visit online shopping sites & 23 % responded as very often (See Table 4).

Table 4: Use of Internet to visit at Online Shopping Sites

Gender/Frequency	Very Often (5)	Often (4)	Sometimes (3)	Rarely (2)	Never (1)
Male	8	14	58	14	6
Female	38	13	43	6	0
%	23%	13.5%	50.5%	10%	3%

The following score values calculated by using Likert scaling technique are revealing that youngsters are in favor towards the use of internet to surf the online shopping sites. This indicates their addiction level towards it.

Very Often            46 X 5 = 230

Often                     27 X 4 = 108

Sometimes            101 X 3 = 303 (Highest One)

Rarely                   20 X 2 = 40

Never                     6 X 1 =06

It can be observed from the table 5, the youngsters are more aggressive towards those commodities which are directly related with their lifestyle i.e. cloths, electronic, computer & peripherals, books/CD etc. It is well known that changing trend & fashion impact a lot on the appearance & personality of a person. Therefore, respondents are found to be highly impulsive towards the adoption of changing fashion, specifically for the clothes as mean value of female respondent is 75 & it is 63.88 in case of male respondents (See Table: 5).

Table 5: Preferred Commodities for Online Shopping

Commodity / Gender	Male Mean ( )	Female Mean ( )
Grocery	2.77	0
Cosmetics	5.55	25
Books/CD	27.77	18.7
Cloths	63.88	75
Furniture	5.55	6.25
Electronics	47.22	31.25
Gadgets	44.44	6.25
Computer & Peripherals	36.11	18.75
Toys	0	0
Cinema Ticket	0	12.5
Airplane & Railway Ticket	22.22	0

The collected data also revealed that there are various factors which initiate & persuade the youngsters to go for online shopping (See Table: 6). In this hectic life schedule its look very much haphazard for youngster to find the free time to move for the traditional market place, spend fuel, roam here &there to search the information, bargain for the price, taking pain to carry the items from the market to the home and so on. In the data analysis, it has been found that 62% respondents were said that surfing at online shopping websites & collecting information is a good source for passing the free time. This statement reflects that the youngster spends a good amount of time on online shopping sites. Majority has been found in male respondents. 57.5% respondents were in the favor that shopping on internet saves their time. The study revealed that 50.18 % respondents find it flexible to shop online at anytime& from anywhere. The responses indicate that buying from online shopping sites is easy & convenient due to the availability of various commodities, brands, home delivery, easy payment modes etc. More than half respondents i.e., 54% are in the favor of this statement. 36.5% respondents were neutral to respond on the question asked from them regarding the risk in online shopping while 41% respondents replied that they are not in favor (disagree) that there is a risk to shop online. The price of the commodity purchased online is cheaper than traditional purchased from retail store, said by 36.15% respondents, whereas 39.5% respondents were indifferent about this. Due to availability of verities of commodities, brands, color, fashion etc, it’s felt to be difficult task to select a best one to make final purchase decision. The data also revealed the same, as 49% respondents were neutral to reply exactly on this statement. The study indicates the most favorable response possible on the statement, “Cash on Delivery is a good payment mode in comparison of use of debit/credit card”, as 40% respondents mark the ‘strongly agree’ on this statement.

Table 6: Youngsters Level of Agreement on Research Questions

Questions	Gender/ Response	Strongly Agree (5)	Agree (4)	Indifferent (3)	Disagree (2)	Strongly Disagree (1)
Surfing at online shopping websites & collecting information is a good source for passing the free time	Male	14	75	5	3	3
	Female	13	49	13	25	0
Shopping on internet saves time	Male	30	53	9	8	0
	Female	19	62	19	0	0
Flexibility of time for shopping	Male	28	50	14	5	3
	Female	19	37	44	0	0
Online shopping is convenient & easy	Male	22	58	12	5	3
	Female	25	50	25	0	0
Online shopping is risky	Male	8	14	36	33	9
	Female	0	12	37	49	2
Price of commodity purchased online is cheaper than traditional purchased from retail store	Male	22	36	29	11	2
	Female	0	31	50	19	0
Selection of a particular commodity is difficult	Male	11	33	36	20	0
	Female	0	20	62	12	6
Cash on Delivery is a good payment mode in comparison of use of debit/credit card	Male	50	33	14	3	0
	Female	31	25	25	19	0

HYPOTHESIS TESTING

In order to test the hypothesis, chi-square test is used.

Ho: Youngsters are not addicted towards online shopping.

H1: Youngsters are addicted towards online shopping.

The contingency table or cross tabulation of the collected data has been done as below:

Table: 7 Use of Internet to Visit at Online Shopping Sites by Respondents

Respondent /Frequency	Very Often	Often	Sometimes	Rarely	Never
Yes	46	27	101	20	6
No	154	173	99	180	194
Total	200	200	200	200	200

The contingency table has numbers of individuals or frequencies in its cells. The test statistic is

                                                                         

Where, O = Observed frequency of the cell

             E = Expected frequency of the cell    

                 = (Corresponding row total X Corresponding column total) / Grand Total)

Table 8: Contingency Table Represents the Observed & Expected Frequency of Respondents

Respondent /Frequency	Very Often	Often	Sometimes	Rarely	Never
Yes	O 11=46 E 11 = 40	O 12 =27 E 12 = 40	O 13 =101 E 13 = 40	O 14 =20 E 14 = 40	O 15 =6 E 15 = 40	200
No	O 21=154 E 21 = 160	O 22 = 173 E 22 = 160	O 23 =99 E 23 = 160	O 24 =180 E 24 = 160	O 25 =194 E 25 = 160	800
Total	200	200	200	200	200	1000

The value has to be put on the test statistic:

           = 0.9 + 4.225+93.025+10+28.9+ 0.225 + 1.05 + 23.25 + 2.5 + 7.22

           = 171.295/-

The test statistics follows chi square distribution with (2 - 1) (5 – 1) = 4 degree of freedom. Therefore critical value at 5% level of significance is 9.488. Since computed value of test statistic is larger than the critical value, I reject the null hypothesis at 5% level of significance and conclude that youngsters are addicted towards the online shopping.

Ho: Female and male teenagers both are not addicted towards online shopping.

H2: Female and male teenagers both are addicted towards online shopping.

The contingency table or cross tabulation of the collected data has been done as below:

Table 9: Status of Agreement

 Surfing at Online Shopping Websites & Collecting Information is a Good Source for Passing the Free Time

Response/ Gender	Male	Female
Agree	91 79.5	68 79.5	159
Disagree	09 20.5	32 20.5	41
Total	100	100	200

The contingency table has numbers of individuals or frequencies in its cells. The test statistic is

                                                                         

Where, O = Observed frequency of the cell

             E = Expected frequency of the cell    

                 = (Corresponding row total X Corresponding column total) / Grand Total)

Table 10: Contingency Table Represents the Observed & Expected Frequency of Respondents

Response/ Gender	Male	Female
Agree	O 11=91 E 11 =79.5	O 12 =68 E 12 =79.5	159
Disagree	O 21=09 E 21 =20.5	O 22 = 32 E 22 =20.5	41
Total	100	100	200

The value has to be put on the test statistic:

            

           = 1.67 + 1.67 + 6.45 + 6.45

           = 16.24/-

The test statistics follows chi square distribution with (2 - 1) (2 – 1) = 1 degree of freedom. Therefore critical value at 5% level of significance is 3.841. Since computed value of test statistic is larger than the critical value, I reject the null hypothesis at 5% level of significance and conclude that female and male teenagers both are addicted towards online shopping.

CONCLUSION

The study revealed the important facts which were awaited earlier. It has been found that youngsters are highly attracted & aggressive towards the online shopping. The various factors have been identified which influence and persuade the youngsters to go for online shopping i.e., shopping on internet saves their time, flexibility of time for shopping, convenient & easy, risk free transactions, availability of cash on delivery & other payment modes, are the key determinates. It has been found that price is also a concerning factor in online shopping, most of the respondents like to purchase online because the price of commodity purchased online is cheaper than traditional purchased from retail store. The hypothesis testing proved that youngsters, female as well as male both are addicted towards the online shopping. The youngsters find it interesting to collect the information regarding the emerging trends, new arrivals of goods & services, their price & how it can upgrade their life, etc. Surprisingly the study revealed that male are more aggrieve towards online shopping sites, 68% female respondents and 91 % male respondents like to pass their free time through surfing on online shopping sites. It’s a kind of addiction growing gradually and resulting in financial & job related problems. In addition, this research indicated that youngsters are quite interested in the information acquisition & purchase of those products which change according to the time such as clothes, electronic items, gadgets, books & CD etc.  

FUTURE SCOPE OF STUDY

The finding of the study provide the basis for the further research to be carried out in the same field with larger sample size, larger area, might be expended across the boundaries of age bracket of youngster. The study can be used to underlying the perception, attitude and behavior of youngsters toward the online shopping which can be further utilize by the organization dealing in online sales for their business benefits. As the study has revealed that clothes, gadgets & electronic items are the foremost in the list of youngster’s commodity preference for online shopping, so it indicates an opportunity for entrepreneur to think for establishing the e-commerce business to run the online shopping website dealing in these commodities. The organizations can also in-cash such addiction of youngsters for collecting their personal information while login on website & use this information to approach them personally.

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