Search results

This research aims to investigate consumers' likelihood of purchasing services online in two countries, the UK and Italy, which differ significantly in the population's uptake of internet shopping. Four influences are considered: service type, contact with service provider prior to online purchase, familiarity with service provider, and experience with internet purchasing.

For motor insurance and travel, respondents were asked to indicate the probability of purchasing on the internet the service of a provider they had used before, after a face‐to‐face contact with the provider, and also without prior contact with the service provider. Respondents were asked the same questions also for a provider they had not used before.

Differences in the relative uptake of internet shopping in the two countries did not alter the general results: a need for face‐to‐face contact with the service provider prior to online purchase and a preference for buying services from a familiar provider. Previous general experience of online shopping increases the likelihood of purchasing online.

Future studies should examine a broader range of service categories and should consider travel products of different complexity.

Online/offline integration of service provision is very important, as consumers highly appreciate some form of human contact, prior to online purchase, even in countries where consumers are more used to shopping from home.

The paper provides a better understanding of the influences on consumers' likelihood of purchasing services online. Findings are generalized in two countries, with different uptake of internet shopping.

This study analyses the role of individuals' objective financial knowledge in shaping preferences for ethical intermediaries and sustainable investments in Italy. Another goal of this study is to assess the impact of individuals' misperceptions about their own financial knowledge and to test for gender-related differences in attitudes towards socially responsible investing (SRI).

Using nationally representative microdata from the Bank of Italy’s “Italian Literacy and Financial Competence Survey” (IACOFI), the authors use probit models, extended to account for potential endogeneity issues, to assess the causal effects of financial knowledge and confidence on stated preferences for SRI. Empirical models also allow to explicitly assess the moderating role of gender on the effects of financial knowledge and confidence on attitudes towards sustainable investing.

Results indicate that individuals' preferences for sustainable finance significantly increase with financial knowledge, suggesting that inadequate financial competencies represent a barrier to participation in SRI. At the same time, lack of confidence in one’s own financial knowledge significantly hampers attitudes towards sustainable investments. Furthermore, the authors show that women have a greater preference for sustainable finance than men and point out that financial knowledge and confidence exert heterogenous effects on attitudes towards SRI.

This study provides several contributions to the literature on SRI. First, the authors give evidence of the causal effect of financial knowledge on preferences for both ethical financial intermediaries and sustainable investments. Moreover, this is the first study to investigate the role of financial underconfidence bias in shaping individuals' SRI attitudes. Finally, extending previous research, the authors assess differences in SRI preferences between women and men and provide novel evidence on gender-related heterogeneity in the effects of financial knowledge and underconfidence.