The interaction between e-shopping and store shopping: empirical evidence from Nanjing, China

ABSTRACT

The rise of e-shopping significantly changes the way that people shop. Transportation planners have a keen interest in the substitution of e-shopping for store shopping and its impact on transportation systems. The literature offers mixed findings on the relationship between online and store shopping. Few studies have explored this relationship in China where e-shopping has proliferated and retail land use and transportation systems have evolved. Using data gathered from adult Internet users in Nanjing, this paper applies structural equation modeling to investigate the relationships among store shopping, online shopping, and online searching. The results show that online shopping and store shopping have a positive association, however, the effect is from the latter to the former. Online searching positively influences both online shopping and store shopping. These results imply that e-shopping as an information channel promotes store shopping.

KEYWORDS:

• China
• information and communication technology
• Internet shopping
• online shopping
• shopping travel

Acknowledgement

Thanks to Dr. Patricia Mokhtarian for her advice on survey design and administration.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by National Natural Science Foundation of China [4170117] [41571146]; the China Postdoctoral Science Foundation [2016M600393].