Exploring the Factors Driving Live Streaming Shopping Intention: A Perspective of Parasocial Interaction

Recently, live streaming has been becoming a new service provided by social commerce platforms, enabling small sellers to sell products online. Compared with traditional electronic commerce, the immediately interpersonal interaction is a vital feature of live streaming shopping. Based on Parasocial Interaction (PSI) Theory, this study aimed to empirically explore the influence of interpersonal interaction factors on viewers' PSI perception towards streamers. The relationship between viewers' PSI perception towards streamers and their shopping intention was also investigated. This study used Facebook Live as a research field. The results suggest that the viewers would form a positive perception of expertise, familiarity, and similarity to live streamers while watching their live streaming selling channel. Meanwhile, they could perceive the social presence of other viewers from the chat room, which is a significant function of live streaming services. Among these interpersonal interaction factors, familiarity is the primary factor increasing the viewers' PSI perception towards live streamers, followed by social presence and similarity. The results also reveal that the viewers' PSI perception towards live streamers could further drive their shopping intention. Finally, this study provides several practical suggestions for live streamers to sell products on live streaming platforms.