Page 66 - Azerbaijan State University of Economics

THE JOURNAL OF ECONOMIC SCIENCES: THEORY AND PRACTICE, V.78, # 1, 2021, pp. 66-85

SOCIAL INFLUENCE AND SMARTPHONE ADOPTION IN
COLLECTIVISTIC COUNTRY: EVIDENCE FROM
AZERBAIJAN

Maral Jamalova 1

Ph.D. Magyar Agrár- és Élettudományi Egyetem
(Hungarian University of Agriculture and Life Sciences)
1
* Corresponding author. [email protected]

Received January 10; accepted May 2021; published online 18 June 2021

ABSTRACT

This study focused on the impact of social influence on usage and marketing-related
aspects of smartphone adoption. The author was also interested in determining
whether gender had a moderating role in these relationships. The framework of the
survey is founded on the extension of the unified theory of acceptance and use of
technology (UTAUT2) and widened by the inclusion of new variables – brand
awareness and symbolic brand image. Young smartphone owners (i.e., 394
respondents aged between 16 and 35) answered questions regarding the formulation
of attitude toward actual use. For collecting opinions, the author applied the
nonprobability sampling technique. The results illustrated that social influence had a
strong effect on symbolic brand image. Moreover, social influence had significant
relationships with hedonic motivation and habit.

Key words: Smartphone market, Moderation, Azerbaijan, Social Influence,
Smartphone use.

JEL codes: O33; O53; L96

INTRODUCTION

In 2007, Apple Inc. made a big change in customer preference by introducing a new
approach for designing mobile phones. Design and aesthetics, as well as technical
capabilities (Filieri & Lin, 2017; Ling & Pedersen, 2005) of the product, gained
popularity in a short time. So, the presented “dominant design” (Giachetti, 2013;
Trott, 2017) became widely accepted by users and applied by the other producers
(e.g. Samsung, Nokia). Speaking of smartphones, it includes a touchscreen with a
QWERTY keyboard, and an App market as well (Schilling, 2010, p. 61).

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