Online shopping addiction has become a worsening problem in China for males and females. Based on 904 shoppers, this study examines the relationship between hedonic shopping motivations and compulsive online buying and investigates gender differences using gender theories. This study finds that different hedonic motivations contribute to compulsive online buying. Gratification seeking and idea shopping are key motivations for compulsive online buyers (females are mostly gratification seekers, while males are mostly information seekers). Conversely, value and role-play shopping reduce compulsive online buying, with a stronger effect on females; however, role-play shopping was unrelated to compulsive online buying for males.

Online gaming is consistently changing with the use of new technologies and seen as making an impact on consumers’ sustainable lifestyles. The gaming avatars have influenced low avatar identification players to engage in physical and learning activities through massively multiplayer online (MMO) game genre. The fundamental purpose of the study is to classify the association of an avatar with consumer’s behavioural intention for exercise and to consume healthy food. This study incorporates three theories: social cognitive theory (SCT), social determination theory (SDT) and player-avatar identification (PAI) theory to determine its four dimensions’ impact on exercise and healthy food intention to attain a sustainable healthy lifestyle. SCT is related to human cognitive behaviour in the light of immersive experience, self-presence, and enjoyment. SDT related to the physical aspects of consumers that are exercise intention and consumption of healthy food. The results have shown that immersive experience, self-presence and enjoyment do impact the consumer’s behavioural intention towards an individual’s sustainability.

China is a collectivist nation that varies socially and culturally from most Western countries. Recently, the country has been an attractive destination for international students. A contemporary digital platform such as WeChat Moments (WMs) is a leading social media platform among locals and international students to communicate and interact in cross-cultural settings for various purposes, including maintaining friendships and establishing new social capital. Prior research has overlooked the beneficial effects of such domestic social media platforms on international students in China, especially for strengthening their existing friendship quality and guanxi networking. Based on the self-disclosure theory, this study examines the relationship between international students’ WMs use intensity, online self-disclosure, closeness to friends, and guanxi network building using data from 445 international students employing structural equation modeling. This study reveals that WMs use has a substantial effect on the formation of guanxi networks and that online self-disclosure mediates the connection between WMs use and friendship closeness and guanxi network building. Several theoretical and practical recommendations are provided in the context of the guanxi network.

This study investigates the effect of buyer-seller personality similarity on consumers’ impulsive buying. Based on interpersonal similarity theory, the results revealed that buyer-seller similarity in agreeableness and openness increased impulsive buying of agreeable and open-minded buyers with a stronger effect of agreeable buyer-seller dyads. While neurotic buyer-seller dyads showed a significant negative effect on impulsive buying of neurotic buyers. Interestingly, conscientious and extraverted buyer-seller dyads failed to show a significant connection with the impulsive buying behavior. Thus, this study proposes that buyers exhibit different impulsive buying behavior when they interact with corresponding sellers due to their personality matching (mismatching).

Online education is the new normal in the prevailing COVID-19 pandemic situation; however, its effectiveness in developing countries having a lack of resources is doubted. We have adopted the technology adoption model to investigate students’ and teachers’ intentions towards online education concerning lack of perceived resources, lack of perceived facilitative conditions, perceived anxiety, and COVID-19 stress on students and teachers’ behavioral intention to use online education. To test our hypothesis, a total of 335 students’ and 313 teachers’ data is collected who have participated in online education amidst the pandemic. The results suggest that the lack of resources, facilitative conditions, anxiety, and COVID-19 pandemic stress negatively affect students’ and teachers’ perceived ease of use and perceived usefulness of online classes. Overall, the findings suggest that for developing countries, the large-scale adoption of e-learning is counter-productive and requires an alternate solution.