Social Sciences & Humanities Open 4 (2021) 100182

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Social Sciences & Humanities Open

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Consumer traits and situational factors: Exploring the consumer’s online

impulse buying in the pandemic time
Ika Febrilia a, Ari Warokka b, *, 1
a
Universitas Negeri Jakarta, Indonesia
b
Centro Internacional “Carlos V”, Universidad Autonoma de Madrid, Spain

A R T I C L E I N F O A B S T R A C T

Keywords: The pandemic outbreak at the beginning of 2020 had changed the ways and perception of consumers using
Consumer traits products abruptly. The study examined consumer traits (i.e., impulse buying tendency, shopping enjoyment
Situational factors tendency, consumer mood) and situational factors (i.e., individual situation, website quality, motivational ac­
Online impulse buying
tivities by retailers, and product attributes) to their online impulse buying. The sample was 290 criteria-met
Pandemic time
respondents and collected using the survey method, distributing the questionnaire, and applying the Struc­
tural Equation Model (SEM) to analyze the findings. The research founds that firstly, there were three accepted
hypotheses in which the influencing factors of online impulse buying, such as impulse buying tendency, con­
sumer mood, and motivational activities by retailers. Secondly, other factors such as shopping enjoyment ten­
dency, individual situation, website quality, and product attributes were not the determinants. It implied that the
on-going phenomena of changing consumers’ online impulse buying driven by their traits should be the critical
factors for any sellers to reap and optimize the available opportunities during the pandemic’s sudden change.

1. Introduction
It is undeniable that the e-commerce business in Indonesia is growing
(Agus et al., 2020; Tayibnapis et al., 2018). Some scholars have expected
this significant business development to penetrate 39.2 million users by
2020 (Annisa, 2019; Humbani & Wiese, 2018; Verkijika, 2020). Those
studies show five main trends in Indonesian online consumer behavior
as the considered-dominant factors during the last decade (Azis, 2019).
The first trend is related to the use of smartphones to access the internet
and find information about products (Salehan & Negahban, 2013). The
majority of consumers, and even more than 90% of consumers, prefer
browsing and shopping through their mobile devices (Tayibnapis et al.,
2018). The second trend relates to cities in Indonesia that are increas­
ingly evenly distributed in online shopping (Beldad & Kusumadewi,
2015). Consumers who shop online are not only women, but also men
are the third trend (Bhatnagar & Ghose, 2004; PereayMonsuwé et al.,
2004). The next trend is related to the activity of consumers who are
looking for information about the products they want in detail (Joines
et al., 2003; Shankar et al., 2010). Furthermore, the last one is the
increasing use of e-money for shopping (Widayat et al., 2020). (see
Figs. 1 and 2)
From the above trends, what is interesting about the behavior of
Indonesian online consumers is that consumers have smart characteris­
tics and are very careful in shopping (Das et al., 2016, pp. 1–28; Lestari,
2019; Rita et al., 2019). They try to minimize the risks that might occur
when deciding to buy something online rather than come to a particular
store (Sinha, 2000). Even these consumers usually have careful planning,
browse information first, and are considered wiser before purchasing
(Agarwal & Prasad, 1998; Delafrooz et al., 2011; Lu, 2014). On the one
hand, these findings imply that the powered-purchasing consumers
consider the product attributes as the quality; however, it still does not
make the consumers change their minds to buy products that they did not
plan before. Though, there are various promotional efforts from mer­
chants to attract the consumers.
On the other hand, the work of Fauzia (2019) shows that only 35.4%
of consumers, especially the aged 49–55 years women, plan and browse
about the products and brands they want to buy. So it can be concluded
that more than 60% of female consumers access the internet and specific
e-commerce platforms just for fun and then accidently decide to buy a
product, or what is commonly known as impulsive buying (Akram, Hui,
Khan, Tanveer, et al., 2018, Akram, Hui, Khan, Yan, et al., 2018; Moser,
2020). The study of Olivia (2019) supports the finding that most women

* Corresponding author.
E-mail addresses: ikafebrilia.bj@gmail.com (I. Febrilia), ari.warokka@gmail.com (A. Warokka).
1
Permanent address: Wisma Jati, Jl. Kayu Jati IV No. 39–41, RT 11 RW 04, Rawamangun Pulo Gadung, Jakarta, Indonesia, 13320.

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ssaho.2021.100182
Received 30 September 2020; Received in revised form 4 June 2021; Accepted 25 June 2021
Available online 3 July 2021
2590-2911/© 2021 The Authors. Published by Elsevier Ltd. This is an open access article under the CC BY-NC-ND license
(http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/).
I. Febrilia and A. Warokka
with student status (young age), with an income of IDR 2,000,000 - IDR
4,000,000, are very impulsive, spontaneous consumers, and do not have
much consideration before making a purchase. Another study reveals
that more than 80% of Indonesian online shop consumers have exact
preferences regarding e-commerce and the goods they want to buy and
not just looking at products (Hidayat, 2019). In other words, this
argument wants to emphasize that the tendency to impulsive buying is
low, and not all Indonesian consumers are likely hard to behave
impulsively. The data of Nielsen Indonesia (2016, 2020) supports the
finding in which explains that consumers who are impulsive and make
purchases suddenly without careful consideration are only about 13% of
the total consumers who actively transact at online stores. Therefore, it
is crucial to examine whether Indonesian consumers tend to behave
spontaneously or not when shopping online and what factors influence
their impulsive behavior (Badgaiyan et al., 2016; Iyer et al., 2020).
Meanwhile, the pandemic COVID-19 outbreak has brought disruptive
online shopping behavior phenomena (Butu et al., 2020; Donthu &
Gustafsson, 2020; Shafi et al., 2020; Sheth, 2020) in which gives sudden
shift of consumers’ ways to buy and consume the products (Biswas, 2020;
Diebner et al., 2020; Lowe, 2020). In other words, since the Corona-based
lockdown and other curfews have limited people to meet their needs
traditionally, online shopping becomes the primary mode to buy and sell
products, subsequently, change consumer purchasing behavior (Crispell,
2020; Deloitte Monitor, 2020; Kim, 2020; Sheth, 2020). Therefore, this
study explores the phenomena and empirical gap by examining the in­
fluence of external (consumer traits) and external (situational factors)
aspects of impulse buying at online stores. The investigation examined
both factors to respond to the gaps by developing seven research ques­
tions. The consumer’s traits consisted of impulse buying tendency,
shopping enjoyment tendency, and consumer mood. Meanwhile, situa­
tional factors came from a person’s situation, website quality, motiva­
tional activities by retailers, and product attributes.
This study contributed to threefold. Firstly, it gave relevant and up-to-
date insights into impulse online buying at the recent phenomena, which
relatively are limited available in terms of emerging markets. Secondly, it
offered a new research model combining external and internal factors to
examine the effects on impulse online buying during a disruptive
pandemic time (i.e., COVID-19 outbreak). Finally, it extended the dis­
cussion and body of knowledge of consumer behavior topics, especially in
terms of impulse online buying, which previously much deep-rooted in
offline stores and developed countries. The employed-advance analysis
method (i.e., the variance-based SEM) allowed analyzing the results
much more robust as well.
2. Literature review
2.1. Impulse buying
Impulse buying became at the light of the discussion in the field of
the consumer firstly in the decade of the 1940s, which some scholars
Fig. 1. Research model.
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Social Sciences & Humanities Open 4 (2021) 100182
defined it as consumer’s unplanned buying and quick transaction
decision-making (Luna & Quintanilla, 2000; Xiao & Nicholson, 2013).
This phenomenon drew numerous researchers to explore impulse
buying behavior, even though they found challenges to measure it. The
participants in experiments were mostly unwilling or hesitant to inform
their purchasing activities (Kollat & overtly Willett, 1969). It led to the
inconclusive impulse buying definition, either its concept (Amos et al.,
2014) or the determinants (Muruganantham & Bhakat, 2013; Badgaiyan
& Verma, 2014). To some extent, various particular stimuli contributed
to this irrational behavior (Aruna & Santhi, 2015). For instance, the
studies focused on identifying the influencing factors of consumer
behavior in the buying decision process, whether internal (related to
personal characteristics) or external (related to situational – store and
product – characteristics) affecting impulse buying (Amos et al., 2014;
Ciunova-Shuleska, 2012; Husnain et al., 2019; Sofi & Nika, 2017).
2.2. Consumer traits
Some prior studies conducted in offline stores showed that person­
ality, culture, window display, and sales promotion factors had triggered
consumers to make impulsive purchases (Katawetawaraks & Wang,
2011; Miao et al., 2020; Thompson & Prendergast, 2015). Concomi­
tantly, Saran et al. (2016) found that the big five traits influenced a
person to purchase products impulsively and unplanned. Personal
characteristics, such as extraversion, agreeableness, conscientiousness,
emotional stability/neuroticism, and openness, took account of an in­
dividual’s impulse buying. The other scholars explored the other inter­
nal factors, such as impulse buying tendency, shopping enjoyment
tendency, and emotion/affect/mood (Atulkar & Kesari, 2018; Bahrai­
nizad & Rajabi, 2018; Chang et al., 2014; Dawson & Kim, 2009;
Dhaundiyal & Coughlan, 2016; Leong et al., 2017; Mohan et al., 2013).
Those prior studies argued that emotional-related internal factors were
essential determinants in an individual’s buying decision process. By
borrowing the findings in offline stores, this study formulates four hy­
potheses as follows:
H1. The impulse buying tendency influences online impulse buying
H2. The shopping enjoyment tendency influences online impulse buying
H3. The consumer mood influences online impulse buying
H4. A person’s situation influences online impulse buying
2.3. Situational factors
On the other hand, some scholars argue that external aspects
contribute to an individual’s impulse buying, such as the store atmo­
sphere (e.g., lighting, layout, and music), display and product arrange­
ment, product attributes, and sales promotion. Those factors have
triggered people to make purchases spontaneously, which previously
they did not plan to buy, instead, to stroll and “refresh their eyes”
I. Febrilia and A. Warokka Social Sciences & Humanities Open 4 (2021) 100182

(Santini et al., 2019; Akram, Hui, Khan, Tanveer, et al., 2018; Atulkar & Table 1
Kesari, 2018; Leong et al., 2017; Chang et al., 2014; Mohan et al., 2013; Variable names, number of indicators, and research adopted.
Dawson & Kim, 2009). Some studies also consider other factors, such as No Variable Number of Research
the availability of time and money, social influence, and hedonic and Indicators
utilitarian motives as situational factors (Atulkar & Kesari, 2018; Bar­ 1 Impulse Buying 9 Atulkar and Kesari (2018);
akat, 2019; Hashmi et al., 2020; Parsad et al., 2018). Those external Tendency Mohan et al. (2013)
factors can make the consumers finally decide something different from 2 Shopping Enjoyment 6 Atulkar and Kesari (2018);
what they thought about buying before (Yu & Bastin, 2010). Based on Tendency Mohan et al. (2013)
3 Consumer Mood 6 Bahrainizad and Rajabi (2018)
those studies, this study proposes the following hypotheses to examine 4 Person’s Situation 8 Atulkar and Kesari (2018);
the effect of situational factors on consumer’s online impulse buying: Chang et al. (2014)
5 Website Quality 6 Rezaei et al. (2016) & Ashraf
H5. The website quality influences online impulse buying et al. (2019)
6 Motivational Activities 11 Atulkar and Kesari (2018);
H6. The motivational activities by retailers affect online impulse buying
by Retailers Dawson and Kim (2009)
H7. The product attributes influence online impulse buying 7 Product Attributes 6 Atulkar and Kesari (2018)
8 Online Impulse Buying 7 Atulkar and Kesari (2018);
Rezaei et al. (2016)
3. Research method
Source: Author’s elaborated data.

This research employed a quantitative study to examine the

influencing factors of consumers’ online impulse buying in which
applied the purposive sampling method as the chosen sampling tech­
nique. The selected respondents should meet the following two
criteria: domiciled in Jakarta and actively transacting using various
online store brands within the last six months. The respondents
answered the questionnaire, and the collected data were processed
and analyzed through SEM (Structural Equation Modeling). The
examined variables used the five-Likert scale, with range 5 (strongly
agree) until 1 (strongly disagree) as shown in Table 1.
4. Results and discussions
4.1. Descriptive data analysis
The collected data show that female respondents are dominant
(67%), in the young-aged (67.1%), and single marital status (9.3%),
meaning that those segments are active in online shopping during the
current pandemic time. It implicitly reveals that the lockdown and
curfew policy has forced those consumer groups to explore more online
shopping activities (Nielsen, 2020). The data also demonstrate that
university-level-educated respondents are critical consumers in the on­
line shopping business even though they are relatively middle-to-low
income earners. It indirectly shows the consumers’ perception of on­
line shopping’s easiness and relatively affordable to get the offered
products driving those segments to access online stores (Nielsen, 2020).
Finally, the offered promos, time-saving considerations, the influence of
mood, product quality, and personality factors are the driving aspects of
surveyed respondents preferring online stores to offline ones.

The collected respondents were 290 consumers who met the set-
criteria, as shown in the following table (Table 2).

Fig. 2. Research Model with Variance-based SEM Source: Author’s data processed (2020).

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I. Febrilia and A. Warokka Social Sciences & Humanities Open 4 (2021) 100182

Table 2 Table 3
Descriptive data. Indicator’s validity & reliability test.
Category Number of Percent Construct Indicator Item Factor Cronbach
Respondents (%) Loading Alpha

Gender Male 94 32.4% Impulse Buying I have strong feelings for IBT1 0.558 0.841
Female 196 67.6% Tendency buying the product
Age 15–20 years 105 36.2% I buy products to get IBT2 0.543
21–25 years 52 17.9% certain satisfaction
26–30 years 15 5.2% I can’t control myself to IBT3 0.740
31–35 years 37 12.8% buy the product
˃ 35 years 81 27.9% I buy products because of IBT4 0.593
Marital Status Single 172 59.3% environmental influences
Married 118 40.7% I will not buy products IBT5 Not
Occupation Student 147 50.7% that are not on my Valid
Lecturer 72 24.8% shopping list
Employee 42 14.5% When I shop, I usually buy IBT6 0.734
Level of Education High School 51 17.6% products that I didn’t plan
Undergraduate 142 49% to buy
Master 69 23.8% I am an individual who IBT7 0.771
Income Level per IDR 500,000 – 117 40.3% always makes unplanned
Month <1,000,000 purchases
IDR 2,500,000 - 53 18.3% When I see a product that IBT8 0.772
<5,000,000 catches my eye, I will
IDR 55 19% immediately buy the
5,000,000–10,000,000 product without
Goods that are Usually Fashion products 219 75.3% considering anything
Purchased Online Cellphones and its 125 43% It feels great to make IBT9 0.753
accessories purchases spontaneously
Headscarves and 122 41.9% Shopping Shopping is a very fun SET1 0.884 0.878
cosmetics Enjoyment activity for me
Travel services/ticketing 77 26.5% Tendency I have a certain pleasure SET2 0.896
Food 8 2.7% when shopping
Children’s needs 2 0.7% I love the shop’s soothing SET3 0.630
Books and writing 2 0.7% and refreshing
instruments environment
Household equipment 2 0.7% Shopping is my favorite SET4 0.825
Frequency of Online Once 126 43.3% activity
Shopping in 1 month 2–4 times 132 45.4% For me, shopping is a SET5 0.858
5–10 times 23 8.2% pleasant experience
>10 times 9 3.1% In my opinion, coming SET6 Not
Nominal Spending on Less than IDR 500,000 195 67.2% and shopping at an offline Valid
Online Shopping in IDR 500,000 - 59 20.3% store is a waste of time
1 month <1,000,000 Consumer Mood I buy a certain product CM1 0.715 0.869
IDR 1,000,000 - 25 8.6% depending on how I feel at
<2,500,000 the time
Reasons for Shopping The existence of promos 214 73.5% Sometimes, I buy CM2 0.781
Online Time-saving 209 71.8% something to make myself
considerations feel better
The influence of mood 73 25.1% Shopping is a way to CM3 0.802
Product quality 63 21.6% reduce stress in everyday
Personality factors 47 16.2% life
My happiness increases CM4 0.820
with the number of
4.2. Validity and reliability testing products I buy
When I’m feeling happy, CM5 0.798
shopping becomes even
Table 3 shows the validity and reliability testing results, which the more fun
valid indicators will proceed into the hypothesis testing stage. When shopping, I can be CM6 0.745
very happy and
enthusiastic, but I can also
4.3. Multicollinearity test feel sad
Person’s I always put some extra PS1 Not 0.709
To determine whether the obtained data obtained are well distrib­ Situation cash on my travels so I can Valid
buy whatever I like best
uted or not, this study applied the correlation test among variables I always have a time limit PS2 0.804
shown in Table 4. The results reveal that there is not any severe multi­ on shopping
collinearity problem among the independent variables in which the My time for shopping is PS3 0.860
correlation value is less than 0.8 (Gujarati, 1995). very limited
The time pressure I feel in PS4 0.728
Table 4 reveals the correlation of the independent - dependent var­
shopping is high
iables in which most of them showed positive and significant results. As I don’t feel rushed into PS5 Not
with the correlation between impulse buying tendency and online im­ shopping Valid
pulse buying (0.735**), it exhibits the more significant the tendency of It seems, I will not make PS6 0.524
consumers to shop impulsively, the higher the likelihood that consumers unplanned purchases
My budget for shopping is PS7 Not
will purchase products unexpectedly at certain online stores. The same very limited Valid
results happen in the correlation between shopping enjoyment tendency PS8
- online impulse buying (0.497**), consumer mood - online impulse (continued on next page)
buying (0.608**), website quality - online impulse buying (0.138 *), and

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I. Febrilia and A. Warokka Social Sciences & Humanities Open 4 (2021) 100182

Table 3 (continued ) Table 3 (continued )

Construct Indicator Item Factor Cronbach Construct Indicator Item Factor Cronbach
Loading Alpha Loading Alpha

If I find a product that I Not The high quality and the PA6 Not
really like, then I’ll buy it Valid low price will prompt me Valid
right away with the extra to purchase suddenly
cash I have Online Impulse Exciting marketing OIB1 0.693 0.888
Website Quality In my opinion, a quality WQ1 0.768 0.856 Buying activities motivated me to
website is a website that is shop more than planned
well-organized The fun shopping process OIB2 0.778
A visually appealing WQ2 0.702 prompted me to make
website can influence my impulsive, sudden
desire to shop purchases
I like shopping on WQ3 0.796 I am often spontaneous in OIB3 0.855
websites that provide buying products
reliable information The purchase I made was OIB4 0.825
The appearance of the WQ4 0.814 unplanned
website must look I have no prior intention OIB5 0.743
elegant, stylish and classy of purchasing a particular
A quality website is a WQ5 0.793 product
website that is not out of Before visiting this OIB6 0.727
date website/online store, I
A good website shows the WQ6 0.719 had no plans to purchase
reputation of the online this product
shop concerned I can’t help but buy OIB7 0.787
Motivational When I see a price MA1 0.652 0.879 products on this website/
Activities by promotion (ex. Discount), online store
Retailers then I will buy
impulsively/unplanned Source: Author’s elaborated data.
I often buy products for MA2 0.706
other benefits (ex. Gifts) motivational activities by retailers - online impulse buying (0.560**).
Friendly salespeople MA3 0.583
The more consumers feel they have a pleasant experience while shop­
make me even more
excited to shop ping, the greater the mood (especially good mood) for consumers when
I chose a particular store MA4 0.731 shopping has. The better the quality of the website from the online store
to shop because it gave a where consumers shop is, the more consumers would be impulsively
promo “Buy 1 Get 1 Free” buying. The more appealing the promotional efforts made by retailers to
I went back to shopping at MA5 0.742
the same store to take
attract consumers to shop, then the level of impulsive purchases will be
advantage of the coupons even greater.
that I got on the previous Meanwhile, there are slightly different results on the correlation be­
purchase tween people’s situation - online impulse buying (− 0.040), and the
I will get a discount when MA6 0.761
relationship between product attributes - online impulse buying (− 0.014),
I have reached a certain
nominal spend both of which showed no effect/no correlation. It means that in online
I often receive unexpected MA7 0.716 shopping, consumers do not feel that time and money constraints are a
gifts after finishing barrier to them from making spontaneous purchases. Likewise, if they
shopping at the store of have more time and money, they do not automatically decide to make an
my choice
The shop where I shop MA8 0.627
unplanned purchase. The same thing happens when it comes to product
provides free shipping attributes. Respondents who were involved in the research argued that the
facilities price, quality, and features of the product did not influence their decision
I can return/exchange the MA9 0.546 to buy the product impulsively. The table below shows the correlation
products I bought within a
between variables, as described above.
certain period of time
Lucky draws are always MA10 0.682
held by the shop I choose 4.4. Hypothesis test results using SEM
to shop for
I am willing to become a MA11 0.681
member at a store because The following Table 5 shows the results of hypothesis testing using
I will get a discount when variance-based structural equation model (SEM).
shopping The results of the first hypothesis test shown in Table 5 indicate that
Product Before buying, I always PA1 0.784 0.834
the impulse buying tendency affects the online impulse buying of con­
Attributes consider the price of the
product sumers (β = 0.682; p < 0.001), so H1 is accepted. It means that consumers
I love buying high quality PA2 0.818 who tend not to control themselves to make unplanned purchases are
products at a low price most likely to become impulsive buyers. They have a strong feeling of
Product quality will be PA3 0.843 buying products online and would be very happy if they could make it
the main consideration
before I make a purchase
happen. The result supports the previous studies (Atulkar & Kesari, 2018;
Before deciding to buy, I PA4 0.827 Dawson & Kim, 2009; Dhaundiyal & Coughlan, 2016; Leong et al., 2017;
will check the Mohan et al., 2013).
completeness of the The second hypothesis testing shows a contradictory result, which
product features first
examines the effect of shopping enjoyment tendency on online impulse
I am always tempted to PA5 Not
buy products at low prices Valid buying (β = 0.012; p > 0.05); the statistical test concludes to reject H2. It
even though the quality is implicitly demonstrates that consumers’ happy feelings when shopping
mediocre does not affect their impulsive buying decisions. They can enjoy the
process of browsing information about products in their favorite online

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Table 4
Descriptive analysis.
Variable Mean Standard Deviation IBT SET CM PS WQ MA PA OIB

IBT 2.878 0.766 1 – – – – – – –

SET 3.680 0.821 0.567** 1 – – – – – –
CM 3.217 0.926 0.666** 0.666** 1 – – – – –
PS 3.209 0.772 − 0.097 − 0.021 0.139* 1 – – – –
WQ 4.274 0.625 0.181** 0.356** 0.317** 0.224** 1 – – –
MA 3.424 0.729 0.543** 0.515** 0.607** 0.123* 0.299** 1 – –
PA 4.463 0.613 0.049 0.210** 0.141* 0.107 0.565** 0.157** 1 –
OIB 2.986 0.883 0.735** 0.497** 0.608** − 0.040 0.138* 0.560** − 0.014 1

Note: **p < 0,01; *p < 0,05; IBT = Impulse Buying Tendency; SET = Shopping Enjoyment Tendency; CM = Consumer Mood; PS = Person’s Situation; WQ = Website
Quality; MA = Motivational Activities by Retailers; PA = Product Attributes; OIB = Online Impulse Buying.

not make it a purchase he did not plan before. This finding does not
Table 5
support the studies carried out previously by Chang et al. (2014); Leong
Hypothesis test results.
et al. (2017); Bahrainizad and Rajabi (2018); and Atulkar and Kesari
The relationship Estimate S.E C.R Probability Sig. (2018). Moreover, even though the online store website is well designed,
between variables
visually attractive, and provides complete and reliable information, this
Impulse Buying 0.682 0.061 11.204 *** Significant does not make the respondent becoming an impulsive consumer. In other
Tendency →
words, the decision to make an unplanned product purchase is not
Online Impulse
Buying (H1)
determined by how stylish a particular online store owns a website. These
Shopping 0.012 0.061 0.195 0.846 Not results are not in line with the previous studies conducted by Rezaei et al.
Enjoyment Significant (2016); Akram et al. (2018); and Tariq et al. (2019).
Tendency → The test of the influence of motivational activities by retailers on on­
Online Impulse
line impulse buying also shows a significant result (β = 0.171; p < 0.01),
Buying (H2)
Consumer Mood → 0.152 0.070 2.175 0.030 Significant which H6 is accepted. It can conclude that promotions such as discounts,
Online Impulse gifts, ‘buy one get one free,’ coupons, free shipping, and prize draw can
Buying (H3) attract consumers to shop for products they had not planned initially. The
Person’s Situation → 0.006 0.049 0.129 0.897 Not more promotional efforts made by retailers, the higher the level of con­
Online Impulse Significant
Buying (H4)
sumer’s impulsive buying. The results of this hypothesis testing are in line
Website Quality → − 0.047 0.055 − 0.862 0.389 Not with the previous study conducted by Dawson and Kim (2009); Atulkar
Online Impulse Significant and Kesari (2018); Akram et al. (2018); and Miao et al. (2020).
Buying (H5) The examination of product attributes’ effect on online impulse
Motivational 0.171 0.056 3.070 0.002 Significant
buying exhibits an insignificant statistical result (β = − 0.051; p > 0.05),
Activities by
Retailers → which it rejects H7. The finding also indicates that product attributes
Online Impulse such as price, quality, and completeness of product features do not affect
Buying (H6) consumer purchases made spontaneously. Respondents, who are mostly
Product Attributes − 0.051 0.053 − 0.976 0.329 Not university-level-educated people, think that the attribute is something
→ Online Impulse Significant
Buying (H7)
important, which should be considered carefully even though the deci­
sion can change if the seller offers a promo (as well as the previous
Source: Author’s data processed (2020). hypothesis test results). This outcome seems to contradict the previous
studies conducted by Leong et al. (2017); Bahrainizad and Rajabi
store, but this does not make respondents spontaneously make pur­ (2018); and Atulkar and Kesari (2018).
chases. This finding does not support prior studies (Atulkar & Kesari,
2018; Leong et al., 2017; Mohan et al., 2013; Ozen & Engizek, 2014). 5. Conclusion
The third hypothesis testing shows the effect of consumer mood on
online impulse buying (β = 0.152; p < 0.05), which the statistical test This study explores both internal (consumer traits) and external
concludes to accept H3. The result indicates that consumers’ feelings (situational factors) aspects, which are considered to influence online
when shopping online influence their decisions to make impulsive impulse buying of consumers at the pandemic COVID-19 time. After
purchases. When the mood is pleasant (consumers are feeling happy), testing the proposed hypotheses using variance-based Structural Equa­
the shopping activity becomes more fun so that the opportunity to make tion Modeling, this study concludes the findings as follows. Firstly, there
a purchase suddenly increases. Likewise, if the mood is bad, consumers are positive and significant statistical figures on the first, third, and sixth
do shopping to reduce stress and make them feel better. It means the hypotheses. It indicates that impulse buying tendency, consumer mood,
likelihood of unplanned purchases is getting bigger. The results of this and motivational activities by retailers are the influencing factors of
hypothesis testing are in line with the results of previous studies con­ consumer’s decisions to purchase products at online stores impulsively/
ducted by Mohan et al. (2013); Chang et al. (2014); Saran et al. (2016); suddenly arrived/unplanned. Secondly, the rejected second, fourth, fifth,
and Bahrainizad and Rajabi (2018). and seventh hypotheses reveal that particular factors such as shopping
The results of the fourth and fifth hypotheses testing are adverse enjoyment tendency, person’s situation, website quality, and product
findings. The effects of a person’s situation on online impulse buying (β attributes are considered not to affect consumers’ impulsive purchases
= 0.006; p > 0.05) and website quality on online impulse buying (β = made at online stores. Thirdly, the internal (i.e., mood, impulse buying
− 0.047; p > 0.05) are statistically insignificant respectively; therefore, tendency) and external factors (promotional efforts made by sellers, such
the study concludes to reject H4 and H5. It implicitly indicates that the as price discounts, prize coupons) simultaneously affect the consumers’
availability and limitations that consumers have concerning money and online impulse buying). It provides new insights on consumer behavior
time will not affect impulsive shopping activities. Alternatively, although during a particular phenomenon (the pandemic outbreak) that abruptly
the respondent has excess money and sufficient time to shop, this does changes the modes to buy and acquire the products.

6
I. Febrilia and A. Warokka
5.1. Recommendation
For further studies, some limitations should be addressed in
particular research lines. Firstly, it can add some relevant indicators to
improve the validity robustness by replacing the invalid indicators.
Since the validity of the empirical study is limited by the sampling plan
(non-probabilistic, convenience sampling) and the relatively low sam­
ple size in terms of applying variance-base SEM. Besides, the primary
respondents were women, which biased the analysis and interpretation
of results. Consequently, this investigation can be considered as merely
exploratory, and the results cannot be generalizable. Further research
should use large, representative samples, apply probabilistic sampling
methods to confirm or refute our findings. Additionally, it can expand
the respondent’s sampling segments into a broader demographic range
to have cross-sampling analysis and rigorous generalization. Secondly,
this study encourages using co-variance-based SEM (SEM Partial Least
Square) to have more robust results, especially in terms of the explor­
atory study in examining the particular phenomenon. Model modifi­
cations are more allowed in the SEM PLS approach to examine not only
direct effects but also indirect effects and moderated ones.
CRediT authorship contribution statement
Ika Febrilia: Conceptualization, Methodology, Software, Supervi­
sion, Validation, Writing – review & editing. Ari Warokka: Data cura­
tion, Writing – original draft, Visualization, Investigation, Writing –
review & editing.
Declaration of competing interest
The authors declare that they have no known competing financial
interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to influence
the work reported in this paper.
Acknowledgement
This work was supported by the Universitas Negeri Jakarta Research
Grant [grant number 467/UN 39/KU.00.01/2020].
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