Understanding consumer online shopping behaviour from the perspective of transaction costs

4.6.2 Internet Access Availability 
Internet access availability in this study is defined as the extent to which consumers can 
approach the potential available Internet around them and the ease of access to the Internet 
for the purpose of online shopping. Because of the lack of a published survey instrument, 
items for measuring internet access availability were originally developed using extant 
relevant literature on Internet accessibility (Yoh 1999, Cho
 et al.
2003) and discussions with 
the pre-test participants. The respondents were asked to evaluate the internet accessibility and 
ease of access to the internet in their study or work place. All of the items were measured via 
a seven-point Likert scale with endpoints of strongly disagree and strongly agree. A high 
score was indicative of a high availability of internet access. The measurement items are 
listed below in table 4.4. 
 
Table 4.4 Internet Access Availability Measurement Items 
 
IAA1. I can easily find Internet, whether it is a wired network or wireless. 
IAA2. My PC can easily connect to the Internet. 
IAA3. I can easily access to Internet in my study or work place. 
IAA4. I can easily access to the Internet at anytime and anywhere.

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4.6.3 Perceived Internet Expertise 
To assess perceived Internet expertise, four items were adopted from the work of O’Cass and 
Fenech (2003). The items captured the consumer’s knowledge of Internet and experience 
with and confidence in using the web to search product information and locate retail sites. 
The respondents indicated the extent to which they agreed or disagreed with statements about 
their perception of Internet expertise, with 1 = ‘strongly disagreee’ and 7= ‘strongly agree’. A 
high score was considered indicative of a high level of Internet expertise. The items are 
presented in table 4.5.