Leveraging social presence to drive impulsive buying in live shopping: the roles of self-efficacy, psychological ownership and perceived scarcity

Purpose This research aims to examine how three types of social presence – broadcasters, viewers and live streaming – affect consumer self-efficacy and psychological ownership, ultimately driving impulsive buying behaviours, with perceived scarcity as a moderating factor. Design/methodology/approach This study employs the stimulus–organism–response model and psychological reactance theory to examine how social presence on live streaming platforms influences consumers’ impulsive purchasing decisions. Specifically, it explores how psychological ownership and self-efficacy mediate the linkages, as well as how perceived scarcity can amplify domain effects. Structured equation modelling was applied to assess data collected from an online survey of 500 live shopping consumers in mainland China. Findings Our findings reveal that the social presence of viewers does not trigger consumers’ impulse buying behaviour. In contrast, the social presence of broadcasters and live streaming exerts a significant impact on impulse purchasing. Our findings also show that psychological ownership and self-efficacy play an important role as key mediators. Notably, perceived scarcity strengthens the impact of broadcasters’ social presence on consumers’ self-efficacy. Originality/value This study examines the influence of social presence and psychological factors on impulse buying behaviour in live shopping, a topic that remains relatively underexplored in the existing literature.