The Impact of Awareness for the Consequences from Adopting Electric Scooters—The Crucial Role of Warm Glow and Extrinsic Appeal

Abstract

With the rapidly development of electricity technology and renewable energy, adopting electric vehicles (EVs) not only can efficiently collaborate with renewable energy, but also can help decrease the negative environmental effects of traditional vehicles. However, even though electric vehicles offer many advantages, most consumers still hesitate to buy or even rent them. While there is a large growing body of studies focusing on topics related to electric public transportation and electric cars, there is still a shortage of them examining electric scooters (ESs). Based on the norm activation model (NAM), green consumption effect, and extrinsic motivation, this study aims to present the crucial antecedence of consumers’ intention to adopt ESs. As a main transportation for most of the people in Taiwan, this research adopts design of experiments and develops two studies to collect data from Taiwan. The results show that warm glow mediates the positive relationship between awareness of consequences and intention to adopt them. Moreover, the interacting effect of awareness of consequences and extrinsic appeal on intention to adopt ESs is mediated by the warm glow. For academia, the results herein fill the gap related to electric transportation. In real-world practice, this study provides valuable suggestions for governments that want to abate any negative impact from traditional scooters.

Keywords

• awareness of consequences
• warm glow
• extrinsic motivation
• electric vehicles