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Mobile social commerce has rapidly developed as a new area in the field of electronic commerce, and it has caught the attention of researchers and practitioners (Cui, Mou, & Liu, 2018). Mobile social commerce is the combination of social networks and e-commerce in the environment of Web 2.0, and enterprises increase sales and improve service quality based on information sharing and social interaction among consumers in this new stream of e-commerce (X. Lin, Li, & Wang, 2017). The term “mobile social commerce” was introduced by Yahoo! in November 2005. Mobile social commerce creates a network of consumer interaction in which information primarily user-generated content spreads through social networks, thereby helping consumers decide which product or service to purchase. Social interaction, which is the core characteristic of mobile social commerce, distinguishes mobile social commerce from common e-commerce.
Interaction (Interactivity) as “the degree to which two or more communication parties can act on each other, on the communication medium, and on the messages and the degree to which such influences are synchronized”. Interaction is regarded as the key factor for successful communication, web design, and mobile commerce in CMC(Kang, Mun, & Johnson, 2015), which is the essential factor affecting behavioral outcomes. Despite increasing interest in social interaction communications, an exact definition and dimensionality of interaction (interactivity) varies widely but still has a dispute(Pavlik, 2011). However, the common concept of interaction includes a sense of relation among users and promotes information available to each other. Fortin, Burton, and Soboleva (2012) identified two types of interactivity, namely, interpersonal interactivity and machine interactivity(Hoffman & Novak, 1996) , saw interpersonal interactivity as communications between individuals and organization and regarded machine interactivity as “the extent to which users can participate in modify the messages they receive”(Steuer, 1992) .
Some scholars argued that interactions involve users’ subjective perceptions concentrating on individual characteristics that enhance interaction(John E. Newhagen, John W. Cordes, & Mark R. Levy, 1995; Yim, Chu, & Sauer, 2017). For example, John E. Newhagen et al. (1995)discovered that users with the motivation to participate in interactive media will experience interactivity. The interpersonal interactivity is created by establishing a technologically effective delivery process to boost users’ subjective decision-making to participate(Yim et al., 2017). H. Zhang, Lu, Gupta, and Zhao (2014a)founded that consumers can get informational and emotional value from interactions in s-commerce and have to share valuable information, and interactivity positively affects social support and flow. Kang et al. (2015)discovered that interactivity positively impacts affective involvement and cognitive involvement with mobile LBS retail apps. K. Z. K. Zhang, Benyoucef, and Zhao (2016) contended that interactivity positively affects relationship quality. By interactions, consumers can provide social support to others(T. P. Liang, Ho, Li, & Turban, 2011; H. Zhang et al., 2014a). For customer control, consumers interact with electronic commerce platforms individually and have little control, while consumers on social commerce platforms or apps are allowed to create content(C. Y. Li, 2019) .