Consumer Perceived Risk in the Korean Mobile Phone Market

Purpose - This study aims to illustrate the relationship between demographic factors and perceived risk types, supposing that Korean customers tend to postpone buying or hesitate to purchase the new version of hand sets, because of an early buying risk. Research design, data, and methodology - In addition to existing perceived risk types, the authors introduced an early buying risk. In order to measure each variable, also, the study has employed a five-point Liker-scale. To increase research reliability and validity, the research adopted an exploratory factor analysis, a confirmatory factor analysis, and one-way ANOVA. Results - First, there were statistically significant differences between financial risk and the group. Second, there weren't any statistically significant differences between the group means among the four perceived risk types (Performance Risk, Social Risk, Psychological Risk, and Physical Risk) and 4 factors (Gender, Age, Job, and Education). Lastly, job is apparently differentiated from others (Gender, Age, and Education). Conclusions - The authors found that customers regarded an early buying risk as one of the important perceived risk types, when purchasing a hand set.