Institutional behavior mechanism: Exploring the impacts of macro-environmental stimuli on continued digital payment adoption behavior

Though we acknowledge the established knowledge structure of digital payment adoption, the current literature still falls short in capturing the underlying motives and mechanisms driving digital payment adoption across all scenarios. To address this gap, we employed a comprehensive moderated mediation approach, arguing that an institutional behavior mechanism may account for the impact of both macro-environmental stimuli, namely digital economy ecosystem advancement and digital culture exposure, on continued digital payment adoption behavior. Moreover, we presume these impacts might strengthen as individuals' digital technology familiarity increases. We engaged 1144 active digital payment users from Taiwan to estimate the model and analyze the data using PLS-SEM. The findings revealed that the two macro-environmental stimuli significantly enhance continued digital payment adoption behavior. Subsequently, we demystified the crucial role of individuals’ perceived institutionalization of digital payment usage in amplifying these stimuli on continued digital payment adoption behavior. However, these stimuli weaken as their familiarity with digital technologies increases. •The literature lacks a comprehensive understanding of the mechanisms behind digital payment adoption across all scenarios.•Our moderated mediation analysis reveals a novel insight into an institutional behavior mechanism.•The macro-environmental stimuli significantly enhance continued digital payment adoption behavior.•The impacts of macro-environmental stimuli weaken as individuals' familiarity with digital technologies increases.•We present new theoretical applicability in predicting continued digital payment adoption behavior.