Exploring investors' willingness to use robo-advisors: mediating role of emotional response

Purpose This paper aims to investigate investors' willingness to use robo-advisors from customers' perspectives and analyzes the factors that drive them to use robo-advisors, including perceived usefulness and emotional response. Design/methodology/approach The authors extend the Cognition-Affect-Conation (CAC) framework to the behavioral domain of robo-advisor users on financial technology platforms and conduct an empirical study based on 248 valid questionnaires. Findings The authors find two types of factors driving the willingness to use robo-advisors: perceived usefulness, trust and perceived risk as external driving forces and investor sentiment as an internal driving force. Trust has a significant positive effect on willingness to use, and arousal in emotional response plays a mediating role between perceived usefulness and willingness to use. Originality/value This research provides valuable insights for financial institutions to engage in robo-advisor innovation from customers' perspectives.