The Dual Psychological Mechanisms of Financial Transparency: Consumer Resonance and Financial Control in Fintech Continuance

Ketut Gede Sri Diwya (Universitas Pendidikan Nasional, Denpasar, Indonesia)
Naomi Aurelia Johnny Alberta (Universitas Pendidikan Nasional, Denpasar, Indonesia)

Jurnal Manajemen Teori dan Terapan
Vol. 19 No. 2 (2026): In progress (August 2026)

Objective: This research examines how perceived financial transparency relates to continuance intention toward fintech payment services, testing whether the relationship is direct or operates indirectly through two psychological pathways, consumer resonance (affective) and perceived financial control (cognitive), based on Dual Process Theory. Design/Methods/Approach: A quantitative cross-sectional online survey of active Fintech payment users produced 352 valid responses, analysed using Structural Equation Modeling-Partial Least Squares (SEM-PLS) with bootstrapping (5,000 resamples). Findings: Perceived financial transparency has no significant direct effect on continuance intention. However, it is significantly associated with both consumer resonance and perceived financial control, each of which, in turn, is significantly associated with continuance intention. Both indirect effects are statistically significant, and the effect through consumer resonance is numerically larger than the effect through perceived financial control, although the two were not compared statistically. Originality/Value: This study contributes to the fintech continuance literature by specifying the appraisal route through which financial transparency becomes behaviourally meaningful, rather than treating it as a determinant in its own right. The direct hypothesis is deliberately derived from the competing informational account, so that this account and the mechanism account become empirically distinguishable instead of assumed. Applying Dual Process Theory at the construct level, the study shows that transparency is linked to continuance intention through two distinct affective and cognitive routes, which questions the assumption that psychological antecedents contribute additively. Practical/Policy implication: Because transparency alone showed no significant direct association with retention in this sample, fintech providers may need to design transparency features that also support users’ emotional attachment to the platform, given that the affective route had the larger indirect effect. Regulators may wish to consider that transparency requirements framed solely in terms of information availability may not, by themselves, change user behavior.