Augmented reality for online return governance: Policy and practice implications for e-commerce platforms

Abstract

Online product returns are a platform-governance challenge because they connect consumer protection, seller costs, information quality, reverse logistics and platform accountability. This conceptual and practice-oriented study examines how augmented reality (AR) may support online return governance by improving pre-purchase product evaluation. A structured integrative review was conducted in July 2026. Fifty-four candidate records were assembled from the authors' doctoral reference library, targeted keyword searches, publisher platforms and citation chaining; 25 sources were retained after relevance, publication-status and quality screening. Product uncertainty theory provides the core explanatory mechanism, while platform-governance and consumer-protection perspectives clarify how technological affordances can be converted into responsible practice. The resulting framework links interactive, vivid and contextually embedded AR presentation to improved product diagnosticity, lower quality and fit uncertainty, pre-purchase return-risk prevention and governance safeguards. Five testable propositions specify the proposed relationships and their boundary conditions. The paper argues that AR should not be treated only as a sales-conversion device, but as a human-centred decision-support technology whose governance value depends on representation accuracy, product type, consumer capability, privacy protection and platform accountability. Practical implications are developed for platforms, sellers, regulators and sustainability actors. Because the framework is conceptual and the review is targeted rather than exhaustive, its relationships require empirical validation using experiments, surveys, transaction data and field studies.