Environment design factors and attitude towards a website

[Truncated abstract] The World Wide Web has changed the way in which consumers shop. With an increasing number of retailers shifting their businesses online, retail managers and marketers will need to place more emphasis on web design to improve peoples’ attitudes towards their websites. However, web users’ reactions to environmental design vary depending on their individual and search task characteristics. Although past research has examined web way-finding and the ways in which people search on the web, little research has examined the relationships between a website’s environmental characteristics and outcomes such as attitude towards the website, and how these relationships are impacted by individual and search task characteristics. Titus and Everett’s (1995) Consumer Retail Search Process model (CRSP) developed for traditional retail settings, provides a strong foundation for further investigation into way-finding. The present study drew on this model and developed it for online retail settings, investigating the impacts four environmental design characteristics (complexity of the spatial configuration, environmental differentiation, environmental visibility and the availability of orientation aids) have on attitude towards the website. The study also examined the moderating roles played by some individual and search task characteristics (i.e., need for cognition, environmental sensitivity, product involvement and goal-directed or experiential task). A 2 (high or low complexity) x 2 (high or low orientation aids) x 2 (goal-directed or experiential search) design was used to test the model. Participants were sent to a fictitious online bookstore and, subsequently, asked to respond to a questionnaire.