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Context congruity effects of online product recommendations: an eye-tracking study

Jing Luan (Department of Economics and Management, Beihang University, Beijing, China)
Zhong Yao (Department of Economics and Management, Beihang University, Beijing, China)
Yongchao Shen (Department of Economics and Management, Beihang University, Beijing, China)
Jie Xiao (Department of Business Administration, Hunan University, Changsha, China)

Online Information Review

ISSN: 1468-4527

Article publication date: 23 August 2018

Issue publication date: 13 September 2018

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Abstract

Purpose

The purpose of this paper is to understand how the context congruity effects of online product recommendations (PRs) by recommendation agents (RAs) influence consumers’ attention to and memory of recommended products in an online shopping environment.

Design/methodology/approach

The study focuses on the context congruity effects of online PRs by examining consumers’ browsing patterns and attention characteristics (fixation counts and fixation duration) using an eye-tracking device and by measuring memory performance with an aided memory test. Three types of PRs (highly congruent, lowly congruent and incongruent PRs) and two degrees of involvement (high and low involvement) are considered.

Findings

The results of the gaze data show that context congruity effects can influence consumers’ PR attention, but this effect is not moderated by involvements. The results of the memory data show that PR recognition is influenced not only by context congruity effects but also by involvement. Another significant finding is that attention to a PR does not necessarily guarantee better memory performance.

Practical implications

The study significantly contributes to deepening the understanding of how context congruity can influence consumers’ attention to and memory of PRs. The findings also have important managerial and practical implications, such that selecting and presenting PRs should be based on context congruity effects.

Originality/value

First, introducing context congruity effects to investigate the effectiveness of online PRs by RAs not only provides an important theoretical contribution to research on recommendation effectiveness but also enriches its application. Second, the findings suggest that the relationship between visual attention and memory is not definitely positive. Third, to interpret the complex translation process from attention to memory, the authors propose a methodology that considers stimulus attributes, issue involvement, cognitive capacity and cognitive interference.

Keywords

Acknowledgements

This work has been supported by the Natural Science Foundation of China (Project Nos 71271012, 71332003, 71671011) and by the Excellence Foundation of BUAA for PhD Students (Project No. 2017050).

Citation

Luan, J., Yao, Z., Shen, Y. and Xiao, J. (2018), "Context congruity effects of online product recommendations: an eye-tracking study", Online Information Review, Vol. 42 No. 6, pp. 847-863. https://doi.org/10.1108/OIR-02-2017-0035

Publisher

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Emerald Publishing Limited

Copyright © 2018, Emerald Publishing Limited

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