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Visual information quality is one of the most important elements that determines online shoppers' experience on a web site. Yet, currently many e‐tailers use poor quality visual information such as small and blurry images. Therefore, the purpose of this paper is to investigate the impact of visual information quality on online shoppers' affective responses and behavioral intent toward the web site. The theoretical framework of perceptual fluency, the ease with which perceptual forms (i.e. objects) are processed, guided the research.

A theoretical model was developed based on the literature and tested using multivariate analysis of variance (MANOVA) and structural equation modeling (SEM). The model proposed a mediating effect of pleasure in creating positive aesthetic evaluations and behavioral outcomes of the perceptual fluency effect. An online experiment (n=1,999) was employed with two levels of perceptual fluency.

MANOVA results confirmed the perceptual fluency effect on aesthetic evaluation and pleasure. SEM analysis supported the proposed model. Pleasure had a stronger impact on behavioral intent than aesthetic evaluation. Theoretical and managerial implications of the perceptual fluency effect on online consumer behavior are discussed.

Previous research has not addressed perceptual fluency from a strong theoretical framework. The paper empirically tested and extended the perceptual fluency hypothesis. Although previous researchers observed the fluency effect on preference choices without testing the mediating effect of affect, this paper examined the mediating role of affect and confirmed the importance of pleasure in aesthetic evaluation. Also, this paper extends the scope of the perceptual fluency effect beyond aesthetic preference/evaluations to behavioral intent.

Casual online shoppers without a strong intention to purchase items can easily leave web sites within seconds. However, there is little research examining how and why consumers are engaged momentarily when they are exposed to a target stimulus in a low involvement shopping situation. This online experiment study seeks to investigate the possibility of enhancing situational involvement with personal and stimulus factors, namely enduring involvement and perceived perceptual fluency, and to determine how enjoyment contributes to the relations among enduring involvement, perceptual fluency, cognitive effort, and situational involvement, in a low‐involvement online shopping context.

An online experiment was conducted to test the conceptual model. Two mock web sites with different levels of perceptual fluency were developed to test effects of perceptual fluency on situational involvement, and participants completed an online survey after viewing one on the web site.

Structural equation modeling was performed to test the proposed model (n=657). The result confirmed that perceived perceptual fluency elicited enjoyment, which in turn positively affected situational involvement, purchase intention, and cognitive effort. Enduring involvement influences enjoyment, cognitive effort, and purchase intention in a web‐browsing situation. Enjoyment plays a key role by mediating the perceptual fluency effect and enduring involvement effect on purchase intention and cognitive effort. The findings of the current study demonstrated that perceptual fluency of a stimulus could engage people by enhancing enjoyment.

The current study provides an insight into comprehensively understanding how situational involvement can be created through visual information display/web site design as well as a personal factor. The study uniquely approaches the issue of involvement and engagement through internal, psychological process of consumers. Also, the empirical support for the proposed model successfully extends the perceptual fluency hypothesis, contributing to the field of literature.

Based on the construal level theory, the purpose of this study is to prove the effect of interaction between construal level and visual crowding on consumers' buying intention. The study tries to explain the reasons behind the different buying intention toward visual crowding among consumers with different construal level.

This study was conducted through two situational simulation experiments. The main data analysis methods are ANOVA and bootstrap analysis.

(1) the matching of construal level and visual crowding has a significant effect on consumers’ buying intention. (2) Perceptual fluency mediates the interaction between the construal level and visual crowding on buying intention.

This study measures consumers' buying intention through situational experiments but does not measure consumers' buying behavior through real scenarios.

According to the study conclusions, consumers prefer visually crowded packaging that matches their construal level. Enterprises should consider the impact of the construal level on the effect of packaging stimulation.

This study enriches the theory related to construal level and highlights the mediating role of perceptual fluency. The addition of perceptual fluency explains the mechanism by which visual crowding affects consumers' buying intention. This extends the research on the antecedents and effects of perceptual fluency.

This study innovatively introduces visual crowding into packaging and matches visual crowding to construal level, explaining why different consumers buy different visually crowded packaging.

This paper aims to investigate the role of attention, processing motivation and processing depth in the relationship between self-reported subjective processing fluency and relevant advertisement variables such as ad attitude, brand attitude and purchase intentions.

Two empirical studies were conducted using self-report questionnaires.

In Study 1 (N = 176), the measure of self-reported subjective processing fluency was pretested. As expected, it was found to be sensitive to visual and semantic features of advertisements and to predict attitudes toward an advertisement. In Study 2 (N = 204), mediation analyses showed that self-reported subjective processing fluency was a predictor of attitude toward the advertisement (through attention and processing depth), attitude toward the brand (through processing depth) and purchase intentions (through processing depth).

The results emphasize the role of cognitive processing in explaining the effect of processing fluency on attitudes in marketing research.

Practitioners could use this theoretical framework and take into account the fluency with which consumers process information to improve the way they advertise their products.

The results suggest that self-reported subjective processing fluency can be relevant to predicting consumers’ attitudes because it increases attention and processing depth of the advertisement.

This study aims to investigate the influence of two critical brand extension design components

brand design consistency and category design consistency

on the formation of consumers ' product attitudes and purchase intentions. It also aims to examine the underlying mechanism for attitude formation towards new brand extensions using processing fluency theory and the moderation of brand strength.

A 2 (brand design consistency: high vs low)×2 (category design consistency: high vs low)×2 (brand strength: strong vs weak)×2 (processing fluency: conceptual vs perceptual) between subjects experiment with 642 participants was used to test the proposed hypotheses and model.

Results obtained from SEM and ANCOVA demonstrate that both brand and category design consistencies assert significant effects on new product attitude in brand extensions; however, the relative effect of category design consistency is greater. Further, the effect of category design consistency varies as a function of brand strength, and is stronger for weak brands than for strong brands.

Brand managers should maintain consistency of extension product design with both the parent brand and the new product category, and prioritize the latter for weak brands.

This study integrates brand extension and aesthetics research on prototypicality to formulate and test important research questions, previously unexamined. Further, realistically-rendered product images, allowing both conceptual and perceptual processing, were used in the experiment to provide a better imitation of real product choices – an approach different from most extant brand extension studies, which utilize verbal stimuli.

This study investigated the impacts of the interaction experiential customization (IEC) mode on consumers' information processing fluency and green customization intention (GCI) as well as the moderating effect of consumers' self-construal.

This study conducted an online field experiment, questionnaire study and between-subjects laboratory experiment to test the hypotheses.

It was found that IEC had a significant positive effect on consumers' GCI. Moreover, consumer retrieval processing fluency played a partial mediating role in the relationship between IEC and GCI. In addition, consumers' self-construal moderated the “IEC? Three dimensions of processing fluency” relationships.

The results emphasized the importance of IEC in influencing consumers' consumption intention in a green customization setting and have some practical implications, that is, companies have the opportunity to use appropriate digital choice architecture designs, which can enhance consumer processing fluency when promoting eco-friendly products in the customized consumption process, especially for independent consumers.

This study focused on the customization design on consumers' GCI and explained the mechanism of impact of IEC on improving consumers' processing fluency and GCI in a product customization setting based on the fluency theory. In addition, this study investigated the moderating effect of consumers' self-construal (independent vs interdependent) on their significant different information processing modes for low-carbon choices.

The purpose of this paper is draw together the different explanations of low attention advertising effects in the related, yet traditionally separate, paradigms of low involvement processing and mere exposure effects. Further to this, the paper aims to integrate these perspectives into a more holistic theoretical framework for researching and explaining low attention advertising effects.

A critical review of the consumer literature in the related areas of low involvement processing and mere exposure effects is undertaken. This reveals very different explanations of the psychological processes that underpin research within these paradigms, and gives rise to a conceptual problem in the understanding of how advertising creates effects under conditions of low attention.

This paper argues that these two streams of research should not be seen as competing theories, however, but that collectively they explain the different routes by which advertising creates effects under conditions of low attention. Specifically, the paper proposes an integrated model of advertising effects that identifies two distinct routes to the creation of advertising effects under conditions of low attention. This model is founded on the notion that mere exposure effects are essentially driven by perceptual processes, whilst low involvement processing is almost universally seen to be underpinned by conceptual processes.

As the two routes incorporate different psychological processes, it is argued that such a distinction gives rise to important implications for advertising design and research. These are discussed in detail.

This paper draws together the various strands of research from related, yet traditionally separate, fields of research and provides a framework in which to develop further empirical and theoretical work into low attention advertising effects.

The purpose of this paper is to examine how developing country brand name and brand origin affect the customer’s evaluation of the brand in radically new high-tech products. Using processing fluency as a theoretical underpinning, this study can answer the following questions: first, does foreign brand name (developed vs developing Asian brand name) affect the customer’s attitude toward the brand? Second, does the brand origin (developed vs developing country) moderate the effect of foreign brand name on attitude toward the brand? Third, does the individual difference (knowledge and technological sophistication) matter in determining the brand origin and fit effect on willingness to buy?

A 2×2 between subject experiment was conducted in which two factors were manipulated: foreign brand name (developed: Japan vs developing: China) and brand origin (developed: Japan vs developing: China).

The fit between brand origin and brand name leads to better evaluation of the brand than no fit. On the other hand, for developing country brand origin (e.g. China), the brand naming effect is mitigated by enhanced processing fluency caused by fit, which leads to better evaluation of developing country brand. Fit effect is more pronounced for more knowledgeable consumers. Technologically more sophisticated consumers are more willing to buy the developing country brand origin than technologically less sophisticated consumers due to the processing fluency effect.

This paper introduces the two dimensions of foreign brand name (developed vs developing) and examines the interaction with the brand origin. This research fills the gap of under-researched area in brand naming literature, which is the effect of developing country brand naming on attitude toward the brand of radically new high-tech products. This research extends the previous literature by applying linguistic mechanism, processing fluency to examine the Asian brand naming including emerging market. This research makes an important theoretical contribution by identifying an underlying individual-level construct, “knowledge” and “technological sophistication,” which explains and influences the effects of brand name and brand origin on willingness to buy the brand.

The purpose of this paper is to examine the influence of the symmetrical disposition of information items displayed on the front of product packaging on perceived complexity, perceptual fluency, aesthetic evaluation and product purchase intention.

A sample of 104 participants was exposed to fast-moving consumer goods packaging. A within-subject design experiment was carried out to assess the influence of the symmetrical disposition of information items displayed on the front of the packaging. ANOVA and a PROCESS procedure to assess mediation (Hayes, 2013) examined the relationships among the factors influenced by symmetry.

This study found that the symmetrical disposition of information items around the vertical axis (mirror symmetry) decreased visual complexity and highlighted an “indirect-only mediation” of visual complexity on the aesthetic evaluation of the packaging through processing fluency. This research also highlighted the fact that packaging aesthetic evaluation had a positive influence on purchase intention.

This study extends knowledge on package design by showing that the elements on which the producer can act (in this case, symmetry on the front of packaging) have an influence on the consumer’s evaluation of the product and intention to purchase.