Abstract

Are there too many options in online shopping? Although extant studies have largely focused on the effects of choice overload, few shed light on choice overload in online shopping situations. In light of online shopping’s untouchable nature and sorting mechanisms, we argue that choice overload in online shopping is associated with consumer vigilance and assortment desirability. Across four experiments, we found that the size of the online choice set significantly influences consumers’ choice difficulty and choice deferral. We also discovered that consumer vigilance and assortment desirability moderate these relationships. Specifically, high vigilance increases the negative impact of assortment size on consumer decision, whereas assortment product desirability alleviates this consequence. We contribute to the literature by extending prior predictions of choice overload and proposing a framework involving choice overload, vigilance, and desirability for future research.

摘要

网上购物的选择是否太多？尽管现有的研究主要集中在选择超载的影响上，但很少有人阐明在线购物情况下的选择超载。鉴于网上购物的不可触碰的性质和分类机制，我们认为网上购物中的选择过载与消费者的警惕性和分类合意性有关。在四个实验中，我们发现在线选择集的大小显着影响消费者的选择难度和选择延迟。我们还发现，消费者的警惕性和商品分类的需求会缓和这些关系。具体来说，高度警惕会增加分类大小对消费者决策的负面影响，而分类产品的可取性则减轻了这种后果。