Are First Impressions about Websites Only Related to Visual Appeal?

Abstract

This paper investigates whether immediate impression about websites influences only perceptions of attractiveness. The evaluative constructs of perceived usability, credibility and novelty were investigated alongside visual appeal in an experimental setting in which users evaluated 20 website screenshots in two phases. The websites were rated by the participants after viewing time of 500 ms in the first phase and with no time limit in the second. Withinwebsite and within-rater consistency were examined in order to determine whether extremely short time period are enough to quickly form stable opinions about high level evaluative constructs besides visual appeal. We confirmed that quick and stable visual appeal judgments were made without the need of elaborate investigations and found evidence that this is also true for novelty. Usability and credibility judgments were found less consistent but nonetheless noteworthy.

Website Appeal: Development of an Assessment Tool and Evaluation Framework of E-Marketing

“…Moreover, the model suggests that aesthetic elements are not the only determinants in establishing a favorable first impression. This observation has also been made by Papachristos and Avouris [93], who note that immediate impression about websites does not just influence perceptions of attractiveness.…”

Design, implementation and evaluation of an autostereoscopic 3D mobile phonebook

“…First impressions have earlier been studied e.g. in the context of Web design, however focusing on very short exposure times (500ms and less) [16,22].…”

Do Aesthetics Matter in Long-Established Trust?

“…Lindgaard et al [25] noted that 'visual appeal clearly dominates first impression judgments of other characteristics such as perceived usability and trustworthiness. Judgments about credibility of websites were found less consistency but noteworthy between extremely short and long exposure [37]. From their experiment aesthetics were moderately correlated with credibility in both phases (r=.580 and r=.484).…”

“…Those experiments broaden our knowledge regarding how (fast) trust is formed during our first impression as Lindgaard et al [25] showed that people are able to judge the visual appeal, trust and usability of websites consistently upon viewing them only for 50 msec. Additionally, Papachristos and Avouris [37] showed how consistent these judgments are over time (after viewing 500 msec in the first phase and no time limit in the second phase). The above mentioned work shows already the relevant connection of visual aesthetics and trust.…”

“…Most of the researches that explicitly focused on trust and aesthetics relationship investigated the perception of trust at the initial judgment by exposing the stimuli which were not familiar to the participants (see e.g., [37][25] [41]). Those experiments broaden our knowledge regarding how (fast) trust is formed during our first impression as Lindgaard et al [25] showed that people are able to judge the visual appeal, trust and usability of websites consistently upon viewing them only for 50 msec.…”