The Effects of Explicitness of Customization and Level of Choice on Listener Attitudes, Behaviors

and Cognitions Toward a Customized Music Radio Application

Justin Weber

Thesis Defense June 6, 2011

Online Customization is Popular

Customization and Attitudes

Research consistently shows the positive effects of customization on attitudes toward a website*

*Kalyanaraman & Sundar (2006); Beier & Kalyanaraman (2008)

Explicitness of Customization

Research is now investigating potential moderators of customization including culture and locus of control*

One such moderator ripe for investigation is the explicitness of the customization process

Some websites will tell the user why/how content was customized while other sites offer no information

Can be viewed as analogous to informative feedback

*Li & Kalyanaraman (2009); Sundar & Marathe (2010)

Examples of Explicit Customization

Examples of Explicit Customization

Level of Choice

Research has devoted much attention to the effects of level of choice and has found that there is a threshold for the positive effects of choice*

*Iyengar (2010)

Users are bombarded by choices online and customization is one strategy to help consumers deal with excessive choice. Users will encounter varying levels of choice and types of customization in concert, thus I proposed this RQ:

In the context of a customized music streaming application, WITRB

Level of choice, explicitness of customization

AND

Attitudes toward the application, choice satisfaction, enjoyment of the choice process, willingness to pay for the application

Research Question

A 2x2 full factorial between-subjects experiment

Procedure:

Pre-experiment questionnaire, customization of stimulus, designated application use, post-experiment questionnaire

Main Study Design and Procedure

N=72* Limited Choice (5 songs)

Extensive Choice (25 Songs)

Non-explicit 18 Participants 18 Participants

Explicit 18 Participants 18 Participants

*Study is recruiting more participants

Sample Stimuli

Measures

Attitudes: 11 items, Cronbach’s α =.95 (e.g. Appealing, good, attractive, etc.)

Choice Satisfaction: 2 items, Pearson’s r =.79, p<.01 (e.g. “I am satisfied with the song selections I made.”)

Level of Choice Check: 3 items, Cronbach’s α =.87 (e.g. “The app gave me a large set of options to choose from.”)

Explicitness check: 3 items, Cronbach’s α =.87 (e.g. “The app clearly explained why song choices were selected.”)

Enjoyment of choice process and Willingness to pay were measured with single items.

Main effect of level of choice on perceived level of choice, F(1, 72)=32.46, p < .001

Main effect for explicitness on perceived explicitness, F(1, 72)=31.35, p < .001

There were no differences in perceived customization among the treatment conditions.

Manipulation Check Successful

None of the hypothesized relationships between explicitness and level of choice on the DVs were significant

However, the direction of some of the results – especially regarding level of choice – is promising*

Hypothesized Results :-/

*On-going analysis suggests that with data clean-up and more participants, these will turn out to be significant

A marginally significant main effect for level of choice on number of songs listened to, F(1, 72)=1.39, p=.053*

Non-hypothesized Findings

*Power analysis shows that with more data this will be significant

A marginally significant transverse interaction of level of choice and explicitness on number of thoughts listed, F(1, 72)=2.86, p =.096

Non-hypothesized Findings, cont.

Customization is such a powerful variable that it subsumes everything else around it in regards to effects on attitudes.

Marginally significant cognitive and behavioral findings suggest something below the surface. More data and analysis could reveal why we are seeing these effects.

Major Conclusions

1. “Explicitness of customization” vs. “Identity signaling/non-identity signaling products”

2. “Customization strategy” vs. “Cognitive capacity”

3. Replication of current findings with other samples and other stimuli, particularly older samples and health care contexts.

Future Research

Thank You. Questions?