Title: Thumbnails as online product displays: How Consumers process them
1Thumbnails as online product displays How
Consumers process them
- By Shun Yin Lam
- Albert Wai Lap Chau
- Tsunhin John Wong
- Presented by Carol Chan, June 28 2007
2What are Thumbnails?
3Thumbnails are
- Typically miniature product images displayed on
one page of a Web site and hyperlinked to other
pages of the site - (Van Duyne, Landay Hong, 2003)
- Some examples
- (More examples can be found in Table 1)
- HMV
- http//www.hmv.com.hk/
- Jshoppers.com, online clothing store
- http//www.jshoppers.com/index-eg.asp?clr1
- Samsung (mobile phone)
- http//www.samsung.com/sg/products/gsm/index.asp
4Functions of Thumbnails
- Like the window displays of traditional
brick-and-mortar shops - To attract online shoppers to the inner pages of
virtual stores - Therefore, online marketers seek to
strategically place these thumbnails in prime,
high-traffic locations in their virtual stores.
5Thumbnails as online marketing communication tools
- Many internet marketers and researchers consider
thumbnails as important elements of effective web
design (Katerattanakul, 2002) - As images are more quickly processed than text
and require for less cognitive effort on the part
of Web surfers - (Helfman, 2000 Woodruff, Rosenholtz, Morrison,
Faulring, Pirolli, 2002)
6Thumbnails as online marketing communication
tools (contd)
- Some internet marketers believes that searching
for an image of a particular object among other
images is faster than searching for the name of
that object among other words (Paivio, 1974) - Well graphic elements can arouse sensory or
cognitive curiosity of Web surfers, leading to a
search for more information (Katerattanakul, 2002)
7Advantages of using Thumbnails
- Shorten the downloading time of visual displays
on Web pages when compare with using full-sized
images (Katerattanakul Siau, 2003 Lynch
Horton, 2001) - Though small in size, can be perceived quickly
(Helfman, 2000) - Help to make a favorable early impression of the
page and encouraging visitors to further explore
the site (Rosen Purinton, 2004)
8Reasons for the study
- Little or no research has been done to examine
how the placement of thumbnails affects consumer
information processing. - There are three main reasons to investigate How
consumer process thumbnails
9Reasons for the study (contd)
- (1) Arrangement of thumbnails affects the effort
of locating a particular product and the
appearance of a Web page, and so the navigation
efficiency and the quality of presentation
pertaining to a Web site. - Enable Web marketers to better present their
products to earn consumers favorable perceptions
and greater trust in their sites.
10Reasons for the study (contd)
- (2)The amount of information processing the
individual thumbnails triggered is related to
communication effects - Prior research has shown that it has significant
effect on the consumers memory of the element
(Wedel Pieters 2000) - Previous studies also demonstrated that the
extent to which a brand on a shelf display is
processed positively affects the probability it
will be considered for purchase (Chandon,
Hutchinson, Young, 2001). Applied to the use of
thumbnail array, it worth study.
11Reasons for the study (contd)
- (3) No study has investigated the search behavior
of consumers within a page. - Help to reveal how potential customers search for
a particular product within a page
12Objectives of the study
- To provide insights into within page information
processing and search behaviors by analyzing
consumers eye movement over a thumbnail array - Based on the assumption that the rectangular
configuration of a thumbnail array triggers an
eye-movement (scanning) routine, that is related
to the reading direction associated with the
language a consumer use most often in reading and
writing
13Literature Review
14Cognitive processing and measurement of eye
movement
- Cognitive processing by humans can be divided
into two types of activity - The acquisition of information from the
environment or retrieval of information from
memory - Internal operations (e.g. comprehension) that are
performed on the information acquired or
retrieved (Rayner, 1998 Russo, 1978)
15Cognitive processing and measurement of eye
movement
- Most efficient means for human to obtain
information (Rayner, 1998 Russo, 1978) - Eye Fixation
- moments when our eyes remain relatively
stationary - Information is extracted form the stimulus upon
which the eyes fixate and processed internally - Saccades
- Jump between fixation
- Vision is suppressed
- Eye-movement is measured by eye-tracking devices
that can continually record in small time
interval the exact fixation point.
16Advantages of collecting eye-fixation data
- Reveal moment-to-moment processing activities
within a Web page - Clarify exactly how much information consumers
gather and process from different objects on the
page - So, help to study the efficiency of consumers to
gather information from a Web page
17Key Constructs Measures Used in the study (1)
- Search direction
- Definition the direction to which a participants
moves his/her sight across the environment when
trying to locate an object - Measure Saccade counts in each direction
category - (Eight categories, north east, south, west,
northeast, southeast, southeast, southwest and
northwest, dividing 360 degree into eight equal
sectors)
18Key Constructs Measures Used in the study (2)
- Attention Speed
- Definition How fast a participant pays attention
to a stimulus - Measure Inverse of the time taken for the first
fixation on the stimulus to occur
19Key Constructs Measures Used in the study (3)
- Amount of processing
- Definition The quantity of information extracted
from a stimulus and then processed internally - Measure Fixation frequency and gaze duration
pertaining to the stimulus
20Key Constructs Measures Used in the study (4)
- Search effort
- Definition The total amount of effort required
to search for a target object and to confirm that
it is located in the environment - Measure Total fixation frequency and the total
gaze duration over the entire length of the
search process
21Information Processing in the Web Environment
- Web page can be considered a type of scene, as
its often consists of some background elements
such as - Web page menu bars,
- Background colors and so forth,
- And objects, for instances
- Thumbnails
- Text,
- Banner ads and etc
- Viewer gathers and processes global visual and
semantic information in the first few fixations
(Henderson Hollingworth, 1999). Viewer can thus
identify or categorize the scene and it may in
turn activate an automated eye-movement
(scanning) routine associated with the category
to which the scene belongs (Furst, 1971
Janiszewski, 1998 Pieters Warlop, 1999) - May applicable to thumbnail identification.
22Information Processing in the Web Environment
(contd)
- Research in cognitive psychology provides
evidences that people follow a routine in
scanning a matrix of object to some extent and
this routine is related to their dominant reading
direction. - English speakers- Left to right, Top to bottom
- Hebrew speakers- right to left
23Hypotheses
- H1 The direction in which a Web surfer searches
for information over a thumbnail array reflects
his or her dominant reading direction - H2 The difference in the attention speed for
items in the left and the right regions of a
thumbnail array reflects the dominant reading
direction of the Web surfer - H3 The difference in the attention speed for
items in the left and the right regions of a
thumbnail array is larger in early fixation than
in later fixation
24Hypotheses (contd)
- H4 The difference in the amount of cognitive
processing carried out for items in the left and
the right regions of a thumbnail array reflects a
Web surfers dominant reading direction - H5 The difference in the amount of cognitive
processing carried out for items in the left and
the right regions of a thumbnail array is larger
in early fixations than in later fixations - H6 The relationship between the search effort
required of a web surfer to locate a particular
product on a thumbnail array and the position of
the thumbnail depicting the product reflects the
surfers dominant reading direction
25Classification of Regions Sites of Interest on
a thumbnail array
- If a region of the thumbnail array is found to be
processed first or more intensely than the
others, will be advisable to place the
promotional product in that region - If individuals with different cultures exhibit
different eye-movement norms, maybe worthwhile to
personalize the thumbnail organization to suit
the norms
26Methodology
- Conducted an eye-tracking experiment in the Eye
Movement Laboratory in the University of Hong
Kongs Dept. of Psychology - Used Eyelink system to record fixation position
at a sampling rate of 250Hz with two cameras to
collect head movements - Participants
- Students below 30 years old
- A group of 95 local students
- A group of 50 mainland students
27Dominant Reading directions of local students
- Right to Left
- Top to bottom
28Dominant Reading directions of mainland students
29Methodology (contd)
- Materials Select 12 target Chinese Web pages
pitched a variety of consumer products such as
mobile phones, electrical appliances and watches.
6 items are shown in 1 page, arranged in 2 rows
with 12 existing web pages to form a series of 24
pages - Procedure Each participants was asked to view
the 24 target and filler pages successively to
study the key constructs listed before.
30Results - Search direction
- Appears that participants moved their eyes
horizontally more often than vertically, and
vertically moved their eyes more often than they
did so diagonally - Dominance of the horizontal direction supports
H1, that the search direction reflects the
dominant reading direction of consumers - Yet the differences between local and mainland
students are not indicated
31Results Attention Speed
- Participants first looked at the middle regions,
moved their eyes toward the left, and then toward
the right. - Support H2, that the difference in the attention
speed between the left and the right regions of a
thumbnail array reflects the dominant reading
direction of a surfer - The left-right difference was more significant
for the upper row than that for the lower row.
This supports H3, states that the difference in
the attention speed between the left and the
right regions is larger in early fixation than it
is in later ones.
32Result - Processing Amount
- The upper middle region received more processing
than the other regions - The left regions received impressively more
processing than the right regions. - Supports H4 which states that the difference in
the amount of processing carried out by a Web
surfer on the left and the right regions reflects
his/her dominant reading direction - Researchers combined with the observation on the
average gaze at the upper row earlier than they
do at the lower row, the result supports H5, that
the difference in the amount of processing
between the left and the right regions is larger
in early fixation than it is in the later ones.
33Result - Search Effort
- Participants appeared to find the target item
more quickly when the item was in the left
regions compared with those in the right regions - Seemed to be more efficient in their search when
the item was in the upper row compared with those
in the lower row. - The left-right difference appeared to be about
the same for both the upper and lower rows - Overall result supports H6, states that the
relationship between the search effort and the
target location reflects a surfers dominant
reading direction
34Conclusion
- Participants first fixated on the middle and then
on the left and finally on the right regions,
support the hypotheses - Tended to looked at the upper row before the
lower row - Appeared to process the left regions to a greater
extent than they did the right regions - Eyes moved horizontally and vertically more often
than diagonally - The findings are consistent to the tenet that a
scanning routine related to the dominant reading
direction affects participants eye movement over
a thumbnail array
35Expanded implications
- Web marketers could
- Enhance consumers navigation efficiency by
placing items in high demand on the
eye-catching regions - (Question Which regions?)
- Increase the chance the products to be found
- reduce the number of click, that save the effort
of backtracking
36Expanded implications
- Placement of thumbnail in the eye-catching
regions could enhance the hedonic experience of
visitors - Consider placing aesthetic images or products
with new features (create curiosity) - Regularly change the images in these regions (for
return traffic)
37Expanded implications
- Consider the cultural congruity of a web site.
- Lunar, Peracchio and deJuan (2002) provided
evidence that the cultural congruity of a site is
positively related to a visitors attitude
towards the products advertised in the site. - Many global marketers vary the Web site content
by country - e.g. Nokia, Samsung
- Personalize/Strategically matching the thumbnail
applications according to different cultures may
help to promote and market the products