In the field of human–computer interaction, the concept of visual aesthetics gained popularity after researchers started to recognize its merits and effects on user experience. Yet, no proper instrument exists to assess the visual aesthetics of websites that are intended for users who speak Arabic as their native language. As such, the aim of this study was to develop and evaluate an Arabic version of the Visual Aesthetics of Websites Inventory (VisAWI) and its short version (VisAWI-S). For this purpose, participants were asked to evaluate a randomly assigned website with the AR-VisAWI and with different validating instruments. A final sample of 223 participants was included in the analyses. Confirmatory factory analysis showed an acceptable fit of the AR-VisAWI and a good fit of the AR-VisAWI-S to the proposed structures. The reliability was also excellent (Cronbach’s α and McDonald’s Omega (ω) = .95) for the long version and good (Cronbach’s α and ω total = .89) for the short version. Furthermore, the pattern of correlations to convergent and divergent measures supported the high construct validity of the translated scales. Overall, our results are the first empirical demonstration that the VisAWI captures facets of perceived aesthetics that can be reliably assessed in the Arabic-speaking world.

The aesthetic appeal of a website has strong effects on users’ reactions, appraisals, and even behaviors. However, evaluating website aesthetics through user ratings is resource intensive, and extant models to predict website aesthetics are limited in performance and ability. We contribute a novel and more precise approach to predict website aesthetics that considers rating distributions. Moreover, we use this approach as a baseline model to illustrate how future research might be conducted using predictions instead of participants. Our approach is based on a deep convolutional neural network model and uses innovations in the field of image aesthetic prediction. It was trained with the dataset from Reinecke and Gajos [2014] and was validated using two independent large datasets. The final model reached an unprecedented cross-validated correlation between the ground truth and predicted rating of LCC = 0.752. We then used the model to successfully replicate prior findings and conduct original research as an illustration for AI-based research.

In digital media and on the World Wide Web, content is king. As such, users’ subjective perceptions of content can influence a variety of their evaluations, thereby altering their attitudes and behavioral outcomes. Thus, users’ content perceptions need to be assessed using a valid measure, but this often has to be done while keeping the survey time as short as possible. For these situations, we created a four-item short version of the Web-CLIC questionnaire. We tested this version, called the Web-CLIC-S, in a series of three studies, including 1,414 participants and 33 fully functional websites of different content domains. Confirmatory factor analysis confirms that the Web-CLIC-S reflects an unidimensional g-factor of subjective web content. The Web-CLIC-S also demonstrates high internal consistencies and high short- to medium-term retest reliabilities. Furthermore, we find strong evidence for construct validity in terms of convergent, divergent, discriminative, concurrent, incremental, and predictive validity. In a fourth study, encompassing 12,568 ratings on 183 websites, we provide benchmarks for 12 different content domains and optimal cut points. Overall, the present research suggests that the Web-CLIC-S can serve as a sound screening tool to assess users’ subjective perception of content in research and practice settings.

Content is of primary importance in the World Wide Web. In particular, subjective perceptions of content are known to influence a variety of user evaluations, thereby altering attitudes and behavioral outcomes. Thus, it is essential that individually experienced facets of content can be adequately assessed. In a series of seven studies, we create, validate, and benchmark a measure for users’ subjective view on web content. In the first six studies, a total of 3106 participants evaluated a sum of 60 websites. The resulting Web-CLIC questionnaire is a 12-item measure based on prior research on web content. It encloses four main facets of users’ content experience: clarity, likeability, informativeness, and credibility – jointly representing a general factor subjective content perception. Very high internal consistencies and high short- to medium-term retest reliabilities are demonstrated. Strong evidence for construct validity in terms of factorial, convergent, divergent, discriminative, concurrent, experimental, and predictive validity is found. In a seventh study, encompassing 7379 ratings on 120 websites, benchmarks for 10 different content domains and optimal cut points are provided. Overall, the present research suggests that the Web-CLIC is a sound measure of subjective content perception of both practical and theoretical benefit.

Users access the Internet not only to pursue specific goals (e.g. searching for information), but also to browse through content in a more exploratory fashion. The current study experimentally manipulates participants’ tasks in order to investigate how goal-directed (searching) or exploratory (browsing) website activities moderate the impact of key website attributes on users’ overall judgements. A total of 481 participants fulfilled either browsing or searching tasks online and rated the subjective perception of content, aesthetics and usability, as a predictor and overall impression, recommendation and revisit intention as outcome variables. Using path-models, the results show strong and positive relationships between predictor and outcome variables that were moderated by the task. In the browsing condition, both the recommendation and revisit intention were only, but strongly, predicted by content perception. When searching, this relationship was weakened and also related to aesthetics. The impact of perceived usability on the outcomes was not significantly influenced by the task. Therefore, the present study provides evidence against the assumption that certain website facets become more or less important for the evaluation of a website, depending on the user’s goal-directedness. Instead, our findings contradict common assumptions on two accounts: Aesthetics as a hedonic website facet may not only be processed in a bottom-up fashion when browsing and usability as a utilitarian website facet may not mostly be processed top-down when searching. User’s goals moderate the importance of content and aesthetics for overall ratings of websites in a complex pattern. Content perception: when browsing, the relationship with behavioural intentions is strengthened, while the association with overall impression is only significant when searching. Aesthetics: when searching aesthetics significantly influences post-use behavioural intentions, but not when browsing. Perceived usability: the type of task does not significantly moderate the importance of perceived usability.

The current study investigates how different types of company website designs influence first impressions, aesthetic evaluations and memory performance. We implemented an online study with a between-subjects design to examine differences between three design categories identified by ten experts in a pretest: strong colours of one colour family (SCOFA), large pictures (LAPIC) and same amount of pictures and text (SAPAT). The data of 458 participants (52.2% female) reveal that (i) after an exposure time of 5 s, response times for website-related attributes differ between the categories, (ii) LAPIC and SAPAT are perceived as more aesthetic than SCOFA and (iii) memory performance is best on SAPAT sites. These results underline the importance of first impressions of a site's appearance and provide practical guidance for web designers by showing what users associate with certain designs, which designs they prefer, and which sites are the most memorable.

Content, usability and aesthetics are core constructs in users' perception and evaluation of websites, but little is known about their interplay in different use phases. In a first study, web users (n=330) stated content as most relevant, followed by usability and aesthetics. In Study 2, tests with four websites were performed (n=300), and resulting data were modeled in path analyses. In this model, aesthetics had the largest influence on first impressions, while all three constructs had an impact on first and overall impressions. However, only content contributed significantly to the intention to revisit or recommend a website. Using data from a third study (n=512,42 websites), we were able to replicate this model. As before, perceived aesthetics and usability affected first and overall impressions, while content perception was important for all analyzed website use phases. In addition, aesthetics also had a small but significant impact on the participants' intentions to revisit or recommend a website.