Influences of retail atmospherics and architecture on consumer’s vertical circulation behavior
Dr. Clarine J. van Oel, Ir. Ben de Weerd. Delft University of Technology, Faculty of Architecture Department of Real Estate & Housing, PO Box 5043, 2600 GA Delft, The Netherlands. Email: c.j.vanoel@tudelft.nl.
The credit crunch clearly shows the concerns with patronage and repatronage of stores and shopping malls by retailers and retail managers. In the current market the competitions for customers and customers’ money will be fiercer than ever. The better performing retailers and shopping malls seems to be the ones that for instance focus on the customers over 55 years of age (Stone, 2003). Retail managers and shopping mall developers are well aware that mall patronage is relying on consumer satisfaction with the shopping mall experience (Babin & Attaway, 2000). Certainly, project developers and retail managers are not addressing a single target group of customers in developing a successful business strategy for a shopping mall. Often, customers are distinguished as either utilitarian or hedonic shoppers depending on how they value the shopping experience and infer satisfaction from this shopping experience (Babin & Attaway, 2000; Michon & Chebat, 2004). Hedonic shoppers might be also referred to as pleasure or leisure shoppers, and these typologies illustrate that increasingly shopping malls have become important destinations for leisure. Project developers responded to this call for leisure by more than ever trying to shape consumer’s experience in designing new shopping malls.
The satisfaction consumers infer from their visit to a shopping mall might result in another visit, depending on how satisfied the consumer was with the product and the atmospheric in the shopping mall and stores (Turley & Milliman, 2000). The first choice consumers have to make is to what retail area to go. In a study of intraurban retail area patronage decision making, Bell (1999) found that consumers’ shopping behavior was dependent on whether or not they liked the shopping area (affect), the physical attractiveness (visual amenity), the quality and range of products and stores, price fairness, convenience of location and customer service. Turley and Milliman (2000) referred to customer services as human factors and included also factors like crowding in this category. They evaluated the influences of atmospherics on three types of outcomes: purchase behavior, time spent in a shopping mall and whether consumers felt attracted to the shopping environment or not, which Mehrabian and Russell (1974) posited to be mediated by consumer’s emotional state. From Turley and Milliman (2000) their review is might be concluded that purchase behavior and the valuation of the shopping mall could be considered as valid measures of consumer’s satisfaction. A whole lot of research has been done on consumers’ satisfaction with the kind of factors that might be managed by retailers and retail managers, including human factors (Turley & Milliman, 2000), convenience
of location, quality and range of products and stores (Borgers & Vosters; Finn, 2004) and customer services (Finn, 2004). There is also quite some evidence of the valuation of the physical environment for olfactory and auditory influences and other ‘sensory-sensitive’ (or interior design related) factors like lightning and coloring (Babin, Chebat, & Michon, 2004; Malaika Brengman, 2002; Turley & Milliman, 2000; Wakefield & Baker, 1998). Indeed, there is some research into the valuation of consumers of exterior design factors, supporting the conclusions of various reviews that there are only few studies conducted all suggesting that these might be highly important factors (Babin & Attaway, 2000; Eroglu & Machleit, 2008; Finn, 2004; Turley & Milliman, 2000).
The study of Kent and Kirby (2009) into the retail image that customers construct from stores emphasized the importance of the interior physical environment of the store and underscores the importance of layout and store display that has been put forward by Turley and Milliman (2000). To investigate retail image Kent and Kirby (2009) adopted a visual methodology and used photo-elicitation technique to gain deeper insight into the consumer’s perception of retail image. The use of visual methodology may be particularly important in valuing the influence of factors that might be difficult to verbally describe. This might be explained from the different way non-verbal and verbal information are encoded during information processing. Nonverbal encoding occurs in a configural i.e. holistic way, whereas verbal information induces a respondent to process in a featural manner (Hoegg & Alba, 2008). Combining verbal and non-verbal information will generally introduce an overshadowing of non-verbal information by verbal information (Hoegg & Alba, 2008). In a previous study we found that architectural design and atmospheric characteristics were particularly sensitive to the way level of service related characteristics were included in a survey. Using discrete choice modeling (Kuhfeld, 2010), conceptualizations of architecture and atmospherics were visualized using rendered images. In case of visual conceptualizations of level of service features by means of icons, architecture and atmospheric were affecting respondents’ preferences, but in case of verbatim
conceptualization, the influence of architecture and atmospheric on their valuation was negligible. Since consumers’ preferences in vertical circulation are likely to depend on the configuration of features related to the architectural and atmospheric design of a multilevel shopping center, we therefore aimed to investigate which characteristics of the encountered shopping mall environment favor consumers’ choice for vertical circulation using only visualizations of a 3 level shopping center. We used a 3D design of a 3 level retail center that was at that time under construction and adapted this to address consumer preferences of selected architectural and atmospheric characteristics.
Background and conceptual development
Conceptual model
Research tradition in consumer-environment research has been hampered by the tendency to view the commercial environment solely in discrete features. Eroglu and Machleit (2008) posit that this limitation stems from the lack of a gestalt view of the environment. Since the emphasis in traditional research is generally with questionnaires underscoring verbal encoding, this will contribute to a featural processing which may result in more variance from judgment to judgment, and there is some evidence that over time people will focus on one or two features and become more consistent with featural evaluations than with general evaluations (Hoegg & Alba, 2008). Using a visual approach by showing respondents a rendered video tour through three consecutive layers of a multi-layered shopping mall will allow for nonverbal encoding which occurs in a configural i.e. holistic way (Hoegg & Alba, 2008). Two preference measures were used to assess the valuation of the shopping centers. The first directly focuses on the vertical circulation behavior, whereas the second involves the valuation of the upper floor of the shopping centers. Since the retail environment holds several environmental cues and aims to influence consumers in an emotional way to spend more time and more money in a shopping center (Massara, Liu, & Melara, 2009), we were particularly interested in whether the valuation of the upper floor would be different from the valuation focusing on vertical circulation behavior itself. We used a 3D model of a 3 level future retail development to develop tours through the shopping mall as if the consumer were on a guided tour that showed them the future shopping center. In the video tours several atmospheric factors or so called attributes were varied according to the classification described by Turley and Milliman (2000). Included external factors were human scale (double or single floor height), entrance (entrance from square or street side) and daylight from roof (transparent or oblique roof). As general interior we addressed the factors color/materialization, vertical differentiation of store facades, and presence of visual lines. Type of stairways, type of anchor at the upper floor and spatial form of the facades were included as Layout- and design variables. Point-of-purchase and decoration variables were kind of signs and presence or absence of an artwork. Finally, crowding was included as human factor. The video tours of the shopping centers might present different levels of stimulation to the respondents and from the stimulus load theory (Eroglu & Machleit, 2008; Mehrabian & Russell, 1974) too much stimulation from the shopping environment or too little of it can invoke environmental stress. The environmental stress might be due to information overload in the video tours, but might also stem from an individual’s level of arousal. Because arousal is a necessary
condition for emotion, and pleasure has an U-shaped relationship with increasing levels of arousal (Russell & Mehrabian, 1977), both measures of arousal and pleasure were included to address whether pleasure and arousal shaped consumers’ responses to ambient stimuli in the retail context.
Discrete choice modeling
There are several methods to investigate consumers` utility (preferences) for a product. In measuring the utility for a product, one can distinguish between revealed preference methods, stated preference methods and non-preference methods (Adamowicz, Louviere, & Williams, 1994). The revealed preference method is based on the observation of actual made choices of households and individuals, and it assumes that people show their preferences by their actions. The Stated Preference method is based on information extracted from interviews or choice experiments. An important advantage of the stated preference method over the revealed preference method is that this technique allows for the measurement of peoples opinion to non-economic goods, e.g. comfort, behavior (Hanley, Wright, & Adamowicz, 1998). Within the stated preference methods, there is a direct and an indirect method to investigate consumers` utility. The direct method is known as the contingent valuation method (CVM). The most important problems of CVM are related to cognitive stress and strategic responses (Fischhoff, Karl-Göran, & Jeffrey, 2005). People experience difficulties in assigning a value to a product or service. There is also the risk of strategic bias as people might think they can influence the situation. Because of these problems, we employed the indirect or the conjoint analysis method (CAM), more specifically the discrete choice method (DCM) (Kuhfeld, 2010). The DCM is based on efficiency in choice designs using the multinomial logit model (Kuhfeld, 2010). This model assumes that consumers make choices among alternatives that maximize their perceived utility. Using a partial profile model derived in SAS 9.2 (Kuhfeld, 2010), 15 video tours consisting of 3 virtual shopping malls of three floor levels each were made. Within a set of three shopping centers, 8 atmospheric factors were varied, but between the 15 sets 12 atmospheric factors were varied according to the partial profile design derived in SAS. Subsequent MNL analyses were also conducted in SAS 9.2. SPSS 18.0 was used in additional analyses. Generally, a threshold of p <0.05 was used in significance testing of the main effects. Interactions were considered significant at a significance level of p<0.01.
Measures
For the video tours, an mockup model of a future retail development was rebuilt in Sketch-up. This allowed us to adapt the shopping model according to the appropriate attribute levels (see Table 1) developed in SAS. From Sketch-up, 3D panoramic views of the entrance and interior of the future shopping environment
were obtained. The images were then rendered into a realistic frame with Render(in); stitched into a panoramic view and adjusted for brightness and contrast and to prevent continuous lines becoming kinked with Photoshop; and finally translated into 3D surroundings with Krpano - a viewer for Adobe Flash Player. In Krpano automatic rotation was added that stopped after a full 360 degree rotation. The respondent could start the tour, then had part of a fixed tour, but was able to turn around at each floor before continuing the guided tour to the next floor. In this way, all respondents would see the same so that all design and
atmospheric characteristics or attributes could be evaluated by them, but at the same time they could decide to spend more time to look around according to their needs.
Atmospheric attributes
Table 1 Overview of the atmospheric attributes with subsequent levels per attribute.
Attribute Level 1 Level 2 Level 3
External factors
1 Human Scale single floor height double floor height 2 Entrance at square street side
3 Daylight roof transparent oblique
General interior factors
4 Color/materials cold warm gradient 5 Vertical differentiation
store facades present absent 6 Visual lines present blocked
Layout & Design factors
7 Stairways express single double
8 Anchor store leisure media fashion 9 Spatial form orthogonal organic
Point-of-purchase & Decoration factors
10 Signs theme signing store signing 11 Artwork present absent
Human factors
Case studies: To establish the attribute levels as realistic as possible, six shopping centers in Western
Europe were analyzed. The five centers were used to obtain reference materials for the further
visualizations. The five shopping centers were: Myzell in Frankfurt (Germany), Palladium in Prague (Czech Republic), Westfield in London (UK), Forum Duisburg (Germany), Bijenkorf in Rotterdam (The Netherlands) and Piazza in Eindhoven (The Netherlands). Using the reference materials from the case studies, the atmospheric attributes were designed as two or three level attributes as summarized in
Table
1
.Human scale: The attribute Human scale is defined by the height of the ceiling (single: 4.5 m; double: 9.0
m). From the case studies it appears that for instances Myzell in Frankfurt uses a double height to attract customers to vertically circulate.
Entrance: The entrance at ground floor level –where the video tour started) was either situated at a square
or alongside a street. The latter is thought to invoke a forced routing upstairs, this in contrast to the square that impresses as a non-dominant access.
Daylight: Daylight is defined as the amount of daylight entering from the roof of the shopping center. The
daylight condition of the transparent roof is modeled after Westfield in London; the alternate level is a oblique roof. The daylight is used to attract consumers to move upstairs depending on the openness of the design as presented by the attribute Visual lines.
Color/materials: Color and materials are combined into one attribute as certain materials are associated with
certain colors, and certain materials have similar connotations as colors have. Brickwork for instance is considered a warm colored material; wood is a warm material, and glass is considered a cold material. In the first level, labeled ‘warm’, brickwork and light natural stone floors are combined like Forum Duisburg. The second level, ‘cold’ combines white concrete with dark natural stone floors and is modeled after Myzell in Frankfurt. The use of a gradient level in color/materialization stems from Westfield in London. The ground floor starts with cold colors and materials (thus like the ‘cold’ level), then for the first floor warm colors and materials are used (as in the ‘warm’ level), and toward the upper floor wood is applied.
Vertical differentiation of store facades: The vertical differentiation of store facades emphasizes the diversity
of individual stores in a mall and refers to the street profile in a shopping area. The presence of vertical differentiation might invoke novelty which might increase arousal levels, but might add to information overload as well. Forum Duisburg is an example of a case with vertical differentiation of store facades.
Visual lines: The visual lines are defined as the sightlines between the ground floor and the higher two
stairways are opened up versus only 20 percent of the surfaces in the blocked condition. The presence of visual lines facilitates orientation and goal setting behavior as used in Forum Duisburg and Westfield in London, whereas the blocking might increase novelty and is designed after Myzell in Frankfurt.
Stairways: The stairways represent how vertical circulation is achieved: by means of an express stairway,
which brings consumers directly to the upper floor from where they circulate down to the ground floor (‘express’ level after Myzell in Frankfurt). The other levels are a single stairway or a double stairway as in Westfield in London.
Anchor: The attribute anchor determines what is used as an anchor on the top floor to stimulate circulation
up to this floor. This could either be ‘leisure’ which is visualized as Gastro Boulevard as in Palladium in Prague; ‘media’ which is visualized by means of familiar brands in media and compares to the kind of anchors used by Myzell in Frankfurt; and ‘fashion’ as third anchor as used as anchor in Westfield in London and is also visualized using familiar fashion brands. In the virtual shopping centers, leisure, and familiar fashion and media brands were balanced across all floor levels. If leisure was used as an anchor on the top floor, then fashion and media brands were alternating assigned to the ground floor and first floor.
Spatial form: Spatial form refers to the spatial form inside the shopping center. An orthogonal form would
facilitate orientation and goal setting behavior, whereas organic spatial forms might sometimes block horizontal sight lines but might focus attention by adding uniqueness. Although nearly all case studies combined orthogonal and organic spatial forms, particularly Westfield in London applied both organic forms in its roof and openings of the ceilings. In the ‘organic’ level an organic formed roof and opening of ceilings was combined with organic lining of store fronts.
Signs: The use of theme signing (leisure, media, fashion) might enhance the function of the anchor at the
top floor and is modeled after Myzell in Frankfurt. The alternate level is individual store signing and might facilitate orientation and goal setting behavior. This second level is modeled after De Bijenkorf in The Netherlands.
Art work: Palladium in Prague uses a tunnel of light over an express stairway to attract consumers to the
upper floor. The positioning of the art work was designed after the tunnel of light, but the art work itself was designed in a way that would not interfere with other possible design features such as lightning.
Crowding: Strong circulation patterns can be recognized by a stream of customers. It was argued that increasing the number of consumers at the top floor relative to the ground floor would stimulate vertical circulation. Presence of crowding was visualized by having 5 times as many people at the top floor relative
to the ground floor. Absence of crowding was designed as the reverse with fivefold more customers on the ground floor than on the upper floor.
Valuation measures
Two preference measures were used to assess the valuation of the shopping centers. The first directly focuses on the vertical circulation behavior, and was assessed using the following question (translated from Dutch): “In which shopping center do you feel most invited to go upstairs to visit the upper floor?”.
The second question involves the valuation of the upper floor of the shopping centers. Since the retail environment holds several environmental cues and aims to influence consumers in an emotional way to spend more time and more money in a shopping center (Massara et al., 2009), we were particularly interested in whether the valuation of the upper floor would be different from the valuation focusing on vertical circulation behavior itself. This was addressed by the following question (translated from Dutch): “In which shopping center does the upper floor attracts you most?”. To answer this question for all three virtual shopping centers a picture of the entrance (DC question 1) or the upper floor (DC question 2) was showed to the consumers in making their choice.
Pleasure & arousal
Pleasure and arousal were measured using semantic differential affective adjective pairs (Pleasure: 6 pairs , Chronbach alpha=0.89; Arousal: 6 pairs , Chronbach alpha = 0.73). Both Arousal and Pleasure were measured on a 7 points Likert scale (Malaika Brengman, 2002; M Brengman & Geuens, 2004). For further analyses, pleasure and arousal scores were dichotomized using the median as threshold.
Questionnaire
The questionnaire was developed with NetQ and published online. After an general introduction to the video tour, respondents were randomized into 1 of the 15 video tours through the 3 shopping centers. The video tour was started from the hard disk of the laptop. Before the video tours, demographic information (age, gender, education, household situation, income and cultural background) was obtained. After the video tour, questions regarding shopping behavior and the semantic differentials for arousal and pleasure were
presented. The last part of the questionnaire was the closure. Here respondents could indicate whether they would like to participate in a lottery for an Ipod shuffle or a Senz umbrella. Using an interceptive approach, customers of the Alexandrium Shopping Center in Rotterdam (The Netherlands) were asked to participate in
the survey. For six consecutive days, data were collected using 4 laptops shortly before Christmas when most schools were closed, from December 16 , 2010 until the 21st of December from half an hour (9.30 hrs.) after opening time until half an hour before closing time (4 evening until 17.30 hrs.; 2 evenings until 21.00 hrs.). To enhance participation free coffee or tea and chocolates were available to participants. At request of the respondent, questions were read aloud to them and the provided answers were entered by the
researchers, to avoid that only respondents who were familiar with computers or who did not bring their glasses with them were not able to participate. In total 226 respondents completed the questionnaire. On average, the questionnaire took 15 minutes to complete.
Results
Demographic information about the respondents is summarized in Table 2. Most consumers seem to like shopping, as the majority gives shopping assigned at least 6 (82,4%) on a visual analog scale ranging from 1 (unpleasant) to 10 (pleasant). 23.9 % rated shopping with at least an 8. Indeed, the higher shopping was rated as pleasurable, the more time respondents thought to spend (X² = 68,44 df=36, p=0,001).
Table 2 Descriptive information about respondents (N=226)
N VALID %
AGE (in yrs)
<26 102 45.1 % 26-35 26 11.5 % 36-45 20 8.8 % 46-55 33 14.6 % 56-65 32 14.2 % >65 13 5.8 % GENDER Male 98 43.4 % Female 128 56.6 % EDUCATION Low 70 31.0 % Medium 75 33.2 %
High 81 35.8 % FUNCTION Scholar 31 13.7 % Student 49 21.7 % Working 105 46.5 % Unemployed 4 1.8 % Retired 22 9.7 % Other 15 6.6 % HOUSEHOLD Alone 32 14.2 %
Together with partner 67 29.6 % Together with roommate 11 4.9 % Together with partner &
children
39 17.3 %
Alone with children 9 4.0 % At home with parents 68 30.1 % CULTURAL BACKGROUND
Dutch 173 76.5 %
Surinam 13 5.8 %
Moroccan 7 3.1 %
Other 33 14.6 %
Valuation of atmospheric factors
The results of the first valuation focusing on the attractiveness of the ground in enhancing vertical circulation are summarized in Table 3
.
Vertical circulation seems most strongly facilitated by a transparent roof so that daylight illuminates the shopping center. Here the reference level was a transparent roof and this is valued over an oblique roof. Strong visual lines were preferred to blocking of visual to higher floor levels. An express stairway was negatively valued. Respondents significantly preferred double stairways to an express stairway, whereas the difference between a single stairway and express stairway was not significant. Future research might also focus on the influence of color/materials (p=0.07) and art work (p=0.09) as a way toimprove vertical circulation of customers. Warm colors were preferred (utility=0.34) to the gradient level (reference) that had cold colors at the ground floor. Also, art work could possibly attract customers upstairs. The second question involves the valuation of the upper floor of the shopping centers. Since the retail environment holds several environmental cues and aims to influence consumers in an emotional way to spend more time and more money in a shopping center (Massara et al., 2009), we were particularly
Table 3 Results of the valuation of the ground floor (DC1)
Attributes Reference level Parameter estimate Standard error Chi2 (df=1) p-value Hazard Ratio
Human scale Single height -0.12 0.22 0.30 0.58 0.89
Entrance Street -0.00 0.19 0.00 0.99 0.99
Daylight roof Transparent -0.69 0.22 9.44 0.00 0.50
Color/Materials Cold 0.34 0.19 3.22 0.07 1.41
Vertical differentiation store facades
Present -0.21 0.22 0.95 0.33 0.81
Visual lines Open -0.88 0.23 14.50 0.00 0.42
Stairways Express 0.41 0.21 3.71 0.05 1.51
Anchor Leisure -0.16 0.21 0.57 0.57 0.45
Spatial form Orthogonal -0.28 0.22 1.73 0.19 0.75
Signs Theme -0.30 0.21 1.98 0.16 0.74
Art work Present 0.39 0.23 2.94 0.09 1.47
Crowding Upper floor 0.36 0.22 2.54 0.11 1.43
interested in whether the valuation of the upper floor would be different from the valuation focusing on vertical circulation behavior itself. These results are summarized in Table 4. Respondents might most reward an upper floor with a transparent roof in a shopping center with a gradient in color and materials. Within this level, the top floor would have laminate and this might particularly combine with leisure as an anchor at the top floor. Valuation was also higher is there was crowding at this floor level. Furthermore, respondents valued vertical differentiation of store fronts during leisure related activities. Finally, respondents valued a shopping center at a square that did not enforce a dominant routing upstairs.
Pleasure and Arousal
Both Pleasure and Arousal did not consistently affect respondents’ preferences for any of the attributes.
Table 4 Results of the valuation of the upper floor (DC2)
Attributes Reference level Parameter estimate Standard error Chi2 (df=1) p-value Hazard Ratio
Human scale Single height -0.24 0.23 1.06 0.30 0.79
Entrance Street 0.56 0.21 7.12 0.01 1.75
Daylight roof Transparent -0.94 0.23 15.90 0.00 0.39
Color/Materials Cold -0.66 0.21 10.03 0.00 0.52
Vertical differentiation store facades
Present -0.62 0.24 6.69 0.01 0.54
Visual lines Open 0.02 0.23 0.01 0.93 1.02
Stairways Express 0.06 0.22 0.08 0.78 1.06
Anchor Leisure -1.06 0.22 22.56 0.00 0.35
Spatial form Orthogonal -0.39 0.27 2.15 0.14 0.68
Signs Theme -0.35 0.22 2.54 0.11 0.71
Art work Present 0.34 0.25 2.51 0.11 1.49
Crowding Upper floor 0.54 0.26 4.24 0.04 1.72
Discussion
A shopping center’s architecture will not only affect its atmospherics, but also the functional and spatial characteristics. Even characteristics like signing, symbols and artifacts will be influenced by the building’s architecture as their visibility might be blocked off from a consumer’s position. To a consumer who tries to find his way to his place of interest, such a shopping mall might be a nuisance; to a customer who has no clear goal, this might induce novelty and it might stimulate him to explore the mall. With increasing
vacancies of stores, particularly at higher or basement floor levels, and an increasing demand for multilevel shopping malls, developers might need to learn more about what design influence customer’s passersby in
a shopping mall. Therefore, the aim of the present study was to investigate which characteristics of the encountered shopping mall environment favor consumers’ choice for vertical circulation.
Consumers seem to prefer a shopping mall with a ground floor that allows them to orientate. They feel invited to vertically circulate in a shopping mall with a ground floor that has strong visual lines, with daylight from the roof. They seem to prefer the double stairways and the single stairway respectively, to the express stairway. The ground floor seems more attractive and stimulates to go upstairs if it supports the ease consumers can orientate and circulate. It might well be that they feel attracted by art and might found a ground floor with either warm or cold colors more than a gradient from cold to warm. Regarding the attractiveness of the upper floor, the outcome seems to strongly emphasize leisure-activities. Respondents preferred the Gastro boulevard at the upper floor and highly valued a crowded upper floor that has lots of daylight and laminate floor in a shopping mall with colder colors/materials at lower floor and vertical differentiation of store facades, and an open spacious design of the shopping mall at the ground floor. The design and atmospheric characteristics and their levels were decided upon several case studies of existing multilevel shopping centers. The current results would not suggest that one of these cases might be considered as a best case. The cases typically combine characteristics that seem to both stimulate and discourage consumers to vertical circulate. The results supports the relevance of way finding and orientation at the entrance level, but these characteristics were not valued at the upper floor. Instead, consumers seem to value an atmospheric associated with leisure as anchor, warm colors/materials and crowding at the top floor. Typically, an orthogonal design offers more easily orientation, which is more difficult in a mall with organic roof, lining of store fronts and opening of ceilings as this might block off sight lines. Organic designs might introduce novelty, as would do vertical differentiation of facades. This may suggest that novelty adds to a sense of leisure. However, the number of respondents was not very high and does not support firm conclusions. This study shows that virtual tours offer the possibility to manipulate several design and atmospheric characteristics at once, allowing for a more holistic approach, while controlling for other characteristics. Future work needs to elaborate on what other design and atmospheric characteristics in general facilitate orientation at entrance level and stimulate novelty effects at other levels. This kind of research emphasizes what design and atmospheric characteristics influence consumer preferences in general, and the results might be useful to designers and project developers to better tailor a shopping mall to the needs of their target groups of consumers. Certainly, it does not provide a full receipt for a design as this would abandon novelty effects.
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