Perceived Retail Crowding, Emotional Distance, and Consumer Response in Fashion Stores

Abstract

The same degree of crowding can be perceived differently by different people depending on the consumers' individual characteristics. The purpose of this study is to investigate the influence of crowding degree and perceived similarity with other customers in a store on the in-store emotion state and purchase intention. A lower perceived crowding degree resulted in a higher pleasure emotion state, and a higher perceived crowding degree, led to a higher arousal emotion state. The pleasure, arousal, and dominance emotion states and the purchase intention were found to be higher in the group that perceived a high similarity with other in-store customers. It was found that customers felt more positive emotions and had more positive behaviors when they perceived that they were similar to others in the store environment. This shows that the presence of other customers who were highly similar to themselves is an important factor in customers' shopping behavior.