Document Type
Thesis
First Faculty Advisor
Sharmin Attaran
Second Faculty Advisor
Ganga Hewage
Keywords
search personalization; targeted advertisements; data privacy; consumer behavior
Publisher
Bryant University
Rights Management
CC-BY
Abstract
Almost half the world’s population is online, roughly 3.2 billion people and one of the main uses of the internet is for search. Search engines like Google receive over 63,000 searches per second on any given day, with users looking to find information to questions, interact with communities, and purchase products online. Personalization enables search engines to provide the most relevant results and helps companies reach their target audiences more efficiently. This study focuses on personalization and its various forms, including targeted advertisements, the disadvantages of search, Cookies, and data privacy. The goal of this study is to understand (a) if higher online shopping frequently generates positive attitudes towards personalization, (b) if personalization has a positive impact on attitude towards advertisements, (c) if positive attitudes towards the brand or retailer impact purchase intentions, and (d) if understanding knowledge about personalization impacts how users respond to it. An online experiment was conducted, and the results show that there was a significance between online purchase behavior and personalization. The results also show that personalization has a positive impact on attitude towards targeted advertisements which ultimately impacts purchase decisions. However, from the experiment, it was evident that possessing knowledge about personalization does not impact how users respond to the technology.
