Virtual Artwork Influences Online Shopping

With Black Friday just days away, millions of Americans are preparing for the busiest shopping weekend of the year. But an ever-increasing number of shoppers won’t be battling crowds at the mall—they’ll be clicking through online stores from the comfort of home. In fact, online shopping now accounts for the majority of holiday purchases.

As retailers compete for attention in the digital marketplace, they are asking, What makes one virtual store more appealing than another? New research suggests that digital artwork might be one key to capturing shoppers’ interest.

Art Infusion Theory Online

For years, retailers have known that displaying art in physical stores can positively influence consumer behavior—a phenomenon known as art infusion theory. But as shopping habits continue to shift online, researchers wondered whether this effect would translate to digital environments. A new study by Cornell University Professor So-Yeon Yoon et al., which was published in the Journal of Retailing and Consumer Services, suggests it does—with some surprising twists.

Yoon and her colleagues explored how algorithm-generated artwork affects consumers in virtual retail spaces. They conducted two experiments using virtual fashion stores to test their hypothesis.

In the first experiment, 120 female participants viewed pairs of virtual stores representing mass-market and luxury brands. The stores were identical except for one key difference: Some featured generative art—a video projected onto a wall displaying constantly shifting black-and-white patterns—while others showed only a plain white wall.

The results were striking. Participants viewing stores with generative art consistently rated them as more luxurious and attractive. Surprisingly, the effect was stronger for mass-market brands than for luxury retailers. This challenges the conventional wisdom that art displays are primarily beneficial for high-end stores.

“When we think about art, we think it’s more closely aligned with the luxury market,” Yoon said. “But this AI-powered generative art has this capacity to be more practical, affordable and sustainable compared to the expensive artwork that only a luxury market may afford. I think it’s encouraging to see that the mass brand can benefit, as well.”

The second experiment, involving 90 women, took the research a step further by comparing static versus dynamic generative art—which is constantly changing and evolving. The dynamic art generated higher perceptions of exclusivity and aesthetic pleasure compared to static displays. Participants exposed to dynamic art were also more likely to share their experience.

Perhaps most intriguing was how artistic openness influenced the results. You might expect that people who consider themselves art enthusiasts would be most impressed by the displays. Instead, the research found that participants with low to average artistic openness showed the strongest positive reactions.

“It’s not that those with high artistic openness were negatively influenced,” she said. “They were like, ‘Wow,’ and the people who were less familiar were like, ‘Wow!!’ That was the difference.”

Implications

This democratizing effect of generative art has important implications. While installing expensive fine art in a mass-market store might not make economic sense, computer-generated art offers a practical alternative. It’s already popular in major sporting events, concerts, and interactive gallery shows. Once created, generative art provides unlimited variations without requiring artists to continually produce new pieces.

The practical applications extend beyond retail. Yoon is exploring how dynamic generative art installations might benefit healthcare facilities, assisted-living communities, and retirement homes—environments where visual stimulation could enhance quality of life without requiring ongoing artistic production.

As virtual and augmented reality technologies become more integrated into our daily shopping experiences, understanding how design elements affect consumer behavior becomes increasingly important. This research demonstrates that principles from physical retail environments can successfully transfer to virtual spaces, but with interesting nuances.

The take-home message: Generative art offers retailers an accessible, sustainable way to enhance virtual shopping experiences across market segments. If you head online in the coming days for some shopping, pay attention to the artwork you see in the virtual marketplace!