The cognitive and emotional experience of online product customization: a qualitative study of consumer decision-making

Abstract

As digital markets increasingly move toward individualized consumption experiences, online product customization has become a widely adopted strategy allowing consumers to actively participate in the creation of products. By offering greater freedom, customization possibilities, and consumer control, customization is generally associated with stronger engagement, higher satisfaction, and increased willingness to pay. However, growing evidence suggests that providing consumers with more options does not systematically improve their experience and may instead generate complexity, decision fatigue, and cognitive overload. This thesis investigates how consumers cognitively and emotionally experience online product customization and how this experience shapes their decision-making throughout the customization process. More specifically, it explores the psychological mechanisms underlying interaction with digital customization environments and examines how users respond to abundant choice and interface complexity. To address this research objective, an exploratory qualitative research design was adopted. Fifteen participants completed a think-aloud customization exercise on the Smartphoto online photo album platform, followed by semi-structured interviews. The collected data were analysed through a thematic cross-case matrix combining verbal expressions and observed behaviours in order to identify recurring patterns and individual differences. The findings reveal that online customization is not experienced as a straightforward path toward satisfaction but rather as a dynamic process characterized by continuous negotiation between emotional engagement, cognitive effort, and perceived control. While customization generated enjoyment, creativity, immersion, and feelings of ownership, participants also experienced moments of frustration, uncertainty, and decision fatigue. The results show that cognitive overload was driven not only by the quantity of available options but also by interface structure and usability. Consumers actively adapted by developing coping strategies such as reducing considered alternatives, relying on defaults, or abandoning certain features. Importantly, the study highlights a paradoxical mechanism: despite experiencing substantial friction during the customization process, participants frequently reported high overall satisfaction and strong purchase intention afterward. This suggests that the anticipated emotional and symbolic value of the final customized product may compensate for operational difficulties experienced during interaction. By adopting a process-based perspective, this thesis contributes to existing research on customization, consumer decision-making, and digital user experience by showing that customization outcomes emerge less from objective choice abundance than from consumers’ ability to transform available freedom into manageable and meaningful action.