Perception of Delay and Attitude toward Feedback Display: An Exploration into Downloaders' Demographics

To cope with delay during an online download session, web service providers often present feedback cues to keep downloaders informed of progress. Yet, empirical work examining the downloaders’ perception of delay or their attitudes toward the feedback provided is scant. Moreover, only few studies have addressed the two variables in conjunction with downloaders’ demographics. This study intends to fill that void. 2,160 downloaders who downloaded online content from one content-sharing website participated in the survey. The analysis revealed that differences in perceptions of delay and attitude toward feedback provided across four major demographics including gender, age, education background and the amount of experience on the Internet were statistically significant at the 0.05 level. In addition, the correlation between downloaders’ perception of delay and their attitude toward feedback is also statistically significant. In addition to extending insight into the concept of human-computer interaction regarding perception of delay, the study concludes that service providers should pay more attention to certain groups of downloaders so they perceive delay as less of a problem. Keyword: Website delay, Demographics, Perception of Delay, Attitude toward Feedback Presentation, Downloaders Received January 31, 2013; Accepted September 5, 2013