Digitally Empowered Experiences: Investigating How AR Interactivity Shapes Online Customer Experience

Abstract

This article explores the relationship between Augmented Reality (AR) interaction and Online Customer Experience (OCE) with Customer Empowerment as the mediator and Digital Literacy as the moderator based on the Stimulus-Organism-Response (SOR) framework. A quantitative, positivist, and deductive methodology was used, gathering data from 300 online consumers with experience and knowledge of AR-enabled shopping and analysing it using Partial Least Squares Structural Equation Modelling (PLS-SEM). These findings established that AR interactivity was a significant contributor to customer empowerment, which in turn positively affected OCE, thereby demonstrating empowerment as the primary bridging mechanism. A smaller direct effect of interactivity on OCE was also identified, indicating both direct and indirect effects. Moreover, digital literacy had a modifying effect on the interaction between interactivity and experience in that techno-savvy users benefited more from the experience. Despite the negative moderating effect, digitally savvy users gained advantages, as their cognitive preparedness mitigated overload, enabling easier navigation and affording interactivity that translated into better control, enhanced engagement, and better experiences. The research contributed to the conceptualisation of the SOR model of online retail and offered practice-based guidance for creating adaptive, inclusive, and empowerment-oriented AR interfaces.