The effects of website white space on university students

Abstract

The purpose of this study was to explore university students’ web browsing experience, including usability preference, aesthetics and perceived value. The experimental samples were a set of four web pages with 45% and 55% of white space and from narrow to wide spacing. Thirty-five participants aged between 18 and 24 years were recruited by purposeful sampling to conduct the operational evaluation. It was interesting to note that even though the samples were centered around 50% of white space as previous studies suggested, three questions revealed significant differences: “I found the web page unnecessarily complex,” “the layout appears too dense,” “this web page would help me to feel acceptable.” The result also indicated that most participants preferred more white space, which could help designers to design web pages more accurately in accordance with user preferences.