Visual Compensation in Online Food Consumption: Linking Visual Perception, Sensory Representation, Taste Expectation, and Purchase Intention

The absence of sensory information in online food consumption hinders consumers’ direct taste, olfactory, and tactile experiences prior to purchase. Consequently, visual information becomes a crucial compensatory cue for forming judgments about food sensory attributes. This study proposes an analytical framework centered on visual compensation to investigate how sensory information richness, visual realism, and visual vividness are associated with consumer purchase intention through gustatory mental imagery, texture mental simulation, and taste expectation. Utilizing survey data from 1226 online food consumers, this research employs PLS-SEM, IPMA, and fsQCA for empirical testing. The results indicate that sensory information richness is positively associated with consumers’ perception of visual realism and vividness, which in turn are positively associated with gustatory mental imagery and texture mental simulation. Gustatory mental imagery and texture mental simulation are subsequently associated with taste expectation, while texture mental simulation is also directly associated with purchase intention. IPMA further reveals that taste expectation, characterized by high importance yet relatively low performance, represents a potential priority for improvement, whereas texture mental simulation demonstrates both high importance and high performance. fsQCA findings illustrate that high PI can be achieved through various combinations of visual perception and psychological processing conditions. Moreover, the configurations associated with High PI differ from those associated with Not High PI. This study develops an integrative account of how visual perception, internal sensory representations, and taste expectations are linked to purchase judgments in online food consumption. It also expands the understanding of visual compensation mechanisms in digital food consumption from both structural and configurational perspectives.