The first key purpose of this study was to determine if music can be perceived as being consistent, neutral or inconsistent with the product mood and store mood of a retail environment. The second main objective of the research was to test the Music- Retail Environment Model developed from the literature review. A key issue of the experimental study testing the model, was to find out if music perceived as consistent with a retail environment could generate more positive consumer responses compared with music that is neutral or inconsistent with a retail environment. For this study, “approach responses" included consumer attitudes and behavioral shopping intentions.
A third objective of this research was to test the impact of certain consumer characteristic variables as moderators in the proposed Model that may be related to different responses due to the influence of music in a retail environment.
A fourth goal of the study was to test the possible influence of the music structure characteristic of "mode" to discover if music with a major mode would produce more positive consumer responses than music with a minor mode in a retail setting.