Leveraging Web Experience: How Self-Perceived Knowledge Calibrates the Impact of Website-Driven Participation and Voter Satisfaction on Indian Voting Intentions

Abstract

As digital platforms reshape political communication, political parties increasingly rely on websites to campaign and influence voter behaviour. These websites have become crucial channels through which voters access information, evaluate parties, and form electoral preferences, yet how website quality translates into voting intention remains underexplored. Drawing upon the O-S-O-R theory, the study examined how the political parties' website dimensions related to quality influence voting intention among digitally active Indian voters, through political engagement, participation, and voter satisfaction, with self-perceived political knowledge as a moderator. Data was collected from 1076 respondents who had previously visited the website of any political party at least once. The study used structural equation modelling in IBM AMOS while testing the moderation effect in IBM SPSS. The results reveal that website quality dimensions significantly influence voter satisfaction and political participation, but have no direct effect on political engagement. Both voter satisfaction and political participation positively influenced voting intention, confirming their mediating roles in the website quality–voting intention relationship. Political engagement, however, is significantly but negatively associated with both voter satisfaction and political participation, suggesting that more engaged voters critically evaluate party communications rather than responding affirmatively. Perceived political knowledge strengthened only the relationship between voter satisfaction and voting intention—meaning that among more knowledgeable voters, satisfaction with a party's website more strongly translated into an intention to vote. No such moderating effect was found for political participation. These findings deepen our understanding of how website quality indirectly shapes voting intention and provide actionable insights for political parties aiming to design digital platforms that better serve and engage citizens.