Feb 15, 2008 6:02 AM, PROMO Xtra

When it comes to buying products and providing credit-card data over the Internet, the kids are all right, but Nana and Grampy just feel a little weird.

New results culled from the Pew Internet & American Life Project’s, published Tuesday, find that a majority of Web users under 30 find the Internet to be the best place to find good deals on merchandise or to locate hard-to-find items.

According to the “Online Shopping: Internet” report, 83% of respondents 18-29 agreed that online shopping is convenient and 70% saying it saved them time. Sixty-two percent of the age group said they could find bargains on the Internet. Eighty-four percent in that age group said they valued e-commerce as a way to locate difficult purchases, while about the same proportion said they valued the ability to see an item before buying it.

Shoppers 30-49 found e-commerce to be equally convenient (82%) and even more of a time-saver (73%) but less of a money-saver, with only 52% said it helped them find bargains. The 50-64 survey population found Web shopping to be somewhat less time-efficient (67%), less convenient than their younger counterparts (77%) and much less effective at digging up deals (38%).

Worries about providing credit-card information and other personal data also increase with age, the Pew report finds. While 71% of the 18-29 group said it dislikes providing personal information online, that figure rises to 74% for those 30-49 and to 79% for users 50-64. For Internet users 65 or older, the Web-wary contingent grows to 82%.

And the older the respondents, the more complex they found buying items online. While 24% of those 18-29 and 30-49 agreed that Internet shopping is complicated, 30% of those 50-64 said the same, as did 34% of Web users 65 or over.

“Improving online users’ comfort levels with sending personal or credit card information over the Internet would have the biggest payoff for expanding online shopping,” the Pew report concludes. If respondents who worry about sending personal data over the Web were to have those fears allayed, the proportion of Internet users who shopped online would increase to 73% from the current 66%.

Overall, Pew found that 43% of Internet users report frustration at the lack of Web information about goods and services they want to buy. On the other hand, 30% said they have felt overwhelmed by the amount of information turned up during their online shopping or research. And 32% said some of that information turned up in their investigations or transactions simply has confused them.

The Pew online shopping report is based on telephone surveys with 2,400 U.S. adults conducted between Aug. 4 and Sept. 5, 2007.

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