An Empirical Analysis of the Joint Effects of Shoppers’ Goals and Attribute Display on Shoppers’ Evaluations

Guha, A., Biswas, A., Grewal, D., Bhowmick, S. and Nordfält, J. (2018). An Empirical Analysis of the Joint Effects of Shoppers’ Goals and Attribute Display on Shoppers’ Evaluations. Journal of Marketing, 82(3), pp.142-156.

The article develops a decision-making framework that highlights how display of numeric attribute information and shoppers’ goals jointly influence shoppers’ choices and preferences. The research aimed to investigate how shoppers react to advertising, retail, or online displays in product domains involving numeric attribute information. The authors identify two elements that jointly determine shoppers’ reactions: whether shoppers view the displayed attribute as a LIB attribute or a MIB attribute, and whether the attribute information is displayed in an aligned or nonaligned manner, which influences the importance weight shoppers put on this attribute information. Findings of this article are beneficial for firms to better design advertising, retail, and online displays. The study significantly broadens and modifies the process mechanism underlying the subtraction principle to allow it to extend into multiple product domains. However, several limitations must be considered in interpreting and applying the article findings.

The authors start by examining shoppers’ goals, which may be conceptualized as either individual differences (e.g., extent of diet intentions) or differences primed by product category or shopping environment. Study 1 was conducted in a supermarket in Stockholm. First, there were different ways to display Coca-Cola (CCR) and Coca-Cola Life (CCL) to shoppers in aligned manner (CCR on the shelf above and CCL on the shelf below) or a nonaligned manner. The shelf-signs clearly showed the kJ values associated with each drink, where CCL is a way healthier option due to lower calories. Shoppers who participated in this study after examining the display needed to choose CCL or CCR bottle. Then, they were required to complete a short survey. The results show that for shoppers with diet goals, displaying a focal, healthier food item in an aligned manner increases choice share of the focal, healthier food item and vice versa for the shoppers with taste goals. Study 2a, where two boxes of chocolate were displayed to participants in an aligned or nonaligned manner with indication of calories, lead to the same conclusion made in a Study 1. In Study 2b, firstly participants filled out the six-item diet

intensions scale. A week later, each participant read a couple of paragraphs that were provided about the harm of sodium on health and its connection with better taste and aroma. Then participants needed to pick a can of chicken soup from two options (each can had information about sodium levels). They were required to indicate the importance weight of various factors for their choice decision by allocating five points across (1) sodium content, (2) number of servings per can, and (3) whether the soup contained chicken. The results are consistent with previous studies and identify that for shoppers with diet goals, increased importance weight of attribute gap information increases choice share of the focal, healthy food item and vice versa for shoppers with taste goals. Furthermore, displaying the focal, healthy food item in an aligned (vs. nonaligned) manner increases the importance weight of attribute gap information during evaluations. Studies 1 and 2 are focused on the food domain. Therefore, to generalize the results, authors examine other product domains in Study 3. First, in Study 3a, the authors present an incentive-compatible study involving a LIB scenario that examines choice between two kitchen implements. In Study 3b – in a MIB scenario – a choice between cell phone accessories was examined with aspects that may moderate the effects in the research. Although Study 1 and 2 are specific to food domain, Study 3 shows that conclusions from previous research can be easily modified to extend to any product domain.