Attribute Conflict in Consumer Decision Making: The Role of Task Compatibility
Anish Nagpal, Parthasarathy Krishnamurthy
Journal of Consumer Research · 2008 · Volume 34 · Issue 5
Abstract
Past research holds that a decision between two unattractive alternatives is more difficult than one between two attractive alternatives. We argue that this conclusion may rest on the the task of “choosing” adopted in the past research. A task of choosing requires an attractiveness judgment that is compatible with attractive alternatives but incompatible with unattractive alternatives. We test this thesis by reversing the compatibility using a reject task that requires judgment of unattractiveness. Two studies find that compatibility between alternative valence and task influences decision time, decision difficulty, attribute recall, and effort, underscoring the role of the task in the study of attribute conflict.
Keywords
Behavioral Decision Theory, Cognitive Processes, Judgment and Decision Making, Experimental Design and Analysis (ANOVA)
Enable JavaScript for citation tools and additional paper interactions.