Abstract Differences in discretionary disclosures of quantitative product attributes often result in asymmetric information across products. For example, one brand of milk may feature its protein content on the package label, while the other does not. How do such asymmetric product claims affect consumer choices? We predict that consumers will be sensitive to the mere presence of a quantified claim, judging a product that presents attribute quantity by the valence of the disclosed attribute (positive vs. negative) regardless of the quantity communicated (e.g., high vs. low value of a low-evaluability attribute). Across eight pre-registered studies, we find a robust mere presence effect, in which consumers judge products more (less) favorably when a positive (negative) quantitative quality-relevant attribute is presented, even when the quantitative information represents a relatively low level of quality. Our findings are consistent with an overgeneralized heuristic account, in which consumers rely on the valence of an attribute when it is present, instead of the quantity conveyed. Our findings demonstrate that when a quantitative attribute is salient but not evaluable, asymmetric information disclosure may impede, rather than facilitate, consumers’ judgments of product quality.
Repeated measurement is common in both marketing research and practice. For example, experimenters often ask participants to evaluate multiple similar products, and service providers regularly check in to see how customers are doing. Such practices rest on the assumption that collecting more data simply reveals consumers' experiences and preferences as they evolve over time. The present research finds that repeated measurement also shapes them. Specifically, repeatedly probing consumers about an experience draws attention to how it is changing, prompting consumers to notice incremental differences more than if they were probed less or simply left alone. This process has important consequences for hedonic adaptation and enjoyment. In contexts of negative change, repeated ratings exacerbate adaptation by making incremental declines more salient, accelerating boredom and disengagement. In contexts of positive change, repeated ratings enhance experiences by making incremental improvements more salient. Eight studies (plus eight supplemental replications; total N = 16,311), spanning diverse hedonic stimuli (including games, foods, songs, videos, and artwork) and methodological approaches (including mediation and moderation), highlight this core idea that change is amplified when ratings draw attention to it. The research discusses how repeated measurement may thereby distort understandings of hedonic decline and consumer preferences, and how to harness these insights to promote longer-lasting consumer enjoyment.
An extensive, independent replication study (n = 2,374) of the Mere Urgency Effect (MUE) (Zhu et al. 2018) is reported. The MUE is a surprising tendency for individuals to be lured into suboptimal time allocation by the framing of a dominated option that makes it appear "urgent." This effect arises even though the apparent urgency is illusory. The MUE is replicated in a base design closely following the procedures of Zhu et al. (2018) but with new participants. Across further replications, the base design is varied to control for putative confounds that would explain the MUE as an artefact of the base experimental setup. A new ("fresh eyes") setup provides an additional test, alongside a meta-analytic synthesis across replications. Although the MUE is attenuated by adding controls to the base design, a significant MUE is found in all tests designed to control for confounds, including the new setup. Hence, the existence of an MUE that is robust to variations in experimental design and to controls for the mechanisms conjectured as potential confounds is confirmed. At least within the paradigm studied, a tendency to prioritize tasks seen as urgent can lead to suboptimal decision-making, even when the urgency is illusory.
Consumers routinely make decisions about short time periods, such as waiting for a table or deciding whether to pay for faster delivery. Such periods are often expressed by either a duration or a clock time (e.g., if it is 6:00 PM now, "Your table will be ready in 30 minutes" vs. "Your table will be ready at 6:30 PM"). Eight experiments (N = 16,604) show that these logically equivalent frames change how long a period feels, with downstream consequences for consumer decisions. Relatively short time periods feel longer when framed by duration rather than by start and end time (i.e., clock times or calendar dates), but this pattern reverses as periods get longer. This research refers to this phenomenon as time-duration asymmetry: framing an interval by its start and end time versus its duration changes how long it feels, with the direction of the effect depending on the interval's length. This research proposes that this occurs because duration frames evoke compressive scalar representations shaped by diminishing sensitivity, whereas start-end frames situate time within structured categorical systems that attenuate compression. This research offers a unified framework for understanding how subtle differences in temporal framing shape perceptions of time and subsequent decisions.
Consumers can experience two types of uncertainty when purchasing a product. Preference uncertainty (PU) refers to the uncertainty associated with the horizontal product benefits one desires (e.g., "How strong do I want my coffee to be?"). Outcome uncertainty (OU) refers to the uncertainty associated with the actual benefits the product will deliver (e.g., "How strong will the coffee be?"). Ideally, retailers should strive for outcome certainty (i.e., standardize the strength profile of their coffee [coffees in their line]), and help consumers achieve preference certainty (i.e., help consumers learn their ideal coffee strength), so that consumers can purchase the appropriate product with confidence (i.e., achieve a preference-outcome match). Yet there are situations where high OU is a characteristic of the product class, after controlling for quality (e.g., flavor profile of wine). When OU is high, the present research paradoxically finds that high PU leads to more purchase intent than low PU. This effect occurs because people are more optimistic that they will maximize their utility when PU is high (i.e., multiple outcomes could potentially be the best match for their preference) than low (i.e., only one outcome could be the best match for their preference).
