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Master of Science / Department of Psychology / James C. Shanteau / This project included two studies that looked at how the brand name and price of consumer products can affect intended purchasing decisions. In Study 1, 30 undergraduate students tested products from three different product categories (crayons, tissues, and tortilla chips). Each product category consisted of three different brands; one with high brand value, one with medium, and one with low brand value (generic). The brands for each product were as follows: Crayons (Crayola, Roseart, and Dollartree); Tissues (Puffs, Kleenex, and Wal-Mart); Chips (Tostitos, Mission, and Kroger). The design for this study was a 3x3+3+3 matrix. For each brand, there were five conditions: 1) the product in the correct brand name; 2) the product in a switched brand name; 3) the product in the other switched brand name; 4) the product alone, no brand name; and 5) the brand name alone, no product. The product alone and brand name alone conditions acted as controls. Participants were unaware that the products had been switched. After trying each product, participants rated their likelihood to purchase that product on a 9-point Likert scale; 1 being “definitely would not buy” and 9 being “definitely would buy.” In Study 2, 47 participants completed an online survey assessing their likelihood to purchase three different products (a bicycle, a watch, and a T.V.) based on the price alone. The brand names were removed so as to not create an interactive effect. This study had the same design as Study 1. After a within-subjects Repeated Measures ANOVA, it was found in Study 1, that the two brands with higher brand value were rated as higher quality than the generic. Study 2 found that when just looking at price, subjects were more likely to purchase the cheapest product. In conclusion, it seems that the brand name associated with a product can cause people to rate the quality of that product as either higher or lower depending on the strength of the brand, even if the product itself is lower quality. Also, when looking at the prices of products without the brand names, people want to purchase the lowest priced product.

The behaviour of consumers on the Internet is increasingly a focus of marketing research. In particular, consumers’ behaviour in online shopping, from adoption motivation to post-usage behaviour, has become a major focus of research in the field of marketing, especially within consumer behaviour. Yet it has been acknowledged that while aspects such as adoption and usage motivation are now better understood, there are many questions that remain unanswered, and this warrants continued research effort. In line with the above, this research addresses an issue in online consumer behaviour that is currently under researched and which relates to the role that the consumer’s regulatory focus trait plays in their manifested behaviour in online shopping. The research argues that it is important to understand the role of regulatory focus in online shopping because this psychological trait has been shown to affect other aspects of human behaviour such as in response to advertising, dieting and sports. Drawing upon research from consumer behaviour and the wider fields of marketing and psychology, this research proposes a number of hypotheses relating the consumer’s regulatory focus to her perception of online shopping, motivation for online shopping, and actual usage behaviour in a structural manner. The resulting structural equation model is then tested using empirical data obtained from 306 Internet shoppers in the United Kingdom. The results of the research confirm that regulatory focus has an influence on consumer behaviour in online shopping by affecting their perception, motivation and usage of online shopping. The research makes a unique contribution by demonstrating that regulatory focus is a valid and robust predictor of online shopping behaviour and behavioural outcomes, a conclusion which is relevant to both marketing research and marketing practice. Finally, the research identifies and recommends areas for future studies.

These days, milk substitute products are getting more popular and exist together with milk on the market. These substitute products are appreciated by consumers due to animal welfare, environmental or health related reasons. The purpose of the investigation was to make assumptions about the future situation of farmers and which demographic, personal, sociological, cultural and psychological determinants have an impact on Swedish consumers purchasing substitute products. The proposed methodology to reveal the impact of those factors was a qualitative research. Ten semi-structured interviews with residents of Västra Götaland, aimed to gain a deeper and better understanding of the reasons for consumption of milk substitute products, were conducted in total. The existing theory and scientific articles about demographic, personal, sociological, cultural and psychological determinants of consumer behavior, in terms of food choice and consumption, were used to create an interview guide and also to compare the collected primary data in the end. Participants were asked questions regarding their demography, lifestyle, awareness and perception of milk substitute products and other reasons for their consumption of milk substitutes. The findings revealed that demographic factors such as age and gender seemed to have an impact on the consumer behavior. Moreover, personal and psychological factors were revealed to have a significant impact on the consumption behavior. In particular lifestyle, perception, attitudes and motivations, knowledge and learning had a significant influence on Swedish consumers and their food consumption behavior. Regarding sociological factors it was discovered that friends had a significant influence on food consumption. Cultural determinants were also important to consider. However, they did not have a significant influence on the participants. The findings also revealed that health and animal welfare were the main reasons for changing the consumption. Interestingly, no participant started to consume these products due to environmental reasons in the beginning. The strong competition of milk and milk substitute products on the market is most likely to continue. The future situation for farmers will look different and might get more critical as milk consumption in Sweden could change. This small scale research does not make it possible to generalize the revealed findings. Nevertheless, this qualitative investigation provided the basis for future research in the field of consumer behavior towards substitute products.

From 2006 to 2009, Taiwan's " Performance Workshop" staged the modern Chinese drama ¡¨ Secret Love in Peach Blossom Land¡¨ in various parts of China, and the tickets sold very well. In comparison, China's local performing groups, and even Chinese drama of little theater, but only a few people watch. What¡¦re the reasons for that? And why there are not just a few large-scale performances attract a huge audience, although it¡¦s ticket price significantly higher than general average fare as price reduce everywhere ? This study focused on the success factors of Taiwan¡¦s Modern Troupes in China, and take Taiwan's " Performance Workshop" for example as the case analysis to analyze the reason, why it can have the great box-office. And hope that the domestic and foreign performing groups can know the mainland China people's cultural consumption demands, help them enter the Chinese market of the performing arts. The results found that "income" and "consumer preference" is the most important factor; In addition, the Performance Workshop's drama¡¨ Secret Love in Peach Blossom Land¡¨ can be success is due to the combine of the ¡§high culture" and "mass culture" and use local well-known actors to create promo topic. In script, it performs the different custom of the cross-strait masses by drama. It makes the Chinese people feel curious and fresh, and because word-of-mouth and the reason of endogenisation of tastes, led to the great box-office.

Conflicts can occur in a variety of brand-relationship contexts, whether pertaining to poor service or product failure or to companies’ violations in regard to moral or legal issues. Though addressing relationship conflicts has become a pervasive issue in brand-relationship research, little is known about factors influencing consumer responses to conflicts. The goal of this research was to address this issue by exploring how consumers utilize their emotional intelligence in coping with problems when conflicts arise. For this purpose, two experiments were performed in this study. The first experiment showed that consumer emotional intelligence (CEI) was critical in predicting coping responses. When encountering conflicts in relationships, consumers who were highly capable in CEI were more likely to direct their emotions positively and productively, and they were less likely to exit the relationships than were those low in CEI. The second experiment further investigated a moderator and mediator of the association identified in the first study. The study demonstrated that the type of conflict moderated the effect of CEI on coping behaviors; the CEI effect on intention to exit the relationship was more pronounced when a conflict had directly caused problems for individual consumers (vs. to society as a whole). The results further demonstrated that consumers’ appraisals of a company’s intention in regard to conflicts mediated the association between CEI and coping responses. Specifically, low-CEI consumers were more likely to attribute negative intentions to the company; therefore, they were more likely to exit the relationship than were high-CEI consumers. This research demonstrated that CEI is an important construct in explaining why some consumers react destructively to relationship conflicts whereas others do not. Findings of this research provide a greater understanding of the role of individual differences in the maintenance and dissolution of brand relationships. / text

In recent years, the fashion industry has set off a trend of co-branding, and co-branding has become a unique marketing strategy for major brands to obtain benefits. However, there are potential risks when brands are selecting joint partners. The literature in this paper addresses both the positive effects of co-branding and how it is viewed from a business and customer perspective related to customer loyalty. Besides, previous researches on how to correctly select joint partners have not been explored in the collected literature. Therefore, the purpose of this study is to provide a deeper understanding of the strategy of choosing partners for brands from a negative aspect under the current trend of brand cooperation，and to propose relevant implications through case analysis. The research method used in this paper is qualitative research by conducting case studies and four focus groups. The findings indicate that communication and connection are the basis for two brands to having success. Furthermore, the enterprise needs to evaluate and estimate the capabilities of the partners by analyzing the external environment and opportunities. Besides, with the help of co-brand partners, brands can make up for their shortcomings and work together to achieve the expected goal.

A packaging model is presented in this study which attempts to show some important aspects of a consumer's cognitive process in relation to packaging. This packaging model is based on the theories of imagery, emotion, and perception (and sensation). Perception of a packaged good occurs because the motivation system of a consumer selects particular information that the packaged good provides. Unlike the situation which occurs in behaviorism, stimulus is as important as response, and motivation explains why people don't perceive all the information available in the environment. When perception occurs, two subsequent responses are possible in the mind of a consumer: the connotative response and the denotative response. A connotative response is an evaluation of the perceived, i.e. emotion. Denotative response is imagery which is produced by conditioned sensory response. Imagery may elicit emotional response. Thus, imagery may reinforce consumer behavior positively or negatively. Emotion with regard to a packaged good is, then, the combination of emotions elicited by the perceived and the imagery evoked. This packaging model tries to explain purchasing behavior through the concepts of imagery and emotion.

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