Search

Firms can save considerable money if consumers conserve resources (e.g., if hotel patrons turn off the lights when leaving the room, restaurants patrons use fewer paper napkins, or airline passengers clean up after themselves). In two studies conducted in real-world hotels, the authors show that consumers' conservation behavior is affected by the extent to which consumers perceive the firm as being green. Furthermore, consumer perceptions of firms' greenness and consumer conservation behavior depend on (a) whether the firm requests them to conserve resources, (b) the firm's own commitment to the environment, and (c) the firm's price image. Additionally, firm requests to consumers to save resources can create consumer reactance and can backfire when firms themselves do not engage in visible costly environmental efforts. Such reactance is more likely for firms with a high price image. Finally, the authors show that by spending a little money to signal environmental commitment, firms can save even more money through consumers' conservation of resources, resulting in wins for the firm, the consumer, and the environment.

Many product categories, from pizzas to real estate, present buyers with purchase decisions involving complex area judgments. Does a square look larger or smaller than a circle? How much smaller does a circle of 8" diameter look when compared to one with a 10" diameter? In this paper, we propose a psychophysical model of how consumers make area judgments. The model involves consumers making effort-accuracy trade-offs that lead to heuristic processing of area judgments and systematic shape-and size-related biases. The model predicts that a single linear dimension inappropriately dominates the two-dimensional area comparison task, and that contextual factors affect which linear dimension dominates the task. The relative use of the second dimension depends on its relative salience which can be affected by the manner in which information is presented. A set of five studies--four laboratory experiments and one field experiment, systematically test model predictions. The first study tests the proposition that consumers anchor on a single linear dimension when comparing areas. It shows how presentation context can alter which dimension is anchored on. The next study shows that this bias reversal carries through to consumers' reservation price--people are willing to pay more for objects that appear larger. Study 3 describes a laboratory experiment that tests whether the degree of adjustment is dependent on the salience of the secondary (non-anchoring) dimension; again, reservation price is affected, and we show strong effects of second dimension salience on reservation price. In study 4 we explore the conditions under which a normatively correct rather than heuristic-based biased judgment will be made. Finally, Study 5 establishes the importance of package shape to marketers, by testing in a field experiment whether differences in shape of products affect sales. Overall, results suggest that the manner in which information is presented affects the relative salience of dimen

In this paper we propose that consumers use the direct distance (DD) between the end points of a path, or the distance "as the crow flies" as a source of information while making distance judgments -- such that the shorter the direct distance the shorter the distance estimate. We propose and test for two spatial features which affect direct distance -- path angularity (or the size of the angle between path segments) and path direction (or whether the path retraces back on itself or not). We demonstrate the direct distance bias over nine studies using different operationalizations, methods, contexts and types of subjects. Our results suggest that the DD bias is due to an (in)ability to ignore the perceptually salient direct distance: the bias increases in the presence of stimuli (Study 2), when subjects' attention is drawn to it as a judgmental input (Study 5), and for those subjects who do not have vivid visual images (Study 9). The use of DD as a judgmental input appears to be automatic (cf. Bargh 1989) in as much as it is effortless (Study 4), and difficult to control through increasing motivation (Study 7), or training subjects (Study 8), although it operates within conscious awareness (Study 5). Theoretical implications for the manner in which consumers process spatial information are discussed.

Estimates of number of objects in lines are made in many different situations. For example, radio traffic reports use helicopters to estimate the number of cars in a freeway traffic jam for determining how long the road will take to clear. Also, estimates of migrating geese are mde by looking at the formation of geese in the sky and making a judgment. This paper demonstrates that the Euclidean length between the end points of a line of dots biases the perceived numerical length (numerosity) of the line. Study 1 provides evidence that highly studied "clutter effect" found in distance perception research is moderated by the Euclidean length between the end-points of a line. Thus, while dotted lines with features such as turns, intersections and gaps are perceived to be more numerous than those without this "clutter" effect, cluttering features which lead to a longer (vs. shorter) Euclidean length between end points of the line magnify (vs. diminish) the clutter effect. Follow up studies examine the effect of three factors that affect Euclidean length: the relative length of subsegments (Study 2), the angle between segments (Studies 3 and 4), and the general direction of segments (Study 5). Study 6 conceptually replicates the reseults of studies 2-5 utilizing different experimental procedures and measures. Finally, we propose and test a model describing how people estimate numerosity of lines. The results reported in this paper support the hypothesis that the shorter the Euclidean length between two end points of a line, the lower is its perceived numerosity.