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This research investigates how a price promotion on a fast-moving consumer good influences the sales of substitute products in a retail shelf or online display. An analysis of supermarket yogurt data finds that when nonpromoted products are strong substitutes for the promoted product, a 1% decrease in the price of the promoted product results in a.25% decrease in the sales of proximal products but no change in the sales of distal products—a negative promotion-proximity effect. However, when nonpromoted products are weak substitutes for the promoted product, a 1% decrease in the price of the promoted product results in a.10% increase in the sales of proximal products but no change in sales for distal products—a positive promotion-proximity effect. Subsequent studies show that these effects occur because a proximal strong substitute is more likely to enter a consideration set with the promoted product (negative promotion-proximity effect) and a proximal weak substitute is more likely to be seen and considered by a consumer who is not interested in the promoted product (positive promotion-proximity effect). [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

How does financial education lead to improved financial behavior and higher financial well-being? An influential Consumer Financial Protection Bureau model introduced in 2015 proposes that the goal of financial education is to improve financial well-being and that financial education does so by increasing financial knowledge, which improves financial behavior, which improves financial well-being. In this study, the authors test links in the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau model, examining the differential roles of objective and subjective knowledge. They also test whether an analogous model might capture effects of physical health education on physical health knowledge, behavior, and well-being. They report a quasi-experiment comparing changes in financial and physical health knowledge, behavior, and well-being at two time points in a semester for students enrolled in a personal finance class, a personal health class, or neither. This study reports the first causal estimates of flow from financial education to financial knowledge to financial behaviors to a validated measure of subjective financial well-being. Financial education caused large changes in both objective and subjective knowledge. Yet only subjective knowledge mediated the large effects of financial education on changes in downstream behaviors. The authors find weaker but similar results for physical health. The findings suggest that financial education efforts should be refocused to foster subjective knowledge and improved behavior. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

There are many contexts in which people make judgments about prior judgments. For example, Internet shopping bots (e.g., NexTag.com) allow consumers to search for products and, if the price is too high, list a price at which they would consider making the purchase (i.e., base judgment). If the price drops to this level, the vendor generates an e-mail inviting the consumer to execute the transaction at the reduced price (i.e., contingent judgment). The authors show that the consideration price depends on the content of retrieved information, whereas the willingness to execute the transaction at the consideration price depends on the ease-of-retrieving the information. The authors use different offer prices to encourage the consumer to retrieve information consistent with different product quality levels. The authors also select offer prices so that information retrieval is more difficult at moderate offer prices than at high or low offer prices. Accordingly, the authors show that the consideration price increases as the offer price increases, but the willingness to execute the transaction at the consideration price is greater when there are high and low, as opposed to moderate, offer prices. (Contains 5 figures and 3 tables.)

Based on emotional contagion theory and the value--profit chain literatures, the present study posits a number of hypotheses that show how managers in the small store, small number of employees retail context may affect store employees, customers, and potentially store performance. With data from 306 store managers, 1,615 store customer-contact employees, and 57,656 customers of a single retail chain, the authors examined relationships among store manager job satisfaction and job performance, store customer-contact employee job satisfaction and job performance, customer satisfaction with the retailer, and a customer-spending-based store performance metric (customer spending growth over a 2-year period). Via path analysis, several hypothesized direct and interaction relations among these constructs are supported. The results suggest implications for academic researchers and retail managers. Keywords: manager performance, manager satisfaction, customer satisfaction, store performance DOI: 10.1037/a0017630

In de Langhe, Fernbach, and Lichtenstein (2016), we argue that consumers trust average user ratings as indicators of objective product performance much more than they should. This simple idea has provoked passionate commentaries from eminent researchers across three subdisciplines of marketing: experimental consumer research, modeling, and qualitative consumer research. Simonson challenges the premise of our research, asking whether objective performance even matters. We think it does and explain why in our response. Winer and Fader argue that our results are neither insightful nor important. We believe that their reaction is due to a fundamental misunderstanding of our goals, and we show that their criticisms do not hold up to scrutiny. Finally, Kozinets points out how narrow a slice of consumer experience our article covers. We agree, and build on his observations to reflect on some big-picture issues about the nature of research and the interaction between the subdisciplines. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Drawing from theories of social cognition and perception, the effects of information consistency and distinctiveness implied by semantic cues in reference price ads are examined in a 2 (Levels of Distinctiveness) x 2 (Levels of Consistency) x 3 (Levels of Reference Price) between-subjects experimental design. Both the reference-price level and the perceived distinctiveness of information implied by the semantic cue had significant effects on internal price standard and attitudinal and perceptual dependent variables. Consistency information had no effect. Competing rationales drawn from assimilation-contrast theory and anchoring and adjustment effects on judgment are offered as bases for reference-price predictions. Results reveal that reference-price level had a monotonic effect on most dependent variables, and thus are more consistent with effects predicted by anchoring and adjustment rationales.

Existing theory and prior research suggest that consumers perceive purchase prices more/less favorably when they are preceded by higher/ lower prices. However, to date, researchers have found these effects in contexts in which the product, and thus perceived quality, is held constant. Given that consumers commonly believe price and quality are positively correlated and that price-quality perceptions have been shown to influence price evaluations and willingness to pay, the generalizability of existing research to commonly encountered contexts is questionable. In this research, the authors examine the influence of price order on consumer choice across differing brands in contexts in which consumer quality perceptions are free to covary with price and they are manipulated to be correlated or uncorrelated with price. Using reference dependence theory as a framework, they find that when differing brand options are presented in descending price order, consumers tend to choose higher-price options; when they are presented in ascending price order, consumers tend to choose lower-priced options (the price order effect). In addition, the authors show that consumers' price-quality perceptions are a necessary condition for this effect. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]