Marketing Seminar（2016-19）

Title: The Randomization Effect: The Influences of Randomized Product Display on Consumers

Speaker: Tao tao, The Chinese University of Hong Kong

Time: Wednesday, 23 November.13:30-15:00

Place: RoomK01, Guanghua Building 2

Abstract:

Extant literature suggests that organizing products by category benefits consumers. This research, however, examines when a randomized product display can have a positive influence on consumers’ shopping evaluations. Via five experiments involving different types of products, the authors show that a randomly displayed product set can elicit a higher level of arousal compared to a categorized set, which in turn polarizes consumers’ pleasant feelings associated with their shopping experience, resulting in greater choice satisfaction and shopping experience. In addition, the authors show that the positive randomization effect occurs primarily when consumers do not have a clear shopping goal, and when they treat shopping as a pleasant activity. When consumers are motivated to search for a particular type of products and/or when shopping is considered unpleasant, consumers are more likely to benefit from a categorized (vs. randomized) product display.

Introduction:

Tao Tao is currently a Ph.D. candidate in marketing at the Chinese University of Hong Kong. Under the supervision of Prof. Robert S. Wyer and Prof. Leilei Gao, Tao is completing her Ph.D. in marketing with an expected date of July 2017. Her primary research interests fall within the area of consumer behavior. She studies the impacts of visual presentation on consumers’ affective reactions, sensory experience, and mental simulation, which influence their attitudes, judgments and behaviors. One part of her dissertation, “The Randomization Effect: The Influences of Randomized Product Display on Consumers’ Shopping Experience,” is under 2^nd round review at Journal of Consumer Research. Moreover, she is also interested in other areas of judgments and decision making. One paper about the numerical information processing, “Does 8/10 equal 80/100? The Effects of Scale Range on Judgments of Numerical Information” (with Prof. Robert S. Wyer and Prof. Yuhuang Zheng) is invited for 3^rd round revise and resubmit with minor revision at Journal of Experimental Psychology: General.

Your participation is warmly welcomed!