Date of Award

1996

Document Type

Dissertation

Degree Name

Doctor of Philosophy (PhD)

Department

Marketing (Business Administration)

First Advisor

Abhijit Biswas

Abstract

This dissertation was undertaken to contribute to the discipline of marketing by answering three important research questions: (1) "what are the effects of exaggerated tensile price claims as compared to plausible tensile price claims?", (2) "which alternative framework (assimilation contrast theory or the anchoring and adjustment framework) provides the most suitable explanation of the effects of exaggerated tensile price claims on consumer perceptions and discount expectancies?", and (3) "what role do two contextual variables (consistency and sale-rationale) play in moderating the relationship between the consumer price perception variables and the discount expectancies?". To this end, two experiments were performed with two studies (student and nonstudent) in each. For experiment one (consistency of price promotion behavior), a 3 (level of tensile price claim) x 2 (level of consistency) between group experimental design was implemented. For experiment 2 (sale-rationale in the advertisement), a 3 (level of tensile price claim) x 3 (type of sale-rationale) between group experimental design was implemented. In assessing the moderating role of sale-rationale in an advertisement, some results were found which seemed to indicate a positive effect for the use of a merchant sale-rationale in the student sample. For the consistency of retailer behavior, no results were found in either study. In assessing the effects of exaggerated tensile price claims, the findings indicate that the exaggerated tensile price claim has at least as much of an effect on consumer perceptions and discount expectancies as a high-plausible tensile price claim and a greater effect on consumer perceptions and discount expectancies than a low-plausible tensile price claim. In examining alternative frameworks of the assimilation contrast theory and the anchoring and adjustment framework which are used to depict the effects of exaggerated claims, the findings demonstrated that the anchoring and adjustment framework provided a more suitable explanation of the effects.

ISBN

9780591133547

Pages

250

DOI

10.31390/gradschool_disstheses.6250

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