The influence of nonconscious affect on attitudes and behaviors.
Published: 2006
Language: eng
Number of pages: 162
ISBN-13: 9780494219416
Description: We know that consumers are often unaware of the actual stimuli that influence their decisions (e.g., Nisbett & Wilson 1977) and there is growing interest in examining the differential impact of implicit and explicit attitudes on behavior (for a recent review see Gawronski & Bodenhausen in press). This dissertation investigates the mechanisms and boundary conditions of the influence of implicit attitudes based on nonconscious affect on consumers' attitudes and choice decisions. This research is unique in that participants had access to nonconscious affect and conflicting but relevant product information, a situation which we believe is realistic of what commonly occurs in daily life and provides evidence in support of the idea that there are situations in which nonconscious affect provides the primary basis for attitudes and choice decisions.The second essay investigates the relatively unexplored area of how explicit attitudes emerge from the interaction of product attribute beliefs and nonconscious affect. This essay illustrates that participants do not rely solely on either product attribute information or nonconscious affect but under certain situations follow an additive strategy and incorporate nonconscious affect into their explicitly reported attitudes. We also report evidence of both a direct and indirect effect of nonconscious affect on explicit attitudes. For instance, when nonconscious affect is accessible during exposure to product attribute information, it not only influences participants' liking for a brand, but also shapes how participants construe the product category. The dissertation also includes a discussion of alternative theoretical perspectives on the sources of implicit attitudes and their relationship with explicitly formed attitudes.This dissertation consists of two essays which establish that nonconscious affect plays an important role in consumer decisions. The nonconscious affect was created by conditioning two hypothetical brands with either positive or negative stimuli in which participants were unaware of the contingencies. The first essay demonstrates that if consumers do not form an explicit attitude based on product attribute information, they will rely on an implicit conditioned attitude when making a brand choice. Furthermore, this effect is a robust phenomenon, and is not dependent on low levels of motivation and opportunity.
Notes: Source: Dissertation Abstracts International, Volume: 68-01, Section: A, page: 0268.

Thesis (Ph.D.)--University of Toronto, 2006.

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