The influence of product contagion effect on consumer evaluation: The moderating role of cognitive style

Abstract

Contagion theory stated that consumer product perceptions can be affected by a transfer of properties from one object to another. This study was performed using candy and bitter gourd as the experimental sources. Moreover, we employed 233 students to participate in two experiments and used a 2 × 2 × 2 + 1 between-subjects design to measure the contagion effect. This research focused on how different source properties and presentation types affected consumer evaluations and how cognitive style moderated the result for positive versus negative contagion. Results revealed no significant difference between objects and photos. However, displaying the source and target product simultaneously produced a stronger contagion effect than displaying the source and target product sequentially. In addition, cognitive style moderated two factors in positive contagion. For source property, a photo had a stronger contagion effect than an object among field-dependence consumers, but there was no difference among field-independence consumers. For presentation type, simultaneous presentation created a stronger contagion effect than sequential presentation among field-independence consumers, but produced no difference among field-dependence consumers. Hence, this was the first study to discuss the personality on the contagion effect. Based on the obtained results, marketers could display their products in a better way. Key words: Contagion effect, cognitive style, source property, presentation type.