Fixation Frequency Research Articles

Driver performance and attention allocation in use of logo signs on freeway exit ramps

The objective of this research was to quantify the effects of driver age, ramp signage configuration, including number of panels, logo format and sign familiarity, on driver performance and attention allocation when exiting freeways. Sixty drivers participated in a simulator study and analysis of variance models were used to assess response effects of the controlled manipulations. Results revealed elderly drivers to demonstrate worse performance and conservative control strategies as compared to middle-aged and young drivers. Elderly drivers also exhibited lower off-road fixation frequency and shorter off-road glance durations compared to middle-aged and young drivers. In general, drivers adopted a more conservative strategy when exposed to nine-panel signs as compared to six-panel signs and were more accurate in target detection when searching six-panels vs. nine and with familiar vs. unfamiliar logos. These findings provide an applicable guide for agency design of freeway ramp signage accounting for driver demographics.

Eye movements provide insights into the conscious use of context in prospective memory.

Prior research examining the impact of context on prospective memory (PM) has produced mixed results. Our study aimed to determine whether providing progressive context information could increase PM accuracy and reduce costs to ongoing tasks. Seventy-two participants made ongoing true/false judgements for simple sentences while maintaining a PM intention to respond differently to four memorised words. The context condition were informed of the trial numbers where PM targets could appear, and eye-tracking recorded trial number fixation frequency. The context condition showed reduced costs during irrelevant contexts, increased costs during relevant contexts, and had better PM accuracy compared to a standard condition that was not provided with context. The context condition also made an increasing number of trial number fixations leading up to relevant contexts, indicating the conscious use of context. Furthermore, this trial number checking was beneficial to PM, with participants who checked more frequently having better PM accuracy.

What is in the eye of preservice teachers while instructing? : an eye-tracking study about attention processes in different teaching situations

Professional vision research lacks behind regarding the investigation of attention processes in teaching action. In this study, eye movements of preservice teachers were assessed by mobile eye-tracking technology (MET). Eye movements of N = 7 preservice teachers while teaching in standardized instructional situations (M-Teach) and while teaching in classroom were recorded and analyzed with regard to fixation frequency and fixation duration. According to assumptions of expertise research, the results show that preservice teachers strongly differ in their focus of attention. Furthermore, they show that preservice teachers distribute their attention only over a few pupils while teaching. The findings provide important implications with regard to the question how to support attentional processes even at an early stage of professional development, for example by observing own MET videos.

Semantic and Syntactic Associations During Word Search Modulate the Relationship Between Attention and Subsequent Memory

ABSTRACTTwo experiments were conducted to investigate how linguistic information influences attention allocation in visual search and memory for words. In Experiment 1, participants searched for the synonym of a cue word among five words. The distractors included one antonym and three unrelated words. In Experiment 2, participants were asked to judge whether the five words presented on the screen comprise a valid sentence. The relationships among words were sentential, semantically related or unrelated. A memory recognition task followed. Results in both experiments showed that linguistically related words produced better memory performance. We also found that there were significant interactions between linguistic relation conditions and memorization on eye-movement measures, indicating that good memory for words relied on frequent and long fixations during search in the unrelated condition but to a much lesser extent in linguistically related conditions. We conclude that semantic and syntactic associations attenuate the link between overt attention allocation and subsequent memory performance, suggesting that linguistic relatedness can somewhat compensate for a relative lack of attention during word search.

Chronic Pain and Selective Attention to Pain Arousing Daily Activity Pictures: Evidence From an Eye Tracking Study.

Introduction:According to the pain research literature, attentional bias for pain is the mechanism responsible for the development and maintenance of fear of pain in patients with chronic pain. However, there is still some debate about the exact mechanism and the role of faster engagement versus difficulty in disengagement in the development of attentional bias.Methods:To investigate attentional bias in patients with chronic pain, we used an eye-tracker with the pictures of pain-provoking activities and compared the results with an age- and gender-matched group of pain-free participants. In addition, other measures of pain-related cognition and pain severity ratings were included to assess their contribution to the attentional bias toward pain-related information.Results:Calculating the frequency of the first fixations showed that both groups fixated initially on pain-provoking pictures compared to neutral one. Calculating the speed of fixations showed that control participants were faster in fixating on neutral stimuli, but patients with pain were faster in fixating on pain-provoking pictures, indicating a relative vigilance for the pain-related stimuli among them. These patients reported that the intensity of pain in the previous week was positively correlated with the speed of their fixation on the painful stimuli.Conclusion:Although these results did not provide unequivocal support for the vigilance-avoidance hypothesis, they are generally consistent with the results of studies using eye tracking technology. Furthermore, our findings put a question over characterization of attentional biases in patients with chronic pain by simply relating that to difficulty in disengaging from pain-related stimuli.

Visual Working Memory Resources Are Best Characterized as Dynamic, Quantifiable Mnemonic Traces

Visual working memory (VWM) is a construct hypothesized to store a small amount of accurate perceptual information that can be brought to bear on a task. Much research concerns the construct's capacity and the precision of the information stored. Two prominent theories of VWM representation have emerged: slot-based and continuous-resource mechanisms. Prior modeling work suggests that a continuous resource that varies over trials with variable capacity and a potential to make localization errors best accounts for the empirical data. Questions remain regarding the variability in VWM capacity and precision. Using a novel eye-tracking paradigm, we demonstrate that VWM facilitates search and exhibits effects of fixation frequency and recency, particularly for prior targets. Whereas slot-based memory models cannot account for the human data, a novel continuous-resource model does capture the behavioral and eye tracking data, and identifies the relevant resource as item activation.

Relationship between letter shape and character impression using eye movement measurement

Background Most of the studies that have investigated the relationship between letter shape and the letter impressions have used such evaluation methods as impression evaluations. It is possible to inspect impression changes quantitatively by shape the letter using an impression evaluation, but it is difficult to conduct a detailed examination where the letter elements affects the impression. Therefore, elements that affect the impression of Ming and Gothic styles are still unclear. Consequently, in this study we measure eye movements using an eye-tracking device on participants asked to evaluate letter impressions, and examine those elements that affect letter impressions. In particular, for hiragana letters of the Ming and Gothic styles, we measure eye movement fixation in term of duration and frequency when the participants evaluate those impression that can easily be affected by letter shape such as thickness, weight, adultness. Methods We tested our method with 29 Japanese participants who varied in age from 20 to 30 years. We selected two characters, つ and ほ, as letter simulations that show extreme differences in letter shape features such as the number of strokes and point of intersection in the 71 Japanese hiragana letters. We perform an impression evaluation of four types of letters using the Ming and Gothic styles for the aforementioned two characters. For this, we measure eye movement using an eye-tracking device. We attempt to inspect the results using an interview investigation. Results For the Ming and Gothic-styles of つ, the eye movement fixation duration is sufficiently long for the pressing down of the drafting department; we also measure, the frequency of eye movement fixations. For the Ming and Gothic styles of ほ, an extended eye movement fixation duration is measured for the part that contains much information, such as the central part and curved section of the letter, and many eye movement fixations also occur. In addition, as a result of investigating the point on which participants focus when evaluating letter impressions, we find that this is similar to the results of the eye movement measurement experiment. Conclusions We measure eye movement using an eye-tracking device to examine in greater detail the type of letter shape element that affects letter impressions when the participants evaluate such impressions in this study. From the results of this study, it is clear that eye movement measurement is an effective technique for investigating relationships that are more detailed than letter shape and letter impression. We believe that we can apply this technique when examining the relationship between letter shape and the impression of various letters, such as Korean, English, and the Japanese hiragana letters used in this study.

Typical visual search performance and atypical gaze behaviors in response to faces in Williams syndrome.

BackgroundEvidence indicates that individuals with Williams syndrome (WS) exhibit atypical attentional characteristics when viewing faces. However, the dynamics of visual attention captured by faces remain unclear, especially when explicit attentional forces are present. To clarify this, we introduced a visual search paradigm and assessed how the relative strength of visual attention captured by a face and explicit attentional control changes as search progresses.MethodsParticipants (WS and controls) searched for a target (butterfly) within an array of distractors, which sometimes contained an upright face. We analyzed reaction time and location of the first fixation—which reflect the attentional profile at the initial stage—and fixation durations. These features represent aspects of attention at later stages of visual search. The strength of visual attention captured by faces and explicit attentional control (toward the butterfly) was characterized by the frequency of first fixations on a face or butterfly and on the duration of face or butterfly fixations.ResultsAlthough reaction time was longer in all groups when faces were present, and visual attention was not dominated by faces in any group during the initial stages of the search, when faces were present, attention to faces dominated in the WS group during the later search stages. Furthermore, for the WS group, reaction time correlated with eye-movement measures at different stages of searching such that longer reaction times were associated with longer face-fixations, specifically at the initial stage of searching. Moreover, longer reaction times were associated with longer face-fixations at the later stages of searching, while shorter reaction times were associated with longer butterfly fixations.ConclusionsThe relative strength of attention captured by faces in people with WS is not observed at the initial stage of searching but becomes dominant as the search progresses. Furthermore, although behavioral responses are associated with some aspects of eye movements, they are not as sensitive as eye-movement measurements themselves at detecting atypical attentional characteristics in people with WS.

Keeping an eye on pain: investigating visual attention biases in individuals with chronic pain using eye-tracking methodology.

Attentional biases to painful stimuli are evident in individuals with chronic pain, although the directional tendency of these biases (ie, toward or away from threat-related stimuli) remains unclear. This study used eye-tracking technology, a measure of visual attention, to evaluate the attentional patterns of individuals with and without chronic pain during exposure to injury-related and neutral pictures. Individuals with (N=51) and without chronic pain (N=62) completed a dot-probe task using injury-related and neutral pictures while their eye movements were recorded. Mixed-design analysis of variance evaluated the interaction between group (chronic pain, pain-free) and picture type (injury-related, neutral). Reaction time results showed that regardless of chronic pain status, participants responded faster to trials with neutral stimuli in comparison to trials that included injury-related pictures. Eye-tracking measures showed within-group differences whereby injury-related pictures received more frequent fixations and visits, as well as longer average visit durations. Between-group differences showed that individuals with chronic pain had fewer fixations and shorter average visit durations for all stimuli. An examination of how biases change over the time-course of stimulus presentation showed that during the late phase of attention, individuals with chronic pain had longer average gaze durations on injury pictures relative to pain-free individuals. The results show the advantage of incorporating eye-tracking methodology when examining attentional biases, and suggest future avenues of research.

An Empirical User Study for Measuring the Influence of Colour Distance and Font Size in Map Reading Using Eye Tracking

The primary goal of this study is to empirically analyse the influence of colour distance and font size on map readability. We utilized eye-tracking to complement the classical usability metrics; thus, we studied performance metrics such as effectiveness (i.e. success, accuracy), efficiency (i.e. time to answer, task completion time), and selected eye tracking metrics fixation frequency, fixation duration and scanpath speed as well as conducting an area-of-interest (AOI) analysis to understand the performance and strategy issues that may be influenced by colour distance and font size during map reading. The user experiment was carried out in a controlled laboratory where participants were asked to conduct a visual search task and mark the correct answer with a mouse click on a static map on a computer screen. Collected data was analysed through descriptive and inferential statistics. Task completion times for the five tested colour distances show that as the colour distances grow larger, the relative differences in task completion times become statistically significant; empirically confirming our intuition that larger colour distances are better for map readability. The comparison of the scanpath speeds for the tested font sizes suggests that the medium font size leads to a more efficient search.

Air traffic control: Ocular metrics reflect cognitive complexity

The objective of the study was to evaluate effects of complexity on cognitive workload in a simulated air traffic control conflict detection task by means of eye movements recording. We manipulated two complexity factors, convergence angle and aircrafts minimum distance at closest approach, in a multidimensional workload assessment method based on psychophysiological, performance, and subjective measures. Conflict trials resulted more complex and time-consuming than no conflicts, requiring more frequent fixations and saccades. Moreover, large saccades showed reduced burst power with higher task complexity. A motion-based and a ratio-based strategy were suggested for conflicts and no conflicts on the basis of ocular metrics analysis: aircrafts differential speed and distance to convergence point at trial start were considered determinant for strategy adoption. Relevance to industryEye metrics measurement for online workload assessment enhances better identification of workload-inducing scenarios and adopted strategy for traffic management. System design, as well as air traffic control operators training programs, might benefit from on line workload measurement.

A study on the relationships between different presentation modes of graphical icons and users’ attention

With the vigorous development of applications (App), graphical user interfaces (GUI) have been widely found in computers and handheld devices. This study aimed to explore the relationships between different presentation modes of graphical icons and users’ attention. An eye tracker was employed to measure each participant’s experimental data; in addition, subjective evaluation of attention was conducted. Thus, the optimum presentation mode attracting the most attention might be determined. The experiment was designed to investigate two variables: icon composition and background. Through permutation and combination, six presentation modes were obtained as follows: line + positive background (M1), plane + positive background (M2), line + negative background (M3), plane + negative background (M4), line + no background (M5), and plane + no background (M6). Thirty-six participants were requested to view thirty stimuli, or the contour drawings of graphical icons, presented simultaneously in six modes mentioned above. The participants’ fixation duration, fixation frequency, and subjective evaluation of attention were analyzed through two-way ANOVA. The analytical results showed that in terms of the three performance indicators above, M4 performed the best among the six presentation modes. Moreover, regarding icon composition, planes performed better than lines in terms of the three performance indicators. As for background, negative background performed the best in terms of the three performance indicators, positive background ranked second, and no background performed the worst. The findings can serve as a reference when icons are researched or designed in the future.

Apathy and Attentional Biases in Alzheimer's Disease.

Apathy, one of the most prevalent neuropsychiatric symptoms in Alzheimer's disease (AD), can be difficult to assess as cognition deteriorates. There is a need for more objective assessments that do not rely on patient insight, communicative capacities, or caregiver observation. We measured visual scanning behavior, using an eye-tracker, to explore attentional bias in the presence of competing stimuli to assess apathy in AD patients. Mild-to-moderate AD patients (Standardized Mini-Mental Status Examination, sMMSE >10) were assessed for apathy (Neuropsychiatric Inventory [NPI] apathy, Apathy Evaluation Scale [AES]). Participants were presented with 16 slides, each containing 4 images of different emotional themes (2 neutral, 1 social, 1 dysphoric). The duration of time spent, and fixation frequency on images were measured. Of the 36 AD patients (14 females, age = 78.2±7.8, sMMSE = 22.4±3.5) included, 17 had significant apathy (based on NPI apathy ≥4) and 19 did not. These groups had comparable age and sMMSE. Repeated-measures analysis of covariance models, controlling for total NPI, showed group (apathetic versus non-apathetic) by image (social versus dysphoric) interactions for duration (F(1,32) = 4.31, p = 0.046) and fixation frequency (F(1,32) = 11.34, p = 0.002). Apathetic patients demonstrated reduced duration and fixation frequency on social images compared with non-apathetic patients. Additionally, linear regression models suggest that more severe apathy predicted decreasing fixation frequency on social images (R2 = 0.26, Adjusted R2 = 0.19, F(3,32) = 3.65, p = 0.023). These results suggest that diminished attentional bias toward social-themed stimuli is a marker of apathy in AD. Measurements of visual scanning behavior may have the potential to predict and monitor treatment response in apathy.

Freezing of Gait in Parkinson's Disease: An Overload Problem?

Freezing of gait (FOG) is arguably the most severe symptom associated with Parkinson’s disease (PD), and often occurs while performing dual tasks or approaching narrowed and cluttered spaces. While it is well known that visual cues alleviate FOG, it is not clear if this effect may be the result of cognitive or sensorimotor mechanisms. Nevertheless, the role of vision may be a critical link that might allow us to disentangle this question. Gaze behaviour has yet to be carefully investigated while freezers approach narrow spaces, thus the overall objective of this study was to explore the interaction between cognitive and sensory-perceptual influences on FOG. In experiment #1, if cognitive load is the underlying factor leading to FOG, then one might expect that a dual-task would elicit FOG episodes even in the presence of visual cues, since the load on attention would interfere with utilization of visual cues. Alternatively, if visual cues alleviate gait despite performance of a dual-task, then it may be more probable that sensory mechanisms are at play. In compliment to this, the aim of experiment#2 was to further challenge the sensory systems, by removing vision of the lower-limbs and thereby forcing participants to rely on other forms of sensory feedback rather than vision while walking toward the narrow space. Spatiotemporal aspects of gait, percentage of gaze fixation frequency and duration, as well as skin conductance levels were measured in freezers and non-freezers across both experiments. Results from experiment#1 indicated that although freezers and non-freezers both walked with worse gait while performing the dual-task, in freezers, gait was relieved by visual cues regardless of whether the cognitive demands of the dual-task were present. At baseline and while dual-tasking, freezers demonstrated a gaze behaviour that neglected the doorway and instead focused primarily on the pathway, a strategy that non-freezers adopted only when performing the dual-task. Interestingly, with the combination of visual cues and dual-task, freezers increased the frequency and duration of fixations toward the doorway, compared to non-freezers. These results suggest that although increasing demand on attention does significantly deteriorate gait in freezers, an increase in cognitive demand is not exclusively responsible for freezing (since visual cues were able to overcome any interference elicited by the dual-task). When vision of the lower limbs was removed in experiment#2, only the freezers’ gait was affected. However, when visual cues were present, freezers’ gait improved regardless of the dual-task. This gait behaviour was accompanied by greater amount of time spent looking at the visual cues irrespective of the dual-task. Since removing vision of the lower-limbs hindered gait even under low attentional demand, restricted sensory feedback may be an important factor to the mechanisms underlying FOG.

보편적 주시특성을 반영한 시야각 보정 공간구조 분석

The universal nature of humans is formed by the view angle and the visibility range. However, the majority of theories on spatial structure analysis based on the visual perception do neither reflect the view angle nor consider only the flat view angle. Some theories that reflect them is a theory where the part included in the view angle and the part excluded in the view angle have been separated in a dichotomous way, excluding the universal characteristics of humans. This study applied an observing probability to a 3-D visibility analysis theory by conducting a eye-tracking experiment, empirically determining the limits of the field of view, and deriving the observing probability by view angle. In addition, it attempted to identify the probability by manufacturing an application of spacial, visual perception analysis and applying the concept of multiple frustum culling. For the characteristics of observation, the data were measured and collected regarding the walking course for 3 minutes for an optional space, aimed for 33 people as subjects. Subsequently, the data were prepared by analyzing the observation fixation frequency probability.

Obsessive–compulsive symptoms and attentional bias: An eye-tracking methodology

Background and objectivesCognitive models suggest that attentional biases are integral in the maintenance of obsessive-compulsive symptoms (OCS). Such biases have been established experimentally in anxiety disorders; however, the evidence is unclear in Obsessive Compulsive disorder (OCD). In the present study, an eye-tracking methodology was employed to explore attentional biases in relation to OCS. MethodsA convenience sample of 85 community volunteers was assessed on OCS using the Yale-Brown Obsessive Compulsive Scale-self report. Participants completed an eye-tracking paradigm where they were exposed to OCD, Aversive and Neutral visual stimuli. Indices of attentional bias were derived from the eye-tracking data. ResultsSimple linear regressions were performed with OCS severity as the predictor and eye-tracking measures of the different attentional biases for each of the three stimuli types were the criterion variables. Findings revealed that OCS severity moderately predicted greater frequency and duration of fixations on OCD stimuli, which reflect the maintenance attentional bias. No significant results were found in support of other biases. LimitationsInterpretations based on a non-clinical sample limit the generalisability of the conclusions, although use of such samples in OCD research has been found to be comparable to clinical populations. Future research would include both clinical and sub-clinical participants. ConclusionsResults provide some support for the theory of maintained attention in OCD attentional biases, as opposed to vigilance theory. Individuals with greater OCS do not orient to OCD stimuli any faster than individuals with lower OCS, but once a threat is identified, these individuals allocate more attention to OCS-relevant stimuli..

The effect of communicational signals on drivers' subjective appraisal and visual attention during interactive driving scenarios

Communicational signals (e.g. lights and horns) are imperative for on-road interaction between drivers. The aim of the present study was to explore how these signals affect drivers' subjective appraisal and visual attention, and how drivers decode the signals from other vehicles within a variety of interactive contexts. Twenty-five male participants (20 valid samples, ranging from 21 to 29 years of age) were recruited to watch film clips of pre-designed interactive scenarios involving common vehicle signals in a full-view simulator (i.e. including road view and mirror views). Participants' attitudes towards the interacting vehicle's behaviours, emotional responses, fixation metrics, and decoded meanings were recorded and analysed. The majority of tested signals, with the exception of the horn used in the behind vehicles, significantly improved drivers' attitudes and pleasure. All signals significantly increased emotional arousal, as well as the total fixation time and mean fixation duration on the interacting vehicle. When the interacting vehicle was visible in mirrors, the signal usage significantly increased the fixation frequency towards it. Meanwhile, a significant decrease in total fixation time and mean fixation duration on the road was reported. The results also demonstrated that the decoded signal contained several meanings simultaneously depending on both the signal type and its interactive context. This study quantified the communication process via vehicular signals under typical situations involving other vehicles, and also suggested new ideas on how to establish more advanced communication between drivers.

ELECTROOCULOGRAPHY BASED READING SPEED ANALYSIS AS AN ASSISTIVE TOOL

Dyslexia is a well-known reading disorder that involves difficulty in fluent reading, decoding and processing of words despite adequate intelligence. It is common that the reading speed of dyslexic patients is lower than their normal counterparts, because of slow letter and word processing. Eye movements in dyslexic patients are significantly different from that of normal individuals, in terms of the presence of frequent fixations and stares in the former. This work proposes a Human Computer Interactive system to assist individuals having low reading speed to increase their reading speed by the analysis of eye movements. Eye movement data for different reading speeds is recorded using a laboratory developed Electrooculogram acquisition system. From the data, Adaptive Autoregressive (AAR) parameters, Band Power Estimates and Wavelet Coefficients are extracted as signal features. Reading speeds are classified using different pattern classifiers from which an average accuracy of 94.67% over all classes and participants is obtained using Radial Basis Function (RBF) Support Vector Machine (SVM) Tree classifier and AAR Parameters as features. Friedman test is done to select the best classifier. The trained classifier is used to recognize the reading speeds of a set of new normal individuals. If the reading speeds are less than a preset threshold, that individual is trained repeatedly for 10 days for improvement. An improvement of reading speed is observed by the decrease in the misclassification rate from 45.1% to 9.92% in 10 days for the fastest speed (1 sentence/2 s) over all the subjects. This work is carried out on healthy individuals. However, the results reveal that the proposed system may also be used for training and assisting children with dyslexia or other similar reading disabilities children.

Discriminating classes of sequential and qualitative colour schemes

ABSTRACTWe present an analysis of the influence of colour distance on the user experience with choropleth and chorochromatic maps. We systematically evaluated five sequential and five qualitative colour schemes in a two-stage user experiment. At first, we conducted an online study to obtain performance metrics accuracy and response time from a large, heterogeneous population. Following this, in a controlled lab study with eye-tracking, we re-examined the findings from the online study for a subset of experimental stimuli and further assessed the user experience through an analysis of their visual behaviour. In this process, along with accuracy and response time, eye-tracking metrics fixation frequency, fixation duration and scanpath speed as well as a gaze transition analysis were utilized. In both experiments, participants were asked to compare two areas with controlled colour distances between them, and decide whether these areas were of the same colour. Results suggest that we are able to discriminate narrower colour distances than commonly used in practice, however, not as narrow as suggested in previous literature.

How Does Social Influence Really Affect Consumer Decisions? Insights from an Eye Tracking Study

Social influence shapes consumers’ decision-making process by observing other consumers’ actions. Having shown that social influence affects consumers’ actual purchases (beyond price and discount) using longitudinal secondary data from Groupon, we conducted a lab experiment, including eye tracking, to examine how different information stimuli (i.e., social influence stimulus and discount stimulus) indirectly affect consumers’ purchasing decisions by shaping their visual attention. Using eye tracking, we were able to capture consumers’ eye movements, allowing us to identify which information stimuli (i.e., areas of interest on a webpage) consumers look at, the duration of their attention on each stimulus (i.e., fixation duration), and frequency of viewing (i.e., fixation frequency) on these information stimuli, thus enabling us to identify the exact visual information that influence their purchase decisions. By objectively measuring visual attention (measured with fixation duration and fixation frequency), we can obtain a much richer understanding of how exactly consumers cognitively process information and subsequently make decisions. We found that consumers have longer visual attention duration and check existing sales more frequently despite a smaller discount level. Interestingly, instead of a direct effect, information stimuli indirectly affect consumer purchasing decisions via their effects on visual attention. Specifically, visual attention (fixation duration and fixation frequency) on the social influence stimulus plays a mediating role (through memory recall), whereas visual attention (fixation frequency) on the discount stimulus plays a moderating role in the positive relationship between the information stimulus and purchasing decisions. The findings imply that visual attention to information stimuli has diverse (both mediating and moderating) roles in shaping consumers’ purchasing decisions. We discuss theoretical, methodological, and managerial contributions and implications of our research.