Chapter 6

Attitudes Based on Low Consumer Effort

Learning Objectives~ Ch.6

To understand:1. Issues in changing consumer attitudes when processing

is low effort.

2. The role of unconscious influences on attitudes.

3. How consumers form beliefs based on low processing effort & efforts to influence those beliefs.

4. Ways consumers form attitudes through affective reactions when cognitive effort is low.

Learning Objectives~ Ch.6

1. Outline some of the issues marketers face in trying to change consumers’ attitudes when processing effort is low.

2. Explain the role of unconscious influences on attitudes and behavior in low effort situations.

3. Discuss how consumers form beliefs based on low processing effort and explain how marketers can influence those beliefs.

4. Describe how consumers form attitudes through affective reactions when cognitive effort is low.

5. Highlight how marketers can use the communication source, message, and context to influence consumers’ feelings and attitudes when processing effort is low.

High-Effort vs. Low-Effort Routes to Persuasion

Peripheral route to persuasion

Peripheral cues

Attitude Formation and Change: Low Consumer Effort

Low Consumer Effort: Beer, Other Examples?

©adage.com; thestlouisegotist.com

Unconscious Influences on Consumers’ Attitudes

Thin-Slice Judgments

Body Feedback

Cognitive Bases of Attitudes When Consumer Effort Is Low

Simple inferences

Heuristics

Frequency heuristic

Truth effect

Factors Influencing Cognitive Attitudes

Communication source

– CredibilityMessage

- Category- and schema-consistent information

- Many message arguments

- Simple messages

- Involving messages

- Self-referencingMessage context/repetition

Marketing Implications

Marketers can increase self-referencing by:

– Directly instructing consumers

– Using the word “you” in an ad

– Asking rhetorical questions

– Using visuals of common consumer situations

Mystery Ads (wait and bait)

Other techniques (avatars, scratch & sniff)

Message Context & Repetition

Can affect strength and salience of consumers’ beliefs

Incidental learning

Truth effect

Context congruent ads

Beware of wearout effects

Affective Bases of Attitudes

Mere exposure effect—wearout

Classical conditioning– Unconditioned

• Stimulus- backward• Response

– Conditioned stimulus—forward

– Concurrent conditioning

Classical Conditioning

Attitude Toward the Ad Dual Mediation Hypothesis

Mood—Categories of Affective Responses

SEVA

Deactivation feelings

Social affection

Factors Influencing Affective Attitudes

Communication source

– Physical attractiveness- Likeability- Celebrity- Sport

Message

-Pleasant pictures-Music-Humor-Sex-Emotional content-Context

Questions?