A paradox exists in our understanding of consumer psychology and behavior. There is a strong positive relationship between familiarity and liking that resides at the core of consumer psychology and behavior (e.g., Monahan, Murphy, & Zajonc, 2000; Monin, 2003; Monin & Oppenheimer, 2005; Zajonc, 1968; 2001). Yet, consumer also prefer novelty (e.g., Bornstein, Kale, & Cornell, 1990; Gillebaart, Förster, & Rotteveel, 2012; Rubera & Kirca, 2012; Talke, Salomo, Wieringa, & Lutz, 2009). For instance, they favor brands more after repeated exposure (Fang, Singh, & Ahluwalia, 2007; Ferraro, Bettman, & Chartrand, 2009), but excessive exposure results in satiation and boredom (Bornstein et al., 1990). Similarly, consumers are both neophiliacs and neophobics who hold a dualistic tendency to approach and avoid innovations, respectively (for a review, see van Trijp & van Kleef, 2008). In fact, recent research on the psychology of familiarity failed to coincide on whether people prefer familiarity or novelty (Norton, Frost, & Ariely, 2011; 2013; Norton et al., 2007; Reis, Maniaci, Caprariello, Eastwick, & Finkel, 2011; Ullrich, Krueger, Brod, & Groschupf, 2013). In this theoretical paper, we propose that a missing piece to this paradox is our understanding of people’s affective motivations to approach novelty. Interest is an emotion that motivates people’s curiosity to approach novel, complex, but not necessarily pleasant stimuli (e.g., Turner & Silvia, 2006). Thus, the purpose of this paper is to shed light on the relevance of interest to our understanding of consumer psychology and behavior. Specifically, liking (contentment and joy) motivates people to favor familiarity, whereas interest motivates consumers to favor novelty. Specifically we use an appraisal theory perspective to differentiate the emotional and motivational quality of interest from liking (contentment and joy). Furthermore, we show how interest and its related appraisal may explain the boundary conditions of the familiarity-liking association that are not yet explained in the existing literature. Practical and theoretical implications of the differentiation between the familiarity-liking and interest-novelty association in consumer psychology and marketing are discussed.

The purpose of this paper is to investigate whether color as stimuli can affects underwear choice based on consumers’ EEG recording as biological response to elicit preferences towards underwear products. The study employs applications of neuroscience methods to analyze the physiological choice process. There are 20 underwear buyers were asked to evaluate several underwear colors (red, white, blue, brown, grey and black) by using wireless EEG headset with 6 channels to collect EEG signals from participants’ frontal, temporal and occipital brain areas that can gives us a measure to estimate consumers’ choice. The result indicated there was a clear and significant change (p < 0.05) of EEG brain waves activities of right and left hemisphere in the frontal (F3 and F4), temporal (P7 and P8), and occipital (O1 and O2) brain areas when participants indicated their preferred color. Additionally, based on the results female consumer prefers underwear which has red color while male consumer prefers white color. This research would essentially contribute to enrich marketing research method by using more advanced experimental designs rather than traditional marketing research methods.

The overarching aim of this paper is to show how a marketing perspective, together with an analysis of dressing and clothes on groups in our society, can help to explain such tangible issues as the recidivism sequence for criminals, this being an important factor for the crime rate in western countries. The problem is visualized in two ways: firstly though statistics from The Swedish Crime Survey, 2015, and secondly by in-depth description of systems of dressing and deporting of oneself—one’s demeanor—complemented with interviews with criminals showing how the identity is drifting into the form of authenticity, which is elaborated as a marketing communication problem in this paper. The analysis is based on a marketing communication perspective in conjunction with individual and group authenticity issues. In sum, it is about the individual recidivism in getting the authenticity of criminality. This means that the identity is visibly anchoring itself in the form of a criminal authenticity. The study boils down to a statement, which can be coined “The longer a person is in prison, the greater the probability of recidivism into criminal activity for that same person.” The conclusion is that we cannot-paradoxically, as it may seem-cure the recidivism problem in the world of criminals since one cannot change an authenticity-authentic identity-well anchored through personal outfits, thus communicating to the society at large. Finally, we provide reasons why the correctional institutions still have great difficulties to bring down the criminal recidivism rate.

Introduction Corporate social responsibility (CSR) has become a necessary tool for firms to develop competitive advantage (Duarte, 2010) as CRS is increasingly valued and demanded by stakeholders (consumers, investors, employees, etc) who see it as representing the civic behaviour of the companies (Prior, Surroca, & Tribo, 2008)..This study looks at the relationship between CSR and customer retention (CR) to answer the question: how does CSR influence CR? The study tries to answer the question by exploring the relationship between CSR and CR toward developing a process model to show how CSR leads to CR, using path diagrams and structural equation modeling. Data was collected through a questionnaire that drew from established measurement instruments, supplemented by primary research. Senior executives of three telecom firms in Ghana were sampled for in-depth interviews towards building a pool of relevant items for questionnaire development. Data from 681 completed questionnaire responses were subjected to structural equation modelling (SEM) to estimate the relationships among relevant constructs and variables. Findings/Conclusions The findings showed a direct relationship between CSR and customer retention as well as an indirect relationship between CSR and customer retention through corporate image (CI), perceived service quality (PSQ) and customer perceived value (CPV). The estimates for Goodness-of-fit indices of the CFA show that; GFI=0.934, AGFI=0.912, CFI=0.957, and RMSEA=0.055, indicating a good fit. The standardised estimates for Goodness-of-fit indices of the SEM show that; GFI=0.933, AGFI=0.912, CFI=0.955, and RMSEA=0.055, indicating a model of good fit. The study challenges theoretical notions with respect to the nature of influence that CSR brings to bear on corporate performance and invites further theoretical inquiry into how CSR inform corporate performance. The study provides the basis for further empirical research work in the area of examining the nature and relative importance of CSR criteria that customers consider in evaluating their perception of companies and behavioural intentions. It also serves as bases to stimulate research using data from different geographical settings to give avenue for the generalisation of the model to extend the CSR and CR theories. The study also furnishes managers with the knowledge that CSR is very necessary for customer retention strategies but it is not a means to an end on its own. It therefore suggests the various components in the process should not be underestimated as it has shown that CSR by itself does not lead to corporate performance in terms of customer retention. Firms may therefore want to improve on the intermediary components to increase corporate performance in terms of customer retention.

Introduction As many as 44 million people cannot read a newspaper or fill out a job application and another 50 million more cannot read or comprehend above the eighth grade level in the U.S. (Kirsch, Jungeblut, Jenkins, & Kolstad 1993). While basic literacy rates may increase, the percent of adults who have sufficient literacy skills to function adequately in that society may decrease. But a more serious problem that the US is experiencing is the increasing number of people who are aliterate. The aliteracy phenomenon is “increasing numbers of capable readers who are regularly choosing not to read”(Mikulecky, 1978, p.3). Aliteracy is on the rise internationally (Merga, 2014). Less than 66% of Hong Kong’s citizens (Anon., 2011) and less than 50% of Italians (Istat, 2010) reported reading a book in 2010. Aliterate consumer can read. However, while aliterate consumers are capable readers, they may display similar reading outcomes (i.e. poor comprehension) to illiterate or low-literate consumers (i.e., consumers who are not capable readers). We explore underlying reading processes of aliterate consumers from a level of processing perspective (Craik & Lockhart, 1972; Greenwald & Leavitt, 1984). Conceptual Background and Hypotheses Level of processing ranges from shallow to deep. Shallow processing consists of attending to phonetic and orthographic components. Deeper processing involves using semantic processing (Craik & Lockhart, 1972). Greater depth of processing thus entails a higher degree of cognitive involvement for the purpose of comprehension. Deeper processing at the semantic task level results in longer processing time and better memory performance (Gardiner, 1974). Conversely, when readers engage in shallow processing, memory performance is reduced (Treisman, 1964, 1969). For instance, in an advertising context, Saegert (1979) finds that deeper processing of ads resulted in greater recall and recognition. As detailed, literature on reading suggests that aliterate processors do not process written texts at a deep level, preferring instead to skim and scan (Duchei & Mealy 1993). In the domain of consumer behavior in general, and product warnings in particular, consumer aliteracy suggests a shallow level of processing of written marketing materials that will be observable from both a process and an outcome standpoint. In terms of process, aliterate consumers lower level of processing will be manifest in less time spent processing product warnings. As an outcome, comprehension of written product warnings should decrease as consumer aliteracy increases and time spent processing decreases. These baseline differences between more- and less- aliterate consumers is formalized as Hypotheses 1-3. H1. Consumers with higher consumer aliteracy levels will spend less time processing written product warnings. H2. Consumers with higher consumer aliteracy levels will have lower comprehension of written product warnings. H3. Time spent processing written product warnings will mediate the relationship between consumer aliteracy and comprehension of product warnings. Method Sample and Procedure One hundred sixty-one students from a large Southeastern university participated in an online survey. The sample was 51 % female and 57% white/Caucasian. Participants were asked to review an ad for fabric softener and then asked to respond to ten comprehension questions regarding the product warning that was prominent in the ad. Respondents were also asked to evaluate the extent to which they agreed (i.e., seven-point scale) with each of the five-items of the aliteracy scale (Jae & Ferguson 2010). Finally, participants were asked to complete a reading ability scale (Reading Level Indicator, 2000) and demographic information. Stimuli Two versions of ads for a fictitious laundry softener product called “Visatia”were used as the experimental stimuli. Participants were randomly assigned to one of the ad conditions. Both ads featured a picture of a product package a statement about the product’s performance (e.g., you can have a fresh feeling every day with Visatia), and product warning information. The ads differed only in the amount and complexity of information provided regarding product performance. A longer and more difficult version of the product claims and a shorter and less complex version of the product claims were used to ensure that differences between more- and less-aliterate consumers did not arise only for ads of a certain length or complexity. Measures Ten comprehension questions were designed to test how well participants understood the product-warning statements in the ads. Each question offered four answer choices. To measure overall comprehension, each question was scored 1 for the correct answer and 0 for the incorrect answer. The five-item aliteracy scale (Jae & Ferguson, 2010) was measured with seven- point Likert scales (strongly disagree/strongly agree). Participants a reading ability test comprised of twenty vocabulary and twenty sentence completion questions (Reading level indicator, 2000). Participants’time spent in reviewing the ads containing the product warnings was measured electronically. Results The average participant spent 30.29 seconds reviewing the stimuli (e.g., product warning), earned 7 out of 10 on product warning comprehension, and achieved 35 out of 40 on the reading ability index. The Consumer Aliteracy Scale demonstrated high reliability (Cronbach’s alpha = .822). Data were collapsed across ad length/complexity conditions after failing to observe differences in processing across the two ads (p > .1). Path analysis was used to test Hypotheses 1-3. Path analysis allowed us to test multiple relationships consecutively and to test for mediating relationships (Iacobucci, Saldanha, & Deng, 2007). The model was estimated with direct and indirect paths included. The fit statistics were acceptable (i.e., χ2= 10.65, df = 13, p = 0.64, CFI = 1.00, RMSEA = 0.00, SRMR = 0.03) (Hu & Bentler, 1999). To test Hypotheses 1-3, including the mediating effect of time on the aliteracy—product warning comprehension relationship, we estimated the direct effects of aliteracy on product warning comprehension, as well as, the indirect effects of aliteracy on time and of time on product warning comprehension simultaneously. Hypothesis two is supported as aliteracy has a direct, negative effect on product warning comprehension (γ21=-0.245, p <.01). The indirect path of aliteracy to time and time to product warning were also significant. Specifically, Hypothesis three is supported in that consumers who reported higher levels of aliteracy spent less time viewing the product warnings (γ11=-0.191, p <.05), and consumers who spent less time viewing the product warnings scored lower on product warning comprehension (β21= 0.294, p <.01). With significant indirect paths, a significant direct path, and a significant Sobel z (i.e., z =2.013, p <.05), we conclude that time spent viewing product warning partially mediates the relationship between aliteracy and product warning comprehension. The Hypothesis three is supported. Correlation analysis indicates that aliteracy level is not correlated with reading ability level (i.e., r = -.03, p =.70). This suggests evidence that aliteracy is not a function of reading ability. Discussion While aliteracy may be a growing phenomenon, the extant research on the topic is limited. From the viewpoint of consumers, aliteracy could lead to unwise product selection, dangerous misuse of products, product dissatisfaction, and wasted time and money. Aliteracy, by definition, is not an ability issue rather motivation issue. Even though capable readers, aliterate consumers reading comprehension is significantly below non-aliterate consumers, a similar outcome pattern observed for low-literate consumers relative to high-literate consumers (Jae & DelVecchio 2004). Due to their lack of reading habit, aliterate consumers do not take full advantage of available information in the marketplace. The current study demonstrates that aliterate consumers display significantly different reading outcomes relative to non-aliterate consumers; differences that are not driven by reading ability. Aliterate consumers spend less time reading and, in turn, achieve a lower level of comprehension of written product warnings relative to non-aliterate consumers. Thus, the study reveals that aliterate consumers may mirror the reading outcomes of low-literate consumers in reading product warnings who demonstrate poor comprehension relative to literate consumers.

Introduction The term “coping”refers to the actions or thoughts that people use to deal with stressful encounters (Folkman, Lazarus, Gruen, & DeLongis, 1986). Coping strategies are adopted to change the stressed person-environment relationship by either confronting and/or by regulating the emotions (Lazarus & Folkman, 1987). Research focusing on coping mechanisms has been a prolific area of study, emerged from a wide range of disciplines including psychology, sociology, and anthropology. However, for marketing researchers, questions still remain about the issue of how coping strategies are manifested in everyday consumption contexts. This represents an important area of research in that consumer coping behavior can determine critical post-purchase outcomes such as re-patronage intention, repurchase intention, and word of mouth (Raghunathan & Pham, 1999). When a service failure occurs, consumers frequently experience negative emotions and make decisions under emotionally taxing conditions (Yi & Baumgartner, 2004). Numerous scholars have made attempts to understand various consumption-related emotions and subsequent conditions corresponding to them (e.g., Raghunathan & Pham, 1999; Richins, 1997; Sujan et al., 1999). However, despite the large volume of studies focusing on consumer emotions, very few studies have examined the relationships between negative emotions with consumer coping strategies (Yi & Baumgartner, 2004). With that in mind, the primary aim of this conceptual paper was to propose a model that delineates consumer coping mechanisms derived from negatives emotions in a service failure and recovery context. Conceptual Model Coping strategies are closely linked with an individual’s attempt to manage a given stressful environment (Lazarus, 1991). Lazarus and Folkman (1984) defined coping as “constantly changing cognitive and behavioral efforts to manage specific external and/or internal demands that are appraised as taxing or exceeding the resources of the person”(p. 141). Menaghan (1983, p. 159) defined coping efforts as “specific actions (covert or overt) taken in specific situations that are intended to reduce a given problem or stress.”Duhachek (2005) defined coping construct as “the set of cognitive and behavioral processes initiated by consumers in response to emotionally arousing, stress inducing interactions with the environment aimed at bringing forth more desirable emotional states and reduced levels of stress.”Thus, the key aspects of coping includes a consequence of emotion, a dynamic process, and behavior and emotional domains of consumer responses (Duhachek, 2005). Implicit in this conceptualization is the idea that links the emotions aroused from a particular circumstance, coping strategies, and subsequent behaviors. As shown in Figure 1, our conceptual model classifies a wide range of negative emotions generated by a service failure that are linked to a set of consumer coping strategies. This will in turn influence subsequent consumer post-purchase behaviors. The behaviors will be either retaliatory (vindictive WOM, brand switching, complaining) or conciliatory (positive WOM, re-patronage intention, repurchase intention) responses. Related Literature When an individual encounters a stressful event, different negative emotions are triggered according to one’s distinct appraisals of the situation (Lazarus, 1991). These appraisals, in turn, affect how the consumer responds to the situation emotionally and behaviorally. These emotions remain powerful until the emotion eliciting problems are resolved. Proposition 1. Cognitive appraisal of the service failure situation evokes negative emotions. While some studies use combined negative emotions to explain resultant consumer behavior, others suggest separate emotion inventories (Lerner & Keltner, 2001) as different emotions trigger huge variation in cognition. Consumer negative emotions that are associated with a service failure condition can be categorized into several subsets (Watson & Clark, 1992). Many studies have utilized a limited number of negative emotions to explain consumer behavior in a service failure context (Nguyen & McColl-Kennedy, 2003). Bonifield and Cole (2006) used an appraisal-tendency framework to predict the underlying mechanism of anger and regret, associated with consumers’appraisals about service failure and their effects on post-purchase behaviors. Yi and Baumgartner (2004) focused on four negative emotions of anger, disappointment, regret, and worry in a purchase context to investigate their linkages to consumer coping strategies. Further, Tronvoll (2011) identified a set of negative emotions experienced in unfavorable service experiences leading to consumer complaint such as shame, sadness, fear, anger, and frustration. Although some marketing theorists consider the emotion of frustration to be an overlap with anger, they can be distinct emotions, especially in the context of service failure, because blaming someone else is different from blaming no particular others (Roseman, 1991). Therefore, the subsequent behavior and adapting coping strategy may differ. Thus, this study distinguished frustration separated from anger. Building on the aforementioned research, this study identified five different categories of negative emotions that are frequently found in a purchase-related situation: anger, frustration, disappointment, regret, and anxiety. Anger associates with feeling of attacking someone or yelling, resulting from an individual to be blamed on of the situation (Lazarus, 1991). Frustration tends to occur when people attribute a goal incongruent event to situational factors (Roseman, 1991). Disappointment refers to the feeling occurred due to the outcome insufficient to meet the expectation (Ortony et al., 1988). Regret is evoked when alternative option seems to be better than the selected one (Zeelenberg et al., 1994). Anxiety is linked to uncontrollable circumstances that are not directly under the purview of the provider or the customer (Ruth, Brunel, & Otnes, 2002). Proposition 1-1. Consumer negative emotions associated with a service failure situation are categorized into anger, frustration, disappointment, regret, and anxiety. Appraisal theorists contend that people use different coping strategies to reduce negative emotions accordingly (Lazarus 1991). In this study, consumer coping strategies were categorized into engagement (problem-focused, emotion-focused) and disengagement categories. Coping strategies in the engagement category involves individuals actively trying to manage, control, or change both problem- and emotion-focused aspects of the stressful person and/or environment transaction (Tobin et al., 1989). Problem-focused coping occurs when an individual tries to manage the source of the stress. Emotion-focused coping refers to where the individual changes the meaning of the event or regulates the expressing emotions (Lazarus & Folkman, 1984). In the disengagement category, mental disengagement strategy involves doing other things to take one’s mind off the problem, denial (refusing to believe that something has happened), distancing (refusing to think about the problem), and escape/avoidance (wishing problem would go away or somehow be over with). On the other hand, behavioral disengagement strategy involves consumers deciding to give up further action as nothing can be done about the situation. They acknowledge that a goal cannot be reached and that further efforts are futile. As the mechanism behind each type of coping strategy differs, the negative emotions generated from varying conditions are linked accordingly. Since anger arises from appraisals of other-responsibility, angry consumers often manifest in confrontive coping, aggressive action towards the blameworthy organization (Smith & Bolton, 2002). With respect to frustration, one is more likely to foster support-seeking coping as this does not imply blame attribution to a particular person or organization (Roseman, 1991), Further, previous work has suggested that person-related disappointment tends to result in confrontive coping behaviors such as direct complaining (Zeelenberg & Pieters, 2004) and behavioral disengagement (Yi & Baumgartner, 2004). On ther other hand, complaining about it or telling others is unlikely take place for regret as this may highlight he or she mistake (Zeelenberg & Pieters, 2004). Lastly, anxiety tends to be associated with escape behaviors (Roseman, Antoniou, & Jose, 1996). Thus, anxiety consumers often are linked with emotion-focused coping such as mental disengagement. In addition, more proactive, problem-focused coping is likely to take place as stated in some other studies (Yi & Baumgatner, 2004). Proposition 2. Negative emotions have differential impacts on consumer coping strategies. Service failure literature indicates that negative emotions influence diverse retaliatory responses. Romani Grappi and Dalli (2012) contended that negative emotions of anger, discontent, dislike, embarrassment, sadness, and worry are associated with behaviors such as switching, complaining, and negative word of mouth. Maute & Dubé(1999) also indicated that customer anger is liked to exit and negative WOM. Likewise, Blodgett et al. (1999) similarly suggested that consumers are prone to spread negative word of mouth when they perceive service failure. However, even if a particular coping strategy is activated, depending on the strategy applied, the subsequent behavior can be changed. Many researchers indicated that when a service failure is not recovered, it is more likely to lead to negative WOM and complaining behavior (Anderson, 1998). Especially, WOM behavior is more emotion-driven responses (Sundaram, Mitra, and Webster, 1998). Therefore, vindictive WOM behavior is more likely to occur when the emotions are not handled properly. In addition, Kau and Loh (2006) stated that dissatisfied customers who do not directly complain to the firm about their negative experiences may not only engage in vindictive word of mouth behavior, but also switch to another brand. Sabharwal, Soch and Kaur (2010) also suggested that dissatisfied non complaints are likely to exit the service provider more easily resulting in brand switching. Bonifield and Cole (2007) identified conciliatory behaviors to include positive WOM, willingness to return to a service provider, and feeling sympathy for the service provider. Blodgett et al. (1993) suggested that when service failure is recovered, positive word of mouth will take place. Voight (2007) revealed that when certain platform is provided for customers to express their feeling regarding their purchase, customer loyalty increases. Proposition 3. Coping strategies lead to either retaliatory responses or conciliatory responses. Proposition 3-1. Disengaging coping strategies are associated with vindictive WOM, brand switching, complaining behavior more than engaging coping strategies. Proposition 3-2. Engaging coping strategies are associated with positive WOM, re-patronage intention, re-purchase intention. Additionally, our model proposes two individual characteristics as moderators: self-efficacy and self-band connection. Especially, those with high self-brand connection are assumed to counter-argue negative brand information in a service failure situation as this concept captures a strong “self”relevant emotive tie between the brand and the consumer (Escalas, 2004). We contend that these consumers would use prior brand knowledge to neglect their negative emotions and make more brand favoring attributions following service failure. Therefore, depending on the the previous connection with the brand performing the service failure, corresponding coping strategy may change. As self-efficacy relates to the belief that an adequate coping response is available, both factors should relate to the strategies consumers use to cope (Sujan et al., 1999). Proposition 4. Individual characteristics such as self-efficacy and self-brand connection moderates the relationships between negative emotions and coping strategies. Conclusions This paper integrates a broad range of literature into a conceptual framework that delineates consumer coping strategies in a service failure and recovery context. In so doing, the model establishes clear categories for classifying negative emotions consumers experience in a service failure situation into testable elements, and it is argued that although the concept of coping is not a simple one, it should be central to any examination of the service failure and recovery phenomenon. Also, the proposed model considers where marketers’recovery efforts should be directed by describing the ways in which consumers cope with a service failure. How a firm responds to its customers when a service failure occurs can say more about that firm than any other customer interaction. If handled well, it can cultivate emotionally intense relational outcomes. However, if the firm handles the situation badly, it may cause highly negative reactions with customers taking their feedback to online reviews and social media conversations in a way that can seriously damage the firm’s reputation. Future research is needed to empirically test and extend the proposed model. Further empirical research in a particular service setting would advance marketing research as well as be of great managerial significance.

A growing body of research has discovered that even the trivial attribute of similarity, that is, incidental similarity, will have significant favorable impact on initial social interactions (Burger et al. 2004; Guéguen, Pichot, and Le Dreff 2005; Jiang et al. 2010; Martin and Guéguen 2013). Incidental similarities are chance similarities between individuals, such as a shared first name or birthplace, which create a sense of association between two people (Burger et al. 2004). Prior research shows that people who perceive they share a birthday, first name, or similar fingerprints with a stranger are more likely to comply with the stranger’s request (Burger et al. 2004; Guéguen, et al. 2005) and are more willing to respond to the stranger’s questions on intimate topics (Martin and Guéguen 2013). Jiang et al. (2010) applied these findings in a service interaction context and found that incidental similarities between consumers and service providers will increase consumers’ liking for the services and purchase intentions. The key reason for these favorable impacts is that an incidental similarity creates a sense of connectedness between two strangers. This sense of connectedness creates a unit relationship between two strangers that is not shared by other people around them. Therefore an incidental similarity generates a fleeting sense of liking and it has been linked to positive affect (Burger et al. 2004) and interpersonal attraction (Insko and Wilson 1977). Although existing research suggests that incidental similarities lead to favorable reactions to the similar other, we propose that the effects of incidental similarities are not invariably favorable. Incidental similarities can elicit unfavorable effects, and can make an otherwise disinterested observer become involved in an exchange between a stranger and a company that (s)he merely witnessed. For example, a service failure involves the service provider and the suffering customer. From the perspective of an individual observing the failure, the nature of the effect of incidental similarities would depend on whether one feels a sense of association with the provider or the customer. Imagine a situation in which someone observes a customer being told that a table he had reserved is actually not available. If the observer notices that customer’s surname happens to be the same as his own, he may be disposed to view the situation from the customer’s perspective and blame the provider for the failure. However, if the observer notices from the provider’s name tag that they happen to have the same surname, he may feel more similar to the provider and attributing him less responsibility for the failure.

The car market is a high-involvement, high-information market, in which consumers are expected to go through extensive searches. Cars are highly symbolic artefacts. The marque and model say a lot about the owner, and evidently, a car is far beyond a purely rational, functionally based purchase. However, car manufacturers face a serious problem as worldwide marque loyalty levels, from purchase to purchase, average below 50%, and tend to decline over time. Evidently, the analysis of factors affecting car marque loyalty is a research topic of significant managerial importance. This study attempts to empirically address the structure of marque loyalty in the car market and has a dual objective: First, to relate marque loyalty to a set of consumer characteristics under a theoretical framework, and second, to examine the impact of current car’s attribute-level performance on loyalty. In this direction, this study illustrates the value of Adaptive Network-based Fuzzy Inference System (ANFIS), as a bridge between qualitative and quantitative approaches, in an attempt to identify alternative complex antecedent conditions that give rise to marque loyalty in the car market. The proposed approach offers to conventional correlational quantitative approaches three benefits: (1) asymmetry (i.e., relationships between independent and dependent variables are treated as non-linear/asymmetric), (2) equifinality (i.e., multiple pathways may lead to the same outcome), and (3) causal complexity (i.e., combinations of antecedent conditions lead to the outcome, and hence, the focus is not on net-effects, but on combinatorial-synergistic effects). To demonstrate these merits, ANFIS is compared to a conventional econometric forecasting technique, namely logistic regression.

Introduction The over population of wild and feral animals is increasing as an environmental problem in many parts of the world due the pressure on native flora and ecosystems. (BBC, 2013; Hall, 2015; Kaji, Saitoh, Uno, Matsuda, & Yamamura, 2010). Examples include deer in Northern Japan and Northeast USA, the urban fox in England, possums in New Zealand and the crown of thorns starfish in the Great Barrier Reef. This phenomenon is also happening in Australia. Recent news reports of huge kangaroo populations devastating grazing land in western Queensland (Arthur, 2015) and a spike in Koalas eating away their habitat in the Cape Otway area of Victoria (Paul, 2015) have highlighted this problem. While the overpopulation of koalas is causing environmental damage to natural gum trees, to the point that they will not regenerate, it is difficult to enforce population control because these animals hold such as positive place as an Australian symbolic animal. Hence, there is some controversy whether they should be culled by environment advocates as part of an ongoing population/environmental management program. To help facilitate appropriate wildlife management in light of the controversial environmental problems, Non-Government Organisations (NGOs) play an essential role as a conduit between government and local citizens. For example, Australian Koala Foundation contributes to the conservation and management of the wild Koala through conducting strategic research for Koala management, conservation and community education in Australia (Australian Koala Foundation, 2015). However, NGOs are currently faced with challenges, such as acquisition of funds to support such work and gathering supporters for volunteer activities. This is because the competitiveness in the not-for-profit-sector has intensified due to an increase in the number of NGOs and oligopoly of donation share by high-profile NGOs (Foster & Fine, 2007; Sunder, 2015). To deal with these challenges NGO’s are resorting to more commercial types of marketing communications such as the use of celebrity endorsement or using celebrities as spokespeople. Although using celebrities as spokespeople for the NGO sector has become a common advertising strategy (De los Salmones, Dominguez, & Herrero, 2013; Wheeler, 2009), research into what kind of characteristics of spokesperson would lead effectively to change customer's attitude and behavioural intentions is limited. This celebrity/cause match is especially important for many environmental NGOs who have to deal with controversial environmental problems (e.g. wildlife management for overpopulated animals). This research examines the differences between the relevant expertise and perceived attractiveness of the celebrity spokesperson and its effect on the public’s perception of trustworthiness of the NGO. As the role of the celebrity spokesperson to encourage the public’s intentions to donate increases another issue arises: can the same strategy be used to solicit the donation of time (by volunteers)? This latter dilemma is something that is rarely experienced in the for-profit or commercial sector. This study presents a conceptual model that may help to identify answers to these questions and will extend the current research on celebrity endorsement. It should also bring out new academic insights about the process of building source credibility and a detailed evaluation of the spokesperson’s role in creating a two dimensional approach to behavioural intentions. Literature review Celebrity endorsement is a common advertising technique used by many organisations to build an association between a well-known and well-liked personality and the company’s brand in order to increase consumer’s awareness and liking for the brand (Spry, Pappu, & Bettina Cornwell, 2011). By utilizing the endorsement of a celebrity spokesperson, the product/service, band and/or company is able to leverage the positive attributes and characteristics of the spokesperson to the advantage of that product, band and/or company image (Erdogan, 1999; Ohanian, 1990). Recently, this strategy of utilizing celebrities as credible spokespeople has been adopted by many socially purposed organisations and NGOs (De los Salmones, et al., 2013; Samman, Auliffe, & MacLachlan, 2009; Wheeler, 2009). In order to evaluate the effectiveness of the spokesperson, source credibility is used as a key measure. The source credibility is defined as ‘a communicator's positive characteristics that affect the receiver's acceptance of a message’ (Ohanian, 1990, p. 41). The concept of source credibility has been established through the development of two important models: source credibility model and source attractiveness model. The source credibility model, proposed by Hovland, Janis, and Kelley (1953), suggests that the effectiveness of a message depends on perceived level of expertise and trustworthiness in an endorser (Erdogan, 1999). Hovland, et al. (1953) analyze the factors which lead to the perceived credibility of the spokesperson and defined that two essential items of source credibility namely, expertise and trustworthiness. Moreover, the source attractiveness model, takes a social psychological perspective (McGuire, 1985) and is defined as another important factor that is likely to affect customers’ perception of the brand. The source attractiveness model explains that the effectiveness of a message depends on source's 'familiarity', 'likability', 'similarity', and 'attractiveness' to the respondent (Erdogan, 1999). This model brings about the idea that attractiveness is also a factor determining source credibility. Ohanian (1990) combines these two models and defines the construct of endorser source credibility as consisting of three sub-dimension items (i.e. expertise, trustworthiness, attractiveness). By adopting the source credibility model, researchers have studied the effects of spokesperson on customer's attitudes and behavioural intentions in various research settings and conditions (Amos, Holmes, & Strutton, 2008; Erdogan, 1999; Lafferty & Goldsmith, 1999; Ohanian, 1991). However, a comprehensive review of the literature reveals that some gaps still exist in the work that has been undertaken in this field. Firstly, rather than source credibility consisting of three independent variables (expertise, trustworthiness, attractiveness) Busch and Wilson (1976) and Johnson and Grayson (2005) suggest that for trust building within service marketing and sales research, the constructs of expertise and attractiveness are regarded as antecedent factors of trustworthiness. This approach has not been used in research into celebrity endorsement. Secondly, although most studies have dealt with concept of behavioural intentions as a unidimensional concept, this unidimensional way could make the actual effects of spokesperson unclear because different behavioural intentions may hold different meanings, for different potential sponsors resulting in different forms of donation. In service quality research Zeithaml, Berry, and Parasuraman (1996) confirm that different types of service quality may influence differently any one of five different behavioural intentions (i.e. loyalty, switch, pay more, external response, and internal response). Thus, different types of celebrity endorser (expert or attractive) could also influence different types of behavioural intentions. For example the attributes of celebrity endorser may have an influence on whether someone would be more inclined to donate money, to donate time (volunteer for the organisation), and/or spread positive word of mouth. Conceptual framework & hypotheses development Although this study investigates the effects of the various combinations of endorser's characteristics on customer’s attitudes and behavioural intentions, research shows that different endorser’s characteristics do affect different customer attitudes and behaviour (Eisend & Langner, 2010; Lord & Putrevu, 2009). Lord and Putrevu (2009) find that attractiveness drives customer's behavioural intentions when customer's motivation is transformational (i.e. affective), whereas expertise and trustworthiness are influential when their motivation is informational (i.e. cognitive). Eisend and Langner (2010) reveal that attractiveness is a determinant of positive customer attitudes in the immediate condition (i.e. ad effects after just 60 seconds), whereas expertise is effective in the delayed condition (i.e. ad effects after one or three days). They also found that a high-expertise and high-attractiveness endorser is particularly effective towards customer attitudes in both conditions. Thus, considering the different effects on customer’s attitudes by different endorser’s characteristics our research objective is to examine which type of spokesperson is more effective in influencing a customer's attitudes and behavioural intentions for NGOs dealing with controversial environmental problems. In addition to solving the research objective, the research will also fill the research gaps indicated through the literature review. Our model (See Figure 1) shows that both the expertise and attractiveness of a celebrity spokesperson will lead to consumers’ perception of the trustworthiness of that spokesperson. Considering the insights from the perspective of trust building processes in the services marketing and sales literature, the celebrity’s expertise and/or attractiveness as antecedent factors of trustworthiness should also have an effect on organisation credibility through trustworthiness as a mediator. Moreover, we propose that the effects of a spokesperson’s expertise and/or attractiveness will influence differently the organisational credibility depending on the level of issue controversy they deal with. For example, Wheeler (2009) found that a celebrity endorser that showed a logical connection with the organisation increased organisational credibility and behavioural intentions. Therefore it is expected that for an environmental NGO that has to deal with controversial issues (such as reducing numbers of animals in habitats under stress from overgrazing) an expert spokesperson may well be a better fit and gain more trust and therefore more credibility for the organisation than an attractive one. However, where the issue the spokesperson is dealing with is not controversial this pattern may well reverse with an attractive celebrity being the more effective spokesperson. From this point of view, the level of issue controversy that the NGO deals with is hypothesized as a moderator between both expertise and attractiveness and trustworthiness. The customer’s perception of both the trustworthiness/credibility of the celebrity chosen as spokesperson and the credibility of the organisation will influence their (the customer’s) attitudes toward the organisation. In the model we follow Amos, et al. (2008) and Erdogan (1999) in asserting that positive organisational credibility will positively influence attitudes toward the firm. From the view that a unidimensional behavioural intention could make actual outcomes unclear, three behavioural intentions (i.e. donation of time, donation of money, word of mouth) options are proposed. This distinction is especially important when considering that many NGOs unlike for-profit organisations have a need to both increase financial resources and human resources. The NGO/celebrity endorser conceptual model is presented in figure 1. Conclusion & future research direction The conceptual model developed in this study research has implications for both academics and managers. Firstly, as an academic contribution, the idea that expertise and attractiveness contributes to trustworthiness, which is reported in trust building in service marketing, should raise new considerations about source credibility building process in celebrity endorsement research. Moreover, the moderating influence of the degree of controversy will play an important part in that relationship, especially for NGOs having to deal with controversial issues such as culling wildlife to protect the environment. The approach that multiple types of behavioural intentions are important outcomes may also enable a more detailed evaluation of the effects of celebrity spokespeople. The interactions between spokesperson characteristics (e.g. expertise, attractiveness) and the three behavioural intentions should be further investigated within the celebrity endorser field of research. Secondly, since the literature which evaluates the effect of celebrity endorsement for NGOs in the context of controversial social issues has been still under-researched, the outcomes of this research will be valuable for most NGO managers struggling with same issues. Moreover, by applying multiple behavioural intentions, more detailed insights how to increase each behavioural intention (i.e. donation of money, donation of time, positive word of mouth) through assigning different spokesperson with different characteristics (i.e. attractiveness and expertise) may enable NGOs to more flexible in assigning a suitable spokesperson. The characteristics of the spokesperson may need to change depending on the resource acquisition requirements the NGO has at that time. Hence, this research will provide meaningful insights from the both academic and managerial perspectives. As a future research direction, in order to validate this conceptual model it is suggested that a between subjects experiment be conducted. The experiment could consist of a scenario whereby a spokesperson is trying to gain public support for the activities of an environmental NGO. Here one could manipulate the expertise (high vs low) and the attractiveness (high vs low) of the spokesperson and the message (controversial vs non-controversial) to establish if differences in the spokesperson characteristics would have an effect on the different behavioural intentions of the respondents.

Quick Response (QR) code has often been employed in promotional coupon campaigns worldwide. This research addresses whether and how curiosity, visual complexity and perceived fit jointly affect consumers’ intention to scan such a code. Based on relevant theories from marketing and psychology, we posit that, while consumers with the high level of curiosity are likely to be more bound to visual complexity, consumers with the low level of curiosity tend to rely more on a good perceived fit, thus overcome the negative effects of visual complexity, forming greater scan intention. To this end, we conduct an experimental study with general consumer sample. The findings support our main prediction. In closing, we discuss theoretical and managerial implications while recognizing important limitations and suggesting future research directions.

Large companies like Nike, Walmart or the German media company Hubert Burda have recently started to use weather data to predict sales and to advertise certain products and services. Technical innovations in particular geo-targeting via GPS and mobile display advertising enable and boost this emerging trend. However, weather not only influences what services and products consumers buy, but also their motivation, mood and risk-taking behavior. Until now there is limited knowledge about the causal effect of weather and so to answer the question: How should advertisers frame their messages depending on the weather condition to increase advertising effectiveness? This study is the first one which addresses this question by conducting a laboratory experiment with 200 participants. The results unravel the underlying mechanism of weather suggesting that good (bad) weather positively (negatively) influences mood, lowers (rises) risk perception and changes motivation/aspiration (i.e., regulatory focus). Most important for advertiser, we found that gain-framed messages were more effective in good weather situation, whereas loss-framed messages were more effective in bad weather.

There has been an increasing trend of using code-switching to enhance ad persuasion among local and global brands. Ads that include two or more languages are referred to as code-switched ads (Luna and Peracchio 2005a; 2005b). It is noted that previous studies investigating code-switched ad effectiveness have focused on bilinguals, not monolinguals. Due to the emerging use of code-switching in ads in monolingual markets, more research efforts are required to understand its effectiveness and boundaries among the monolinguals. The purpose of this study is to investigate the moderating role of consumer local-global identity in the effectiveness of code-switched ads among monolinguals. Two experiments were conducted and the results confirmed our hypothesis that consumer local-global identity moderates the effect of code-switched ads. The results indicated that congruence between consumer local-global identity and code-switching enhanced persuasiveness. In addition, the mediating effect of ad involvement was identified. These findings provide managerial implications for marketers.

Given the pervasive use of brand personification by marketers, it is surprising that there has been extremely limited research directly examining the effects of brand personification. In this article, we attempt to fill this gap in part by exploring how personified brand, in contrast to an objectified brand, might affect consumers’ response. Also, previous research have studied mainly on the visual or combined (visual-verbal) brand personification without differentiating the two types of brand personification. Therefore, this study tries to focus on the verbal brand personification which has not been studied extensively. And there are two types of verbal brand personification: external and internal image. So this study validates the effect of internal (kind) or external (looking good) verbal brand personification separately in the series of two experiments. Study 1 tests the effect of internal verbal brand personification on the consumer evaluation using product brand. Specifically, we test the moderating effect of brand knowledge between verbal brand personification and consumer evaluation and explore the underlying mechanisms (brand intimacy, psychological discomfort) about how the interaction effect of personification level and brand knowledge occurs. Study 2 tests the effect of external verbal brand personification on the consumer evaluation using service brand. Specifically, we test the effect of need-for-cognition on attitude towards personified brand ad and additionally explore the underlying mechanisms (perceived novelty, cognitive resistance) about how need-for-cognition influences. This research could provide useful guidelines for the marketers to utilize personification method when planning the head copy or slogan for advertisement. Therefore, marketers are better able to make an effective brand personification strategy through understanding the boundary conditions and mechanisms about the impact of brand personification based on the findings of this study.

In appeals for donations, some charities highlight why their programs are important or abstract meanings that individuals' contributions can have. On the other hand, some other charities highlight how their programs are implemented or specific actions that are to be made. Drawing on construal level theory, we posit that abstract, “why” laden appeals will be more persuasive than concrete, “how” laden appeals when psychological distance (via physical distance) is high (vs. low). One experiment was conducted to test this premise. Specifically, we examined whether the location where the programs of a nonprofit organization were run was far (i.e., a foreign country) or near (i.e., domestically) would moderate the persuasiveness of abstract versus concrete messages. In terms of the procedure, participants were first asked to read a message from a nonprofit organization helping children suffering from rare diseases in their own country or in foreign countries. Then, they indicated the extent to which they were willing to help the nonprofit. To manipulate the message type, we varied the headline as well as the content of the message so as to make on version construed at a low level and the other at a high level. Further, to investigate a moderating role of disease types, we measured the changes in response to when disease names are suggested more specifically due to the variation in the degree of familiarity to the charity subject. The results of this experiment supported our prediction on the fit effect between physical distance and message type. To be specific, when the appeal was for a foreign cause, abstract messages generated a higher willingness to help the nonprofit. Conversely, when the appeal was for a local cause, concrete messages generated a higher willingness to help the nonprofit. These results indicate construal fit effect in a charitable giving context. Furthermore, we investigated a moderating role of disease types given that such fit effects can be stronger among low- (vs. highly) familiarity of disease. We observed a significant three-way interaction involving the degree of familiarity.

Brand placements, by providing endorsement opportunities for the placed brands, are becoming instrumental in influencing the buying behaviour of ad-savvy consumers. As this marketing tool gains momentum, with the regulatory barriers against the placement beginning to obliterate globally, product placement strategies such as TV placements have become an important choice for practitioners (PQ media 2012). Brand placements are unique in their capacity to include brands as verbal, visual or both, often, as a part of the plotline-the latter has been acknowledged as important factor in influencing placement effectiveness (Russell, 2002; Waiguny, Nelson and Marko, 2013). Within TV shows and movies, plot modality entails pairing of the brands with desirable characters (Karrh 1998) and embedding them in an emotive story. Emotions have been known to play an important role in the consumer information processing (Lau-Gesk and Meyers-Levy 2009). Studies exploring the memory effects largely rely on measures such as recognition or recall. However, if brand placements operate less consciously, explicit measures may be inadequate and implicit measures for memory become desirous (Yang, Roskos-Ewoldsen, Dinu and Arpan, 2006). This study examines the impact of positive emotions (Happiness, Interest) and degree of plot modality (character-brand integration) on consumers' implicit attitudes towards placed brands. In the experiments conducted, it was observed that participants exposed to placement sequences evoking positive emotions were more likely to form favourable implicit attitudes towards the placed brands, especially when the character interaction with the placed brand was low. The findings underscore the need to better understand the interplay of positive emotions and character-brands integration within placements to augment their effectiveness.

A factorial design 2 (high repetition vs low repetition) x 2 (high brand familiarity vs low brand familiarity) is used to test the effects of repetition and brand familiarity on consumers’ memory for brands placed in video games. Consumers recalled better familiar brands and repetition increased recall for familiar brands.

Viral video advertising as a branded entertainment has shown its potential to overcome consumer skepticism by spreading the brand message through individuals’ social connection. Although brand placement prominence and brand disclosure may be critical factors that influence forwarding intention in the viral video ad context, less research has examined these relationship. To fill these gaps, this study aims 1) to examine the psychological mechanisms through which the brand placement prominence influences consumers’ forwarding intention of viral video advertising, and 2) to investigate the potential moderating role of brand disclosure timing. This study shows that the level of brand prominence in a viral video ad is an important factor influencing viewers’ forwarding intention sequentially mediated by persuasion knowledge, critical processing and enjoyment. The moderating role of brand disclosure timing investigated in the current study suggests that when the branded viral video has a high level of brand prominence, post brand disclosure leads to a higher forwarding intention compared to the prior brand disclosure.

Construal Level Theory (CLT) has been explored and researched in many different contexts. In an academic setting, the areas of CLT in time (temporal distance), physical space (spatial distance), and interpersonal/social distance are frequently revisited for the implications they may and often do have. High-level construals are associated with abstract thinking, while low-level construals are associated with more concrete thinking (Trope & Liberman, 2010). In today’s media-saturated world, it is important to understand how the branded messages the world receives affect the cognition of society as a whole. This project aims to explore what role, if any, branding and/or product placement has in the cognitive and performance abilities for various tasks. This will be tested by utilizing branded products in a task-completion challenge and measuring through both task performance and collected survey data from participants. This project will focus on the construal levels of individuals and how the use of and/or the engagement with a socially proximal branded item will affect perceived spatial distance. A study from Van Kerckhove, Geuend, & Vermeir (2014) found that construal levels impact behaviors. The results of their 2014 published study showed that individuals with a high construal (i.e. they thought more abstractly) were linked to a strong inclination to look up, whereas when individuals had lower-level construals (i.e. thinking more concretely) they were more likely to have a behavior of looking down. This ties into their paper’s title quite nicely – “the floor is nearer than the sky” – in that looking down at what is perceivable and spatially proximal is less likely to be viewed as ambiguous or abstract.

The study examines the role of image closeness in advertising persuasiveness. To understand how consumers process different degree of image closeness in advertising, we apply construal level theory (CLT) suggests consumers’ perceived spatial distance of visual stimuli influence their level of construal. It also investigates how advertising’s message appeals (rational vs. emotional) and product types (utilitarian vs. hedonic) moderate the effects of construal level on advertising effectiveness. Drawing on CLT, the authors hypothesize that rational appeals will be more persuasive when consumers perceive the product image in advertising as spatially close, while emotional appeals will be more persuasive when consumers perceive it as spatially distant. The study employed 2(near vs. far distance)x2(rational vs. emotional appeal)x2 (utilitarian vs. hedonic product) factorial design. A total of 232 people (108 males) participated in the experiment. Results revealed that spatial distance and advertising appeals had significant interaction effects on attitude towards ad and brand attitude. Particularly, when the image shot looks close, rational appeals are more persuasive than emotional appeals. Comparatively, when the image looks distant, emotional appeals are more persuasive than rational appeals. The two-way interaction between advertising appeals and product type are also significant for attitude toward ad and brand attitude. Particularly, rational appeals for utilitarian product were more persuasive and while emotional appeals for hedonic product were more persuasive. Finally, three way interaction between spatial distance, advertising appeals, and product type had significant effects on brand attitude. When the image looks close, the superior effects of rational appeal compared to emotional appeal was greater in utilitarian product than in hedonic product. Conversely, when the image looks distant, the superior effects of emotional appeal compared to rational appeal was greater in hedonic product than in utilitarian product. Theoretical and practical implications are discussed.