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The Priming of Material Values on Consumer Information Processing of Print Advertisements Abstract This study examines the effects of consumers' internal contexts on judgments and evaluations of the advertised product. Here, the context refers to the material values of the consumer. Experimental findings illustrate that similarity/dissimilarity between the internal context and the product information presented in the ad, along the materialism dimension, produces context effects. These findings support the assimilation/contrast framework. Implications for context effect research and materialism are also discussed. Introduction It is well known that consumers rely on personal internal frames of reference to process information. Advertisers develop ads to activate these internal frames. Developing ads that are personally relevant to the target consumer is an effective technique in attracting attention and assisting in interpretation and comprehension. Of interest to researchers, practitioners, and especially public policy makers is the issue of consumer materialism. The relationships between it and consumption behaviors such as credit card usage (Pinto, Parente, and Palmer 2000) and over-consumption (Zinkhan 1994), have been investigated. Also, previous research suggests a connection between materialism and information processing strategies (Chatterjee 1997, Hunt, Kernan, and Mitchell 1996). The present study specifically examines the effect of the correspondence of an ad’s use of material claims and a receiver’s material values on one’s product judgments, evaluations and purchase intentions. Advertising which is consistent with one’s personal values, (as well as schemata, attitudes, lifestyles, etc.) is generally processed as more self-relevant and more attention- getting (Engel, Blackwell, and Miniard 1995; Mandler 1982; Myers-Levy and Tybout 1989; and Myers-Levy, Louie, and Curren 1994). These studies suggest that the processing of advertisements is affected by internal frames of reference or “contexts,” that are present at the time of ad exposure. Internal contexts are “concepts or categories previously formed by the individual during the course of encounters with the stimuli in question” (Sherif and Hovland 1961 p. 30). In other words, internal contexts are developed through learning and prior experiences with the social stimuli. They are then internalized, becoming part of one’s psychological core, and used in future judgment processes. While studies have long characterized the importance of internal contexts (Bruner 1951), the effect of material values on consumer information processing is yet to be experimentally investigated. The present research attempts to understand how material values affect information processing. A review of materialism research will be provided. This will be followed by a discussion of priming effects and the assimilation/contrast paradigm leading to proposed hypotheses. The section on method will detail the experimental stimuli, design and subjects, dependent measures, and procedure employed in the experiment. Results will then be presented and the paper will conclude with a discussion section. Literature Review Materialism Materialism is a concept that has received much attention in academic research, as well as in the popular press. During the eighties, consumers were said to be highly materialistic, conspicuously consuming products for the sake of consuming, and not for need or necessity. While more recently at the onset of the 21st century, consumers are 2 said to be more sensible and practical, they are still seeking the “good life.” In fact, materialism seems to be so prevalent today that the concept is being used as a segmentation variable. Yankelovich’s new psychographic segmentation system called Monitor Mindbase, segments people into categories of consumers with varying degrees of materialism among a host of other lifestyle, attitude, and mindset variables. One segment that has emerged from this segmentation system is titled, “Young Materialists.” This segment is characterized as single without children, having average incomes, enthusiastic about shopping, style-conscience, adventurous, and self-absorbed (American Demographics, October 2000). With our society embracing the concept of materialism and using it to further understand and target consumers, it is important to develop an understanding of how materialism manifests itself in consumers and ultimately guides information processing mechanisms. Materialism resides within an individual. Much of the materialism research has focused on the conceptualization and measurement of the construct (Belk 1984,1985; Fournier and Richins 1991; Richins and Dawson 1990, 1992). Two accepted conceptualizations have emerged. Trait Conceptualization and Measurement of Materialism. Belk (1985) defines materialism as “the importance a consumer attaches to worldly possessions...possessions assume a central place in a person’s life... at the highest levels of materialism, possessions are believed to provide the greatest sources of satisfaction and dissatisfaction” (Belk 1985, p. 265). Belk further explains that materialism is manifested in three personality traits: possessiveness - affiliation with objects; the inclination and tendency to retain control or ownership of one’s possessions; 3 nongenerosity - unwillingness to share objects or possessions with others; and envy - a desire for others’ possessions. Belk (1984, 1985) measures overall trait materialism using 24 items that tap into the domain of each of the subtraits. However, this scale’s lack of consistency in reliability assessments has been cited as a major limitation of this conceptualization (Richins and Dawson 1992). Value Conceptualization and Measurement of Materialism. Richins and Dawson (1992) conceptualize materialism as a value. Specifically, these researchers state “materialism is a value that guides people’s choices and conduct in a variety of situations, including, but not limited to, consumption arenas...materialism will influence the type and quantity of goods purchased...those who place a high value on material possessions and their acquisition will behave differently from those who place a lower value on things” (p. 307). In other words, this conceptualization of materialism differs from that of Belk's in that it focuses on possessions rather than one’s personality or behavior. This view of materialism is manifested in three dimensions within one’s overall value system: acquisition centrality - a lifestyle in which a high level of material consumption functions as a goal and serves as a set of plans; happiness in acquisition - acquisition is essential to satisfaction and wellbeing in life; and possessions define success - materialists judge their own and others’ success by the number and quality of possessions accumulated (Richins and Dawson 1992, p. 304). Richins and Dawson measure material values using an 18-item scale reflecting values and attitudes about possessions (Richins and Dawson 1992). Previous research on materialism and information processing has used this value interpretation (Chatterjee 1997). 4 Richins and Dawson were not the first to classify materialism as a value however. In their classic work, Csikszentmihalyi and Rochberg-Halton (1981) discuss materialism as a value and differentiate between instrumental materialism and terminal materialism. Under instrumental materialism, individuals possess “things” as goals that are not related to greed or status. These “things” are not important as “things” but as means to achieve an end-state (e.g., a gift to establish friendship). In other words, these “things” are “instrumental” in achieving a particular goal. Terminal materialism on the other hand, is that where consumption is the end-state in itself. Individuals who possess terminal material values are consumed with possessions as status symbols, and are obsessed with the greed of consumption. Often, these individuals are unhappy and feel helpless. Therefore, the consumed “things” serve as a fix to their state of being. It is terminal materialism that is used in much of the materialism research. Outcomes of consumer materialism such as, over-consumption (Zinkhan 1994), dissatisfaction with life (Belk 1984; Keng et al. 2000; LaBarbera and Gurhan 1997; Richins and Dawson 1992; Richins, McKeage, and Najjar 1992), and a lack of concern for the environment (Durning 1992) are said to result due to terminal materialism. Zinkhan (1994) suggests that much of the commercial messaging of marketers promotes terminal materialism, and ultimately creates individual dissatisfaction with life, and depletes the world of scarce resources due to over-consumption. Thus, due to the potential negative effects of materialism on consumer consumption, a good understanding of how consumers process materialistic information (which is often cited as the motivator for materialistic consumption) is important. 5 Material Values and Information Processing. As stated previously, there has been limited research on the consequences of material values and consumer information processing. Hunt, Kernan, and Mitchell (1996) provide several research hypotheses concerning the relationship between materialism and components of information processing (i.e., encoding, organizing, and retrieval/evaluation). The researchers state that materialists use personal criteria for framing incoming stimuli. They hypothesize that a materialistic value system manifests itself within an individual and ultimately guides his or her interpretation of information in such a way as to reflect these values. In an empirical investigation of materialism and information processing, Chatterjee (1997) specifically examines the role of materialism in the processing of persuasive messages. He utilizes Richins and Dawson’s (1992) conceptualization of materialism and Petty and Cacioppo’s (1981, 1986) Elaboration Likelihood Model (ELM) as a theoretical framework to investigate the impact of materialism on the strategies used by consumers in their processing of advertisements. By utilizing the ELM, he investigates the difference between materialists and nonmaterialists in the amount of effort exerted in their processing of persuasive communication and ultimately their use of central versus peripheral route processing. The basic conclusion from this empirical research is that materialists exhibit greater response to peripheral cues and engage in more heuristic processing than nonmaterialists, while nonmaterialists exhibit greater use of central message arguments and engage in more elaborate processing. Chatterjee (1997) describes how a materialist and nonmaterialist would process information. The present study keys in on the similarity between the display of materialism in an advertisement and the consumer’s level of material values. This 6 approach presumes that consumers often examine and compare incoming information with their own internal frame of reference when processing information. Materialistic Advertising. Materialism has been attached to products, advertising, and media. Displays of hedonic wants and possessions are often utilized in ads as a way to illustrate an association between the advertised product and “the good life.” Because advertising has been acknowledged as a powerful tool in communicating societal images and values (Pollay 1983), the impact of its ability to illustrate materialistic notions via specific appeals is of importance to advertisers, public policy makers, and those embracing the social responsibility component of marketing. It is common to use the term “materialistic” to describe advertising. Belk and Pollay (1985) defined materialistic advertising as one that emphasizes luxury and pleasure seeking. Sirgy et al. (1998) refer to the content of television (i.e. both program content and advertising) as being materialistic. Maher and Hu (2002) study the effects of similarity/dissimilarity in the materialistic elements in the background of an ad, and the advertised product. Results from this study suggested that consumers process print ad information more favorably when the background context of the ad and the target product information are similar to each other along the materialism dimension. These researchers used the assimilation/contrast paradigm to operationalize the similarity. In the present study, the assimilation/contrast paradigm is also used to operationalize the similarity between the materialistic nature of an advertisement and the material values of a consumer. 7 Conceptual Framework Assimilation/Contrast Paradigm Social Judgment Theory suggests that judgments or attitudes toward a stimulus are affected by the context within which it is being evaluated (Sherif and Hovland 1961). In other words, a stimulus is judged not only by its own characteristics, but also by internal contexts (e.g., material values) that are present at the time of exposure. Social Judgment Theory asserts that the evaluation of a target stimulus (e.g., an advertisement) is based on the discrepancy that one perceives between the target stimulus and an available context (e.g., internal material values context). Research demonstrates that large discrepancies between internal contexts and target stimuli will produce contrast effects; while resemblance, or similarity produces assimilation effects (Herr 1989; Herr, Sherman, and Fazio 1983; Meyers-Levy and Sternthal 1993; Sherif and Hovland 1961). A contrast effect occurs when one’s evaluation of a target stimulus moves away from the internal context; while assimilation occurs when the evaluation of the target moves toward the internal context. As previously mentioned, Maher and Hu (2002) employed the assimilation/contrast paradigm to examine materialistic context effects. While much of the context effect research relies heavily on the ELM framework to examine the effects of individual contextual cues on the processing of ad information, print ads are designed in such a way that contexts (i.e., both internal and external) and product information are combined to provide meaning. For this reason Maher and Hu (2002) utilized the assimilation/contrast paradigm to examine the effect of similarity between the target (materialistic/nonmaterialistic product) and context (materialistic/nonmaterialistic 8 background setting) on consumer information processing. The present study examines the effect of similarity between the target (materialistic ad claims/nonmaterialistic ad claims) and internal context (material values) on consumer information processing. According to assimilation/contrast literature, a prime is necessary to evoke the internal context. Priming When investigating the impact of internal frames of reference on information processing, most researchers operate within the priming paradigm. Priming provides a means for activating particular ideas and allows these ideas to more easily come to mind and be used in a judgment process. In other words, while all incoming information is filtered through our value systems, priming simply renders a category more accessible for an individual. A contextual prime helps to elicit a response from a subject. When attempting to examine the impact of one internal context, priming is almost always necessary. Herr (1989) states, “primed categories seem to serve as a standard of comparison for judgments, producing classic judgment effects noted by social judgment theorists” (p. 67). Because individuals have numerous internal contexts from which to use to make a judgment, the use of priming will increase the probability that a subject will use a particular category from a memorial structure to assist him or her in making judgments and evaluations. Traditional priming theory states that when stimuli are applicable to a judgmental response, the subtly activated internal context will influence the judgment in the direction of the category without the subject’s knowledge (Higgins, Rholes, and Jones 1977; Srull 9 and Wyer 1979, 1980). This is the aforementioned assimilation effect. This happens through a process of feature matching (Herr, Sherman, and Fazio 1983; Srull and Wyer 1979, 1980) or feature overlap (Meyers-Levy and Sternthal 1993). In other words, characteristics of the prime are unconsciously examined for a match with accessible and similar mental categories. In the absence of feature matching or overlap, contrast occurs. Material values serve as the primed category in the current study. There are many priming studies in marketing and advertising. For example, Herr (1989) used priming in order to activate particular structures in subjects’ memory concerning the price of automobiles. Stafford, Leigh, and Martin (1995) discuss the use of priming to examine the effect of activated salesperson stereotypes in sales call presentations. Recently in advertising, Forehand and Deshpande (2001) extending the work of Stayman and Deshpande (1989) and Wooten and Galvin (1993) in the area of ethnic-oriented primes, investigated the impact of advertising-based ethnic primes to direct a consumer’s self-categorization and ultimately increase ethnic self-awareness. Their research showed that subjects who were exposed to an ethnic prime, were more likely to self-report their ethnicity than participants who were not exposed to the prime. Furthermore, they concluded that an ethnic prime led to more favorable (unfavorable) evaluations of a spokesperson in an ethnically-targeted ad stimulus when the spokesperson’s ethnicity matched (did not match) the consumer’s ethnicity. This same result was found for subjects’ attitudes toward the ad. Thus, Forehand and Deshpande (2001) conclude that when the ethnic prime is congruent with the consumer’s ethnic background, the consumer has greater self-awareness and evaluates the ad stimulus more favorably than when the ethnic prime is incongruent with the subject. 10 Hypotheses Given the above literature, it is expected that when the ad claim itself is similar to one’s own primed material values, the ad information will be assimilated; while if there is a discrepancy, the target ad stimulus will be contrasted. Assimilation and contrast effects correspond to movement of the target stimulus toward or away from the internal context. Two sets of judgment measures will have to be secured in order to capture the movement: (1) judgment of a target stimulus without the context (context-free), and (2) judgment of a target stimulus with the internal context (context-dependent). The difference between them would yield the movement. When the ad claim and the subject are similar along the materialism dimension, assimilation is expected and the subject will make judgments in the direction of the primed internal context. Furthermore, when the ad claim and the subject are dissimilar along the materialism dimension, contrast is the expected outcome and the subject will make judgments in the opposite direction of the primed internal context. It is important to note here that “similar” and “dissimilar” mean the correspondence of an ad’s use of material claims and a receiver’s material values. These context-dependent judgments will be compared to context-independent judgments to capture the effect of the primed internal context. Therefore, the following hypothesis emerges: H1: Judgment of the target ad stimulus is expected to move toward (away from) the internal context when the target and internal context are similar (dissimilar) along the material value dimension. As stated previously, values are important in guiding information processing and behavior. It has been stated that by appealing to consumer values, an advertiser will increase the likelihood that the target consumer will become involved in the ad and find 11 the product, as well as the ad more interesting and appealing (Sherrell, Hair, and Bush 1984). Forehand and Deshpande (2001) found this to be true with matching the ethnic context of an ad with one’s ethnicity. More favorable evaluations of the ad itself resulted. Thus, ads and products that are similar to the subject with regard to materialistic qualities are anticipated to receive more favorable evaluations, while those that are dissimilar will receive less favorable evaluations. Therefore, H2: More (less) favorable product evaluations are associated with similar (dissimilar) conditions. Attitude-behavior consistency studies suggest that evaluations are indicators of behavioral intentions (Fishbein and Ajzen 1975). While it is expected that assimilation leads to more favorable evaluations, stronger purchase intentions are expected in these situations. Therefore it is hypothesized that, H3: Stronger (weaker) purchase intentions are to be formed in similar (dissimilar) conditions. Method Experimental Stimuli It is anticipated that subjects will process the materialistic/nonmaterialistic ad with their own primed internal material values. The present research uses materialistic ad elements (i.e., both product and executional cues) as a means for operationalizing the similarity between the advertisement and subjects’ own material values. Product. An automobile ad was used as the advertising stimulus. Previous context effect research has stated that it is important to use a product class that is of interest to subjects in the experiment, as well as one that lends itself to several 12 permissible interpretations (Yi 1993). Automobiles are often used in experiments because they serve this purpose. Pretest. Pretests were conducted to identify automobiles and ad cues with high and low materialistic appeals. Consultation with consumer reports, other authoritative sources on automobiles, and popular magazines generated a listing of different styles of cars (e.g., 4-door sedan, station wagon, 2-door mid-size) and executional cues used in the settings of automobile advertising to create imagery for the product (e.g., golf course, wooded field, mountain). Forty-nine students from an undergraduate marketing course participated in the pretest survey. The survey asked subjects to rate the style of an automobile and the various executional backgrounds along the materialism dimension. Results from this pretest indicated that a 2-door sports car best represented a materialistic automobile, while a station wagon was viewed as the most nonmaterialistic. Subjects indicated that a polo match would most likely be a place where you might find a person who is concerned with image and possessions, while a campground was a place that represented a nonmaterialist’s preference in locations. These products and executional cues were used to construct the ad stimuli. An ad with strong material elements (i.e., a 2-door sports car with a polo match background) and an ad with weak material elements (i.e., a station wagon with a campground background) were constructed. Preliminary Study. A survey was conducted to capture the context-free judgment of the ads. One hundred four consumers intercepted from a midwestern shopping mall participated in this preliminary study. Fifty-two percent of the sample was age 35 or younger. As it will be seen, the young orientation of this pretest sample makes it quite 13 comparable to the sample used in the main experiment. It should be noted that participants are not primed in the preliminary study. Internal material values are not activated to process the target stimulus and thus, will not affect the context-free judgment being rendered. Each consumer was asked to judge the products and overall advertisements. As in Herr, Sherman, and Fazio (1983), and Meyers-Levy and Sternthal (1993), several judgment measures were used in order to measure the context-free judgments. Specifically three bi-polar items - high/low prestige, expensive/inexpensive, extremely materialistic/extremely nonmaterialistic were used. Each was measured using a nine-point scale (1 = low prestige, inexpensive, extremely nonmaterialistic to 9 = high prestige, expensive, extremely materialistic). Responses to the 3-item judgment measure were summed for the product and background settings. As expected, the materialistic 2-door sports car (Pm) (mean = 20.81) was judged as more materialistic than the nonmaterialistic station wagon (Pnm) (mean = 16.54). The overall materialistic ad (Am) was judged as more materialistic than the nonmaterialistic ad (Anm) (mean = 19.92 versus 14.19, t stat = 5.27, p = .000). Design and Subjects High similarity conditions were operationalized by presenting the materialistic ad to subjects with high material values, as well as by presenting the nonmaterialistic ad to individuals with low material values. Conversely, low similarity conditions were operationalized by exposing materialistic individuals to the nonmaterialistic ad treatments and by presenting the nonmaterialistic ad to the materialistic subjects. Subjects in the main experiment consisted of a total of 106 undergraduate student consumers from a large midwestern university. Students were solicited and told that if 14 they decided to participate, they would be required to attend two research sessions on the same day of week and time, during two different weeks. Students were awarded extra credits in their perspective courses. Thirty-two percent of the subjects were male, and 89% were under 24 years of age. Ninety percent were white Americans. Fifty percent were marketing majors, and 70% worked between 10 and 30 hours per week. Procedure The experiment was conducted in two sessions. In the first session, subjects were given a survey booklet and were told by the experimenter that the study required their participation today and then again one week from the present date and time. In the first experimental session, participants read and signed a consent form, provided answers to the Richins and Dawson (1992) Material Values scale, and answered demographic questions. After the first session, a median-split of materialism scores was conducted. Scores on the materialism scale were quite uniformly distributed with scores ranging from 31 to 82. The mean score was 56.8 and the median score was 57.0 (standard deviation = 10.44) (Cronbach’s alpha = .86). Subjects with scores higher than or equal to 56.8 were assigned to the high material values group; the remaining to the low material values group. During the main experiment, subjects received two booklets upon their arrival and were told that researchers were “examining attitudes toward print media.” The first booklet contained the prime and ad stimulus. Each priming/stimulus booklet contained one of the following two paragraphs: “From the answers you provided last week, it was determined 15 that you are a person with high material values. This means you believe that possessions are symbols of one’s success, and you strive to obtain higher quality in your possessions. I would like for you to keep these material values in mind while reviewing the ad and answering the questions that follow.” “From the answers you provided last week, it was determined that you are a person with low material values. This means you believe that possessions do not act as symbols of one’s success, and you are not obsessed to obtain the highest quality in your possessions. I would like for you to keep these material values in mind while reviewing the ad and answering the questions that follow.” It should be noted that the priming statements were not randomly assigned to subjects. Instead, these statements match the high/low material values of the individuals. In addition, priming in our study not only helps to bring out the material values of each subject, but the degree of these values (high/low) is also evoked and used in processing the incoming ad stimulus. The two ads (Am and Anm) were randomly assigned to subjects within each of the two material values groups. After reading the priming statement, each subject was instructed to take a few minutes to view the advertisement and close the first booklet. They then opened the second booklet and answered the questions. Each subject spent approximately 20 minutes to complete the entire exercise. Following the collection of the booklets, subjects were debriefed, thanked for their participation, and released. Dependent Variables Judgments. The three bi-polar items - high/low prestige, expensive/inexpensive, extremely materialistic/extremely nonmaterialistic were summed and used to measure subjects’ judgments of the product and overall ad (i.e., the context-dependent judgments). 16 The items were summed in order to obtain overall judgments (product, Cronbach’s alpha = .85; ad, alpha = .83). Evaluations. Evaluations of the product and the advertisement itself were measured using Chatterjee’s (1997) three item, bi-polar scale anchored by values of 1 (bad, unsatisfactory, and unfavorable) and 9 (good, satisfactory, and favorable). The items were summed for both of the evaluations (i.e., product, Cronbach’s alpha = .90; ad, alpha = .93). Purchase Intentions. Purchase intention was measured using a single, seven-point semantic differential scale, ranging from 1 (not likely at all) to 7 (very likely) (MacKenzie, Lutz, and Belch 1986). Specifically, subjects were asked to indicate their intention “if money is not an obstacle.” Results Multivariate analysis of variance (MANOVA) was conducted using judgment of the car, judgment of the ad, evaluation of the car, evaluation of the ad, and purchase intent as the dependent measures and the four treatments as the independent variables. The Wilkes’ lambda takes on a value of 0.2172 and is significant at the 0.0001 level. One-way ANOVA results are as follows: judgment of the car – F-stat. = 63.72 (p= 0.0001); judgment of the ad – F-stat. = 39.85 (p = 0.0001); evaluation of the car - F-stat. = 8.18 (p = 0.0001); evaluation of the ad – F-stat. = 3.27 (p = 0.0244); and purchase intent – F-stat. = 8.43 (p = 0.0001). Treatment means for the judgment measures in the main experiment are presented in Table 1. As stated previously, a comparison of the product and ad judgments in the main experiment to the product and ad judgments in the preliminary study where the 17 internal context was not primed, served as a way to capture the effect of the internal material values context. Specifically, by subtracting the context-independent judgments of the pretest from the context-dependent judgments of subjects in main experiment, a difference score was calculated. This difference score detects the direction as well as the magnitude of the movement in judgments. Note that these two sets of measures are taken from two separate groups of subjects. If measures are taken from the same subject at two different points in time, then movement in judgment can be captured for each subject in the experiment. Yet having the same subjects to provide two similar sets of measures introduces repeated measure bias. For this reason, the decision was made to gather the measures from separate groups of subjects. Thus, the following formula is applied to each subjects’ judgment response: Mji = Ji- J, (where Mji = movement in judgment from subject i, Ji = context dependent judgment score from subject i, and J = average context independent score from the preliminary study). When the unprimed judgment means found in the second pretest are applied to the above formula, the following equations are formulated for judgments of the product: (1) Am/Sm (2) Am/Snm (3) Anm/Sm (4) Anm/Snm = = = = Ji - 20.81 Ji - 20.81 Ji - 16.54 Ji - 16.54 (where A = ad stimuli, S = subject, m = materialistic, nm = nonmaterialistic) The constants 20.81 and 16.54 are from the preliminary study. The same computation is conducted for the judgments of the overall advertisement. 18 ________________ Table 1 About Here ________________ Hypothesis 1. As presented in Table 2, all signs associated with the movement in judgment are as hypothesized. Moreover, one-sample t-test indicates the average movements are significantly different from zero in seven of eight cases; highly significant in six, and marginally significant in the case of Am/Sm for product judgments. Ad judgments for Am/Sm are not significant. Overall, these results lend strong support for the notion that consumers compare the material values portrayed by a product/ad claims to their own material values before making a judgment. Assimilation (movement toward the context) occurs when the target stimulus and the internal context are similar; and contrast (movement away from the context) is the outcome when the target and context are dissimilar. ________________ Table 2 About Here ________________ Hypothesis 2. It was posited that advertising stimuli would receive more favorable evaluations when they matched the subject’s material values, than when they were presented to subjects with dissimilar materialistic values. In order to test this hypothesis, the subjects were reclassified into high and low similarity groups. Independent sample t-test results indicate that there are statistically significant differences in evaluations of the advertised product and ad when the stimulus is presented to subjects with values similar to those reflected in the ad, versus dissimilar values. When the values reflected in the ad are dissimilar to the subject’s own personal material values, less favorable evaluations of the product (19.39 vs 16.21) (p .0001), and overall ad (16.89 vs 13.57) (p .0013) were obtained, as compared to when the 19 personal values were similar to those in the ad. See Table 3. Thus, these results lend overall support for Hypothesis 2. ________________ Table 3 About Here ________________ Hypothesis 3. Independent sample t-test results demonstrated that indeed purchase intentions were highest in conditions where there was high similarity between the product ad claims and the subject’s internal material context (Mean = 4.0 for high similarity vs. 3.19 for low similarity, p .0060). See Table 3. This statistically significant result provides support for Hypothesis 3. Discussion This research takes an information-processing approach to examine the relationship between consumers’ material values and their response to various types of products and advertisements. The assimilation/contrast paradigm suggests that individuals possess internal contexts that serve as sources of comparison when processing incoming stimuli. When there is high similarity between the two contexts in comparison, assimilation occurs, while dissimilarity promotes contrast effects. It is with this notion that the present study utilized product and ad representations of materialistic values in order to assess whether consumers perceive similarity/dissimilarity between these various ad elements and their own material values, which ultimately affects their processing of the information. Use of this theoretical framework for interpreting the effect of a material values context is quite logical because the similarity between the material values context and the external ad context is the main experimental variable. Results suggest that when there is a high amount of similarity between one’s primed material values and ad claims, assimilation will occur; while in conditions where there is low similarity, 20 contrast is the common outcome. This study confirms that judgmental and evaluative outcomes were indeed influenced by the interaction between subjects’ own materialistic orientations and the materialistic orientations presented in a print advertisement. This research has two main implications. It extends the literature on the assimilation/contrast paradigm. This paradigm is useful in explaining some of the information processing strategies of consumers. The present research confirms that consumers make comparative judgments of incoming stimuli. Specifically, the research suggests that consumers use their own internal contexts (e.g., values) as sources of interpretation. As expected, they interpret information is such a way that is consistent with their own internal contexts (e.g., values). When primed, consumers will use material values as a contextual comparison. Therefore, an understanding of a target market’s value system would be beneficial to advertising practitioners. As Yankelovich’s new psychographic segmentation system, Monitor Mindbase recognizes, marketers need to continue to develop marketing/advertising strategies with a deeper understanding of the values possessed by their target market segment. This study also has important implications for materialism research, advertisers, and public policy. Most materialism research has focused on conceptualization and measurement of this construct. The present research extends this literature by illustrating that material values are used to interpret information. These values serve as aided mechanisms for information processing. Furthermore, if consumers use materialism as a way to judge and evaluate products and advertising, there is a need for future research to investigate advertising’s role in the production of the materialistic values of society. Several researchers have suggested that terminal materialism is reflected in images of 21 advertising and promotes negative outcomes for consumers and society as a whole (Zinkhan 1994). While advertisers often state that advertising simply reflects society’s values and does not create values, this study suggests that if effectively primed, consumers will indeed generate materialistic judgments and evaluations of products and advertising. Thus, future empirical research should focus on whether the judgmental and evaluative processes that occur when exposed to materialistic stimuli, promote or enhance materialistic values systems. As in any study of this nature, limitations may compromise the generalizability of the results. Specific limitations involve the type of product used, the specific ads that were used, as well as the sample. Additionally, because material values were measured and used as a prime in this study, socially desirable responding may have occurred to some degree (Mick 1996). Finally, this study was conducted in a relatively highinvolvement situation (e.g., automobiles and print advertising). Results of the study may not be readily generalizable to other product categories, other types of advertising mediums, and to other populations. Therefore findings should be interpreted with caution. However, the testing of these effects with other product categories and advertising vehicles (point-of-purchase stimuli, internet advertising, etc.) would serve as interesting future research avenues and would gain external validity for this research stream. 22 References Belk, Russell W. 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