Economic and Consumer Psychology | Leiden University 1
The effects of brand traits on
brand evaluation, positive
eWOM intentions and the role
of product type
Tom van der Knaap
Master thesis proposal Psychology, specialization economic and consumer psychology Institute of Psychology
Faculty of Social and Behavioral Sciences – Leiden University Date: 17-08-2020
Student number: 2310165
Economic and Consumer Psychology | Leiden University 2 Abstract
An understanding ofhow brand traits influence brand evaluation and positive eWOM intentions is important for companies because it could help them to optimize their brand for success. Based on social perception literature, this study (N = 179) investigated the effect of perceived brand morality, sociability and competence on brand evaluation and positive eWOM intentions. The study also looks at the role of product type. This was investigated using an online survey on six existing brands. The results indicated that morality, sociability and competence together predict a positive brand evaluation. Yet, there is no clear individual contribution from any one of these three brand traits. Additionally, brand competence was the only trait that predicted positive eWOM intentions concerning the brands. No effect for product type was found. The results did not clearly support the hypotheses, but suggest that morality in brand perception is not as important as in social perception. Further research is needed to get a better understanding of the influence of brand traits on consumer behavior.
Economic and Consumer Psychology | Leiden University 3 Introduction
In 2019, Red Bull had to pay a settlement of $640.000 to discontented customers. This happened because Red Bull made false declarations regarding the usefulness of their product. They claimed on their website, with numerous studies, that their energy drink could improve ability and performance. However, actual study results indicate that there is no increased effect in ability or performance when drinking Red Bull in comparison to drinking coffee or other caffeinated drinks (Jensen, 2014). This news article gives an example of what can happen when companies make false statements. Next to the fine that Red Bull had to pay, it probably damaged the reputation of Red Bull as well. For instance, people can evaluate Red Bull as less ethical because they lied about the usefulness of their product. The online reactions from consumers, encountered on different websites, indicate that they resent Red Bull for making these false statements (Hamlin, 2014). These online reactions could be described as negative Electronic Word of Mouth (N-eWOM; Breazeale, 2009) for Red Bull.
EWOMis the online version of WOM and is defined as any positive or negative statementmade by a consumer, about a product or company, which is made available via the internet (Hennig-Thurau, Gwinner, Walsh, & Gremler, 2004). With the rise of online
platforms, eWOM became one of the most important source of information when buying a product (Breazeale, 2009). The difference between WOM and eWOM is that eWOM is available to all consumers who can use the internet. WOM is limited to the circle of friends and family of the consumer. This means that eWOM has a greater visibility and reach, resulting in it being a more important source of information than WOM when buying a product (Huete-Alcocer, 2017). Also, eWOM has been proven to be more effective than conventional marketing approaches or advertising campaigns in influencing consumers´ attitudes towards brands (Breazeale, 2009; De Angelis, Bonezzi, Peluso, Rucker & Costabile, 2012). It is considered to beone of the most influential sources of information about products
Economic and Consumer Psychology | Leiden University 4 or services for consumers (Huete-Alcocer, 2017). However, as the consumer is the marketer of the product in this process, it is hard for companies to directly use eWOM to their benefit (Nieto et al., 2014). Therefore, it is important to investigate which processes drive consumers to talk positively online about a brand. This study will focus on the influence of brand traits on positive eWOM intentions. Companies can use this knowledge to stimulate more positive eWOM about their products, which could result in higher sales. To investigate the influence of brand traits on positive eWOM intentions, it is important to understand how people perceive and evaluate brands. A positive brand evaluation could play an important role in stimulating positive eWOM intentions towards the brand.
Literature points out that people perceive brands in ways that are similar to how they perceive other people; they ascribe certain traits to brands (Aaker, Fournier & Brassel, 2004; Fournier, 2009; Guévremont & Grohmann, 2012; Mark & Pearson, 2001)which can influence brand attitudes. There seem to be two important trait dimensions that play a role in social and brand perception; warmth and competence.In social perception these traits are used as basis to evaluate other people and groups (Fiske, Cuddy, Glick, & Xu, 2002), which suggest that this might be the same for brand perception. Literature on brand perception confirms this, and shows that warmth and competence are expected to predict consumers purchase intent and brand loyalty (Kervyn, Fiske & Malone, 2012). Moreover, research suggest that warmth plays a more important and dominant role over competence in social perception, and in brand perception (Hack, Goodwin & Fiske, 2002; Kolbl, Arslanagic-Kalajdzic, & Diamantopoulos, 2019). However, literature on social perception suggests that the warmth dimension exists out of two domains: sociability, referring to attributes as cooperation and kindness;and morality, referring to an internal ethical sense (Leach, Ellemers & Baretto, 2007). Further research suggests the importance of morality over sociability and competence, when judging others and own groups (Brambilla et al., 2011a; Leach et al., 2007). As social perception and brand
Economic and Consumer Psychology | Leiden University 5 perception have similarity to each other, this research will investigate if the dominance of morality in social perception holds for brand perception as well. This will be done by examining the effect of brand perceived morality, sociability and competence on brand evaluation and positive eWOM intentions.
Because each product and brand hasa different use, it seems likely that brand
perceived competence, sociability and morality vary for different products and brands. When looking at product and brand type there is a classic distinction between two types; hedonic and utilitarian (Park, Jaworski & Maclnnis, 1986). Research points out that hedonic products relate more to the warmth dimension and utilitarian products more to the competence
dimension (Chattlas, 2015). In general, hedonic products get a better consumer evaluation and play a more important role in stimulating purchase intentions (Chen, Chang, & Chen, 2017; Dhar & Wertenbroch, 2000). This research will test the findings from the literature, by investigating if hedonic brands also get a higher brand evaluation, and examine if this difference is mediated by morality. With this, further prove can be gathered regarding the dominance of morality over sociability and competence in brand perception.
The findings of this research can be beneficial for companies when developing their positioning strategy. Brand positioning regards the conceptual place that the brand has in the consumers’ mind (Kotler, 2003). When companies know which brand traits are most strongly related to a positive brand evaluation and eWOM intentions, they can communicate more about these traits or highlight them when positioning their brand on the market. This creates associations in the consumers’ minds. These associations make consumers perceive the brand in a specific way (Kotler, 2003). This means that companies can make their brand be
perceived as moral, sociable or competent to stimulate a positive brand evaluation and eWOM intentions. However, to get a better understanding of brand perception it is important to first take a look at social perception.
Economic and Consumer Psychology | Leiden University 6 Theoretical Background
Social Perception
When looking at social perception, research indicates that most people use stereotypes to observe and understand other people and groups that they do not know (Fiske, Cuddy, Glick, & Xu, 2002). A stereotype is an oversimplified and widely held image or idea of a particular group, which is based on ascribing certain traits to certain people and groups (Fiske et al., 2002). According to the Stereotype Content Model, stereotypes can be captured with two dimensions; warmth and competence. Depending on the warmth-competence
categorization, a person will feel a distinct way about a group which will influence their behaviortowards those individuals (Fiske et al., 2002). The idea for these two dimensions comes from a functional and pragmatic perspective. This perspective suggests that dimensions of stereotypes shape based on interpersonal and intergroup interactions. When people interact with others, they want to know what the goal of the other is and how effective the other will be in pursuing these goals. In other words,people want to know the other’s intention and capability of reaching this intention which relates to warmth and competence (Fiske et al., 1992). This suggests that people evaluate each other based on warmth and competence. Because people evaluate brands similarly to how they evaluate people, it can be expected that these trait dimensions also apply to brand perception.
Brand Trait Dimensions
When looking at brand perception it seems that people tend to ascribe certain traits to objects such as products and brands similarly to how they ascribe traits to other people. This implies that brand personality can be defined as the human traits that get associated with a brand (Aaker, 1997). Multiple studies confirm this finding and indicate that people have relationships with brands that are comparable to relationships with other people (Fournier,
Economic and Consumer Psychology | Leiden University 7 2004; Mark & Pearson, 2001). Aaker (1997) stated that brands can be classified with five different dimensions: sincerity, excitement, competence, sophistication and ruggedness. Each dimension was given its own set of traits. For example, Kodak is described as sincere and IBM is described as competent (Hansen & Christensen, 2003). However, further research points out that when re-analyzing these five different dimensions, they come back to two dimensions; warmth and competence (Davies, Rojas-Méndez, Whelan, Mete, & Loo, 2018). In line with this finding, additional research shows that all brand trait dimensions can be captured within these two dimensions (Kervyn, Fiske and Malone, 2012). Warmth and competence seem to be the most important dimensions for brand perception. This suggests that social perception and brand perception are somewhat similar to each other (Fiske et al., 2002; Kervyn et al., 2012).
The role of brand perceived warmth and competence in brand perception is outlined in the Brands as Intentional Agents Framework (BIAF, Kervyn et al., 2012). This framework can be used to predict purchase intent and brand loyalty of consumers (Kervyn et al., 2012). It is based on the notion that people have relationships with brands that are similar to
relationships with other people (Fournier, 2009) and proposes that brands have a distinct intentions-and-ability profile. The intentions-and-ability profile creates important dimensions underlying brand perception and evaluation. Empirical evidence supports this finding,
showing that intentions and ability are important factors for stereotyping brands (Aaker, Vohs & Mogilner, 2010; Aaker, Vohs & Garbinsky, 2012). This means that brands are evaluated mainly on the basis of their perceived intentions, and their ability to reach these intentions. Warmth and competence are described as; one’s intent and capability to reach this intent (Fiske et al., 2002). Therefore, the intention-and-ability profile has strong similarities to the Stereotype Content Model (Fiske et al., 2002). This supports the idea that social perception and brand perception are somewhat similar in how they can be predicted and explained.
Economic and Consumer Psychology | Leiden University 8 However, it may be difficult for brands to perform well on both warmth and
competence which leavesthem sometimes faced with a trade-off between warm and
competent considerations. For instance, socially responsible decisions might not always lead to better financial performance, and vice versa. Hence, it is important to determine which trait dimension weighs more heavily on consumer responses. To investigate this, a further look is taken at social perception with warmth and competence as base. Research indicates that warmth is more important for a positive evaluation than competence. The reason for this, is that negative warmth can cause a threat for the perceiver. However, negative competence does not cause a direct threat for the perceiver. Therefore, the intentions of someone are initially more important to know than their competence (Hack et al., 2013). As brand perception is somewhat similar to social perception, these findings may hold for brands as well.
Research indicates that brand perceived warmth is a key driver of consumer-brand identification which stimulates purchase intentions and positive brand perception.
Contrastingly, brand competence is not significantly related to consumer-brand identification (Kolbl, Arslanagic-Kalajdzic, & Diamantopoulos, 2019). This implies the importance of brand warmth over brand competence to stimulate purchase intentions and a positive brand perception; suggesting that judging a brand as being well intentioned is more important than to judge a brand on its ability. The reason for the dominance of the warmth domain may be similar to the reason in social perception. Negative warmth, which is similar to negative intentions, can form a direct threat to the perceiver. In contrast, negative ability does not. However, there is conflicting literature that points out, when choosing between service providers, consumers systematically value competence more than warmth (Kirmani, 2017). Yet,this is a very specific product area.
The conclusion based upon the above literature, is that warmth in general plays a more important role than competence in social perception. As social perception has similarities to
Economic and Consumer Psychology | Leiden University 9 brand perception, these findings may hold for brands as well. Further research confirms this, indicating that in brand perception warmth plays a more dominant role in stimulating
purchase intentions and positive brand perception. However, warmth is a broad domain. Therefore, the idea that warmth is captured in only one dimension is questionable.
Sociability and morality
It could be argued that warmth has different aspects, such as honesty and friendliness. There is ample research supporting a distinction of two domains related to warmth:
sociability, referring to attributes as cooperation and kindness;and morality, referring to an internal ethical sense -the right or wrong intent of someone (Brambilla & Leach, 2014; Leach et al., 2007). When looking at morality and sociability, research indicates that to judge a person or group as trustworthy has a different implication than judging a person or group as kind or caring (Brambilla & Leach, 2014). The side note must be made that this research was not tested, but was theoretically detracted (Brambila & Leach, 2014). With thisfinding, an alternative model to predict interpersonal, in-group and outgroup perception with three dimensions is proposed and tested: competence, morality and sociability (Brambilla et al., 2011a; Brambilla & Leach, 2014; Leach, Ellemers & Baretto, 2007). Empirical evidence supports this alternative model and showed that when judging social targets, sociability and morality didnot factor together. They differed in terms of mean levels and did not correlate any more highly than they did with judgments of competence (Landy, 2015). These results indicate that sociability and morality are two separate domains, with no direct overlap with each other. On the basis of the criticism and research results, Kervyn, Fiske and Yzerbyt (2016) broadened their concept of warmth. They redefined warmth as an umbrella term that contains both sociability and morality.
Economic and Consumer Psychology | Leiden University 10 on both domains and not use the overarching warmth dimension. This way a more specific image is drawn about which brand trait has an influence on brand evaluation and positive eWOM intentions.
The Importance of Morality
As stated before, warmth seems to be the most important dimension for social and brand perception. However, it seems that warmth exists out of two domains; sociability and morality. Therefore, it is key to find out which domain is more dominant. Research points out that morality seems to be more important than sociability or competence in social perception. For instance, research suggests that when an in-group is more successful, thus high in
competence, in-group morality is still more important for a positive evaluation than
competence (Leach et al., 2007). In line with this, when evaluating other groups, people seem more interested in obtaining information about morality than about sociability and
competence (Brambilla et al., 2011b). These findings suggest that, in information gathering and social evaluation, morality, sociability and competence are processed differently. In this process, morality seems to play a more dominant role over sociability and competence for a positive evaluation (Brambilla et al., 2011b). Several studies confirm these findings and state that when forming global impressions of a group or a person, the perceiver is more interested in their morality than their competence or sociable qualities (Brambilla et al., 2013; Landy et al., 2016;Stellaer & Willer, 2018). Morality dominates on an interpersonal level as well (De Bruin & van Lange, 2000; Wojckjzke, 2005). A possible explanation for this finding is that immoral people may threaten the perceivers well-being, property or even their lives, which is a more urgent matter than someone’s ability to perform. Therefore, people might prefer a persons’ morality over their competence (Rusconi, Cherubini & Yzerbyt, 2012; Wojckjzke 2005).
Economic and Consumer Psychology | Leiden University 11 When looking at morality and competence in organizations, research shows that
people are more attracted to teams and organizations with high moral values and ethical conduct. Suggesting that people prefer to seek employment in a moral, rather than a
competent, organization (Prooijen & Ellemers, 2015). This indicates that perceived morality of an organization has a greater impact on its attractiveness to individuals than perceived competence has. This gives more support for the dominance of morality.
It seems that morality plays a more important role than competence in judging and evaluating other groups and organizations. As social perception and brand perception are somewhat the same, the argument can be made that these findings hold for brands as well. Specific literature on the influence of brand morality on brand evaluation could not be found. Therefore, this research will contribute to the current literature investigating whether the findings of the importance of the morality domain in social perception can be translated back to brand perception.
Moreover, perceived morality seems to have an influence on perceived competence as well. For instance, research showed that high sociability and high competence of other
individuals were only evaluated positively under the contingency of high morality (Landy, Piazza & Goodwin, 2016; Van der Lee, Ellemers, Scheepers & Rutjens, 2017). An
explanation of this finding is that information indicating incompetence is perceived to be less important for positively evaluating individuals than information indicating immorality. As competence is an easier construct to change, people are more hopeful that individuals may improve in the future when they have inferior competence (Van der Lee, Ellemers, Scheepers & Rutjens, 2017). In line with these findings, another study found that people use information about one’s morality when judging their competence, although they know that these domains are independent of each other (Stellaer & Willer, 2018). They do this by gathering
Economic and Consumer Psychology | Leiden University 12 competence, but also when judging competence on specific skills or domains. These results suggest that immoral targets are seen as less competent, because their immoral actions lead them to be viewed as low in social intelligence (Stellaer & Willer, 2018).
Findings in social perception show the dominance of morality over sociability and competence for a positive evaluation. As previously mentioned, people perceive brands in similar ways to how they perceive people. Therefore, brand perceived morality is expected to be more important than brand perceived competence or sociability for a positive brand
evaluation. Moreover, morality also has an influence on competence. This would suggest that a brand perceived competence only shows a relation with positive brand evaluation when brand perceived morality is relatively high. This results in the first two hypotheses:
H1: Brand perceived morality relates more strongly to brand evaluation than brand perceived competence or sociability.
H2: The relation between brand competence and brand evaluation becomes stronger when brand morality becomes higher.
The Effect of Brand Trait Dimensions on eWOM
As stated in the introduction, eWOM is one of the most influential sources of information about products or services. Hence, it is important to understand what the main motivator of positive eWOM intentions is. This main motivator can be related back to brand traits.
Research suggests that consumers derive their self-image through products and brands, and consequently want to be associated with certain brands that enhance their self-image (Taylor, 2010). This relates to the motives for engaging in eWOM; people also tend to use
Economic and Consumer Psychology | Leiden University 13 these motives for self-enhancing goals (Dahl, 2014). Research shows that eWOM senders are trying to boost their self-image by talking about a brand they like (Dahl, 2014). There are many studies on consumer motives for expressing positive eWOM, but their findings differ slightly. People want to increase their reputation and skill by talking online about a brand. They do this by showing their knowledge, this relates to self-enhancement (Cheung and Lee, 2012). Also, people like to become associated with a certain brand to increase and protect their self-worth (Chu, Lien and Cao, 2018). Furthermore, people have a need for social interaction. They try to fulfil this need by talking online, about a brand, with the goal of seeking out others who share their thoughts (Hussain et al., 2018). Although these are different motivators, they have some common ground. It could be argued that the different aspects of engaging in eWOM are linked to enhancing one’s self-image. This supports the notion that consumers are motivated to talk online about a brand in order to signal and enhance their self-image.
Morality and Self-enhancement
People are thus likely to be motivated to talk about a brand online in order to signal and enhance their self-image. There seem to be two important drivers for self-enhancement: to pursue, maintain or augment a positive self-view or to protect, avoid or repair a negative self-view (Sedikides & Alicke, 2018). It can be argued that morality serves as a drive to enhance one’s self-view. For instance, research shows that morality, but not sociability nor competence, predicted in-group identification and in-group pride (Leach et al., 2007). This can be related to self-enhancement motives, as in-group identification and in-group pride play a role in one’s self-view (Sedikides & Alicke, 2018). Based on this, it can be expected that people will prefer to be associated with a moral brand instead of a competent or sociable brand to obtain their self-enhancement goal. Talking about this moral brand online, helps to
Economic and Consumer Psychology | Leiden University 14 serve that goal.
Further research shows the direct effect of brand competence and morality on positive eWOM intentions. It suggests that an increase in warmth, that has overlap with morality (Hack et al., 2013), makes it easier for brands to get online endorsement from consumers (Bernitter and Verlegh, 2016). Other research showed that brands’ interpersonal interaction with consumers about their social responsibilities influence attributed traits and stimulate positive eWOM intentions (Van Prooijen & Bartels, 2019). It seemed that higher levels of perceived interactivity were linked to higher levels of perceived morality, sociability and competence of the brand. However, only attributed morality is associated with more positive eWOM intentions (Van Prooijen & Bartels, 2019). The explanation for this finding is that eWOM can pose social risks. The social risks occur because one provides information to a social network in which one’s reputation is built and maintained. If this information is not correct it can harm one’s credibility. Consumers might feel these social risks to be lower when the brand is considered to be high in morality, and higher when perceived lower in morality (Eisingerich, 2015). When putting this in perspective with the goal of
self-enhancement, it could be argued that brand perceived morality is preferred above competence. This because, low morality is more of a social risk. When working on your self-enhancement goal you do not want high social risks, as they can counteract this goal.
This study will contribute to the current findings and test if brand perceived morality plays a more important role than brand perceived competence or sociability in stimulating positive eWOM intentions about a brand.
H3: Brand perceived morality relates more strongly to positive eWOM intentions about the brand than brand perceived competence or sociability.
Economic and Consumer Psychology | Leiden University 15 The Role of Product Type
Because every product and brand has a different use, it seems likely that the influence of brand perceived competence, sociability and morality vary for different products and brands. When looking at product and brand type there is a classic distinction between two types. Hedonic and utilitarian (Park, Jaworski & Maclnnis, 1986). Hedonic products or brands are luxury, people use these with the goal of feeling pleasure, fun orenjoyment. Utilitarian products or brands are practical, people use these with the goal of functionality (Chattalas ,2015). When putting hedonism and utilitarianism in relation to brand competence and warmth, one could argue that perceptions of warmth and competence influence whether consumers expect a particular brand to be hedonic or utilitarian in nature. Research shows that high perceived warmth of a brand results in greater expectations of hedonic product
properties. Meaning, people expect the product or brand to be more hedonic in nature. High perceived competence of a brand results in greater expectations of utilitarian properties. This means that people expect a product or brand to be more utilitarian in nature (Peter & Ponzi, 2018). The expectations refer to the classification of an object belonging to a certain category, with certain product characteristics (Chattalas, 2015). An explanation for the relation between warmth and hedonic brands; and competence and utilitarian brands, is that the warmth
dimension relates to people’s social and affective traits. These traits are more related to
hedonic brands. Whereas, the perceived competence relates to intellectual and functional traits and is more related to utilitarian brands (Chattalas, 2015).
As stated in the introduction, hedonic brands in general get a better consumer
evaluation and play a more important role in stimulating purchase intentions (Chen, Chang, & Chen, 2017; Dhar & Wertenbroch, 2000). In order to further demonstrate support for the dominance of morality, this research will test if hedonic brands also get a higher brand evaluation and if so, test whether this difference can be explained by the mediating effect of
Economic and Consumer Psychology | Leiden University 16 high morality scores. This means that for hedonic brands the perceived morality will be
higher, resulting in a more positive brand evaluation than for utilitarian brands. This results in the final hypothesis:
H4: Hedonic brands will score higher on brand perceived morality compared to utilitarian brands, which results in a more positive brand evaluation for hedonic brands than for utilitarian brands.
Method
Overview
To test the hypotheses, a survey was conducted in line with the ethical guidelines of Leiden University. The present study was part of a larger study, which also included research on non-profit organizations. As a result, all participants evaluated six different well-known brands on perceived brand traits, general evaluation and eWOM intentions.
Participants
In this study 179 subjects participated with an average age of 34.20. From these 179 participants there were 101 females and 78 males. The participants were recruited through the professional network of the researchers. All participants signed an informed consent. In this informed consent, participants were informed about their rights, the study, the procedureand the advantages and disadvantages of participating in the study.
Measures Brands
Six brands were evaluated in the survey; Nintendo, Mars, HP, Pink Lady, WWF and Red Cross. Nintendo and Mars were selected as hedonic brands and HP and Pink Lady as
Economic and Consumer Psychology | Leiden University 17 their utilitarian counterparts. The brands were expected to be similar in familiarity and
reputation and represented the same industries: Nintendo vs. HP and Mars vs. Pink Lady. WWF and Red Cross were chosen as non-profit organizations for another study; however, they were also used in the analyses.
Brand Traits
Brand perceived morality, sociability and competence were measured with nine traits derived from Leach et al. (2007). Participants were asked to indicate for each trait how
descriptive it was for the brand in question on a 7-point Likert scale (1 = not at all descriptive; 7 = very descriptive). Morality was assessed with the traits, “trustworthy”, “reliable”, and “honest”. These items were averaged per brand which resulted in reliable scales, s > .87. Sociability was assessed with, “friendly”, “likeable”, and “warm”. These items were also averaged and resulted in reliable scales as well, s > .89. Competence was assessed with, “intelligent”, “skilled” and “competent” and also had reliable scales, s > .86.
Brand Evaluation and eWOM
The dependent variable brand evaluation was measured with the altered brand emotion questionnaire from Yen, Lin and Hin (2014) and consisted of five items. These items
represented five dimensions of brand evaluation: repurchase intentions, recommendation intentions, attachment, positive emotions and passion. The questions were measured on a 7-point Likert scale (1 = totally disagree, 7 = totally agree). The questionnaire was adapted to fit the current research and had a good reliability as the lowest alpha was α = .80. The questions used to measure brand evaluation are as follows: “This brand is my first choice when buying related products.”, “My love for this brand is incomparable to the other brand.” and “This brand is very appealing to me.”.
Economic and Consumer Psychology | Leiden University 18 To measure the dependent variable eWOM, the adapted sWOM scale from the
research of Elsingericht, Chun and Jia (2015) was used. This questionnaire measures
willingness to offer positive word-of-mouth on social sites with five items. Examples of these items are: “To what extent is it likely that you say positive things about the brand on social sites such as Facebook?”, and, “To what extent is it likely that you use social sites to
encourage friends and relatives to buy the brands’ products?”. The participants had to indicate on a 7-point Likert scale (1 = definitely not, 7 = definitely yes) to what extend they agree or disagree with the statement. The questionnaire had a good reliability as the lowest alpha found was α = .84, the questionnaire is included in appendix A.
Manipulation check
A manipulation check wasadded at the end of the questionnaire, this wasto check whether the participants had judged the different brands as expected. To judge the hedonic value of the brand, the participant had to indicate to what extent they find the
products/services of the brand pleasurable and fun. To judge the utilitarian value of the brand, the participant had to indicate to what extend they find the products/services of the brand instrumental and functional.
Control variables
Control variables were taken into account as well. This wasto make sure that the effect found was only due to the variables investigated and that no other factors played a role. The chosen control variables were: “social media use”, “age”, and, “gender”.
Economic and Consumer Psychology | Leiden University 19 Procedure
The survey was conducted online with no direct interaction; the participants received a link directing them to the survey. For the beginning of the survey the participants were asked to read a short introduction and to agree to the informed consent. In this introduction, the participants were informed about the purpose of the study, the confidentiality of data, and the security of their participation. They were free to contact the responsible researcher in case of any further questions. Also, the participants had to indicate if they have a good command of the English language. Then, the survey began. Participants evaluated each brand on perceived brand traits first, followed by purchase intentions, brand evaluation and eWOM intentions. Brands were always evaluated in the same order. At the end, participants were asked to answer the manipulation check questions for the hedonic and utilitarian value of the brand, and general information was gathered regarding sex, age and social media use. Finally, participants were fully debriefed and were given the possibility to add questions or comments about the survey. The whole survey took an average of 20 minutes.
Results
Manipulation Check
In order to test whether the utilitarian and hedonic brands were perceived as intended, two paired sample t-tests were conducted to compare the mean of perceived utilitarian and hedonic value for the two similar type of brands. Results showed that Nintendo and Mars scored significantly higher on hedonic value (M = 4.94, SD = 1.48), compared to HP and Pink Lady (M = 4.44, SD = 1.21), t(178) = 4.78, p = .003. There was also a significant difference in the utilitarian scores for Nintendo and Mars (M = 4.50, SD = 1.37), compared to HP and Pink Lady (M = 4.94, SD = 1.04), t(178) = 5.42, p = .002. This means that the manipulation succeeded, the differentiation between hedonic and utilitarian brands was as expected.
Economic and Consumer Psychology | Leiden University 20 Correlation Analysis
To test interrelations between main variables and relations with control variables, correlation analyses were conducted. Results in Table 1 show that the main variables related to each other as expected. Brand evaluation showed a positive relation with morality,
competence and sociability. The three trait dimensions also significantly goes up for the independent variable eWOM. There was a very strong correlation between morality and sociability, which could result in multicollinearity.
Furthermore, the results show that social media use significantly correlated with morality, competence, sociability, eWOM and brand evaluation. All correlations were significant at the <.001 level. Also, gender correlates significantly with morality and sociability, and age correlates significantly with morality. These variables were taken into account as control variables.
* Correlation is significant at the p = .05 level (2 tailed) ** Correlation is significant at the p <.001 level (2 tailed) Table 1: Correlation Matrix
Morality Competence Sociability Gender Age
Social
media use eWOM
Competence ,683**
Sociability ,858** ,684**
Gender -,258* -,100 -,226*
Age -,115* ,011 -,130 ,246*
Social media use ,402** ,369** ,338** -,315** -,447**
eWOM ,313** ,361** ,283** -,074 -,275** ,382**
Economic and Consumer Psychology | Leiden University 21 Main Analyses
Before testing the hypotheses, the assumptions for regression were checked. There were no signs of non-linearity, heteroscedasticity or non-normality. Also, the errors were
completely unrelated.
Hypothesis 1
At first, the data was checked for outliers. Visual inspection of the data showed outliers on the independent variable. The leverage value, 0.128, was higher than the criterion, 0.07. The outliers were further analyzed, and it seemed that some participants scored a lot higher than the average on the independent variables. However, there seemed to be no good reason to delete the outliers from the data. Therefore, the outliers were kept in the analysis. For each variable, an index for all brands combined was computed by averaging the scales per brand (e.g., a morality index was calculated by averaging the six morality scales). Then, the assumptions for multicollinearity were checked due to the strong correlation between morality and sociability. However, the tolerance was much larger than .10 and the VIF was much smaller than 10. The assumptions were met, and this means that there is no multicollinearity in the data.
According to the first hypothesis, brand perceived morality would show a stronger positive relation with brand evaluation compared to brand perceived competence or sociability. This was tested with a hierarchical multiple regression in which the three traits were entered as predictors, and brand evaluation as the dependent variable. The control variables were added in the first blockand the predictors were added in the second block. After entry of morality, sociability and competence in the second block the added variance explained by the model was 12.9%, which was significant, R2 = .19, F(6, 178) = 6.62, p < .001. However, when looking at the predictors individually it showed that no predictor had a unique contribution in the model, morality β = .15, p = .291; competence β = .09, p = .337;
Economic and Consumer Psychology | Leiden University 22 and sociability β = .18, p = .204. But together, they predicted brand evaluation. This means that the hypothesis must be rejected.
Hypothesis 2
According to the second hypothesis, the relation between brand perceived competence and a positive brand evaluation would become stronger when brand perceived morality was higher. This was tested with PROCESS macro for regression analyses (Hayes, 2014). The total model was statistically significant, R2 = .19, F(3,178) = 12.99, p =< .001. The further results showed that centered morality β = .93, p = .001, centered competence β = .65, p = .009, and the interaction β = -.13, p = .016 were significant as well. Examination of the interaction plot, displayed in Figure 1, showed a negative reversed effect. For low
competence, morality had a significant positive relation with brand evaluation, β = .72, t(178) = 3.99, p < .001. For medium competence, the relation between morality and brand evaluation was also significant but less strong, β = .41, t(178) = 3.21, p = .001. In contrast, the relation was non-significant for high competence, β = .06, t(178) = 1.50, p = .135. The interaction showed a reciprocal relation. When the relation between competence and brand evaluation became stronger, the relation between morality and brand evaluation became weaker and vice versa. Low morality and high competence or high morality and low competence increased brand evaluation. This means that the hypothesis must be rejected.
Economic and Consumer Psychology | Leiden University 23 Figure 1. Interaction plot brands’ morality and competence on brand evaluation
Hypothesis 3
According to the third hypothesis, brand perceived morality would show a stronger positive relation to positive eWOM intentions about the brand compared to brand perceived competence or sociability. At first the data was checked on outliers again. There seemed to be no outliers on the dependent variable or any influential data points. However, there were still outliers on the independent variables, but the choice has been made to keep these outliers in the analysis. Also, no multicollinearity was found. The hypothesis was tested with a
hierarchical linear regression, in this regression the three traits were entered as predictors, and eWOM as the dependent variable. The control variables were added in the first block and the independent variables were added in the second block. The second model was statistically significant, R2 = .19, F(6, 178) = 6.62, p < .001. When taking a further look at the unique contributions of the different predictors, it showed that competence was a statistically
significant predictor of eWOM β = .23, p = .03, but morality β = .08, p = .291 and sociability β = .18, p = .204, were not. As brand perceived morality has no significant contribution to the explanation of positive eWOM intentions, the hypothesis was rejected.
Economic and Consumer Psychology | Leiden University 24
Hypothesis 4
According to the last hypothesis, hedonic brands would score higher on brand
perceived morality when compared to utilitarian brands.This would result in a more positive brand evaluation for hedonic brands. First of all, mean scores of brand perceived morality and brand evaluation were made for the hedonic brands; Nintendo and Mars, and the utilitarian brands; HP and Pink Lady. Then, a paired samples t-test was conducted. There was no significant difference in brand perceived morality for hedonic brands (M = 4.34, SD = 0.91) and utilitarian brands (M = 4.32, SD = 0.95), t(178) = 0.82, p = .201. Also, no significant difference was found in brand evaluation for hedonic brands (M = 3.64, SD = 0.93) and utilitarian brands (3.60, SD = 0.81), t(178) = 0.52, p = .604. This meant that no further analysis could be conducted, and the hypothesis was rejected.
Discussion
The goal of this study was to examine the influence of brand perceived morality, sociability and competence on brand evaluation and positive eWOM intentions. Secondly, this study investigated the role of product type. The results of this study contradicted multiple findings in the existing literature and pose new insights relevant to brand perception and consumer behavior.
Theoretical and Practical Implications
The first aim of this study was to examine the influence of brand perceived morality, sociability and competence on brand evaluation. Based on previous studies on social
perception (Brambilla et al., 2011a; Choi & Winterich, 2013; Leach et al., 2007; Rusconi, Cherubini & Yzerbyt, 2012; Wojckjzke 2005), it was hypothesized that brand perceived morality is more strongly related to brand evaluation compared to brand perceived sociability
Economic and Consumer Psychology | Leiden University 25 or competence. Contrary to the hypothesized association, the results showed that brand
perceived morality had no significant unique contribution to the prediction of brand evaluation, neither did brand perceived sociability and competence. Most literature used is based on social perception, therefore it could be argued that findings in social perception cannot be directly translated back to brand perception (Fiske et al., 2002; Kervyn et al., 2012). This means that people might perceive morality for brands differently than for other people and groups. Morality is preferred over sociability or competence in social perception because immoral people can threaten the perceivers well-being, property or even their lives (Rusconi, Cherubini & Yzerbyt, 2012; Wojckjzke, 2005). However, for brands this may be different. An immoral brand will probably not form a direct threat because it is not an existing organism that can harm one’s well-being, property or one’s life, this would be more of an indirect threat when associated with the brand. Therefore, brand perceived morality might not be the most important factor for a positive brand evaluation. Yet, a combination of all three traits will result in a positive brand evaluation.
It is hard for companies to use this knowledge, as there might be a trade-off between warm and competent considerations. More research on brand perception and the influence of brand traits is needed to get a clearer image of which brand trait has the greatest influence on a positive brand evaluation. With this knowledge, companies could then focus on only one trait when positioning their brand on the market. This way, companies can take trade-off into account.
The second aim of this research was to examine the influence of brand perceived competence on brand evaluation. Research pointed out that high competence was only evaluated as positive under the contingency of high morality (Landy, Piazza & Goodwin, 2016; Stellaer & Willer, 2018; Van der lee et al., 2017) and therefore it was hypothesized that the relation between brand perceived competence and a positive brand evaluation became
Economic and Consumer Psychology | Leiden University 26 stronger when brand perceived morality became higher. However, contrary to the hypothesis, the results showed a reciprocal relation. When the relation between competence and brand evaluation became stronger, the relation between morality and brand evaluation became weaker and vice versa. As stated before, morality might not play that of an important role in brand perception as was expected from social perception. Additional research mentioned that the presence of both competence and morality could create a contrast effect (Cuddy, Glick and Beninger, 2011). This entailed that when a brand was seen as high in warmth it was automatically judged as low in competence and the other way around. The implication for companies is to take into account when promoting morality, they might be perceived as low in competence and vice versa. Companies have to take a well-considered decision in this.
Further research on brand morality and competence on brand evaluation is needed to find a clearer explanation for the negative inverse interaction.
The third aim of this study was to investigate the drivers of positive eWOM intentions. Literature pointed out that brand perceived morality would play an important role in
stimulating positive eWOM intentions towards the brand (Bernitter and Verlegh, 2016; Van Prooijen & Bartels, 2019). Therefore, it was hypothesized that brand perceived morality was more important than brand perceived competence or sociability for positive eWOM
intentions. Contrary to the hypothesized association, the results showed that brand perceived competence played a significant role in stimulating positive eWOM intentions towards the brand. Brand perceived morality did not. A possible explanation of these findings might be that the intention to engage in eWOM also depends on the perceived trust of the brand (Jarvenpaa, Knoll & Leidner, 1998; Ridings, Gefen & Arinze, 2002). This definition of trust consists of a perception of the brand being reliable and having competency (Yeh & Choi, 2011; Lee et al., 2011). However, reliability falls under morality and competency falls under competence. This suggests that the perceived competence of the brand plays a role in this
Economic and Consumer Psychology | Leiden University 27 process and apparently that role is more important than perceived morality. However,
perceived competence only explains 3% of the variance. This implies that the relationship found, between positive eWOM intentions and perceived competence, is not that strong. Further research needs to be conducted to find out which brand trait has a strong relation with positive eWOM intentions. For companies, the implication of these findings for now is to strive to be perceived as competent when they want to stimulate positive eWOM intentions about their brand. They have to take into account that when they are perceived as high in competence, to stimulate more positive eWOM, it can result in an automatic process of being perceived as low in morality.
The final aim of the research was to investigate the effect of product type on brand perceived morality and evaluation. Literature pointed out that hedonic brands relate more to the warmth dimension and utilitarian brands relate more to the competence dimension (Chattalas, 2015). Also, hedonic products received a better consumer evaluation and
hedonism played a bigger role in stimulating purchase intentions (Chen et al., 2017; Dhar & Wertenbroch, 2000). Therefore, it was expected that hedonic brands, would score higher on brand evaluation. This as aresult of scoring higher on brand perceived morality. However, no effect was found. The average score of hedonic and utilitarian brands do not differ on
perceived brand morality nor on brand evaluation. Firstly, as stated before, morality might not play that of an important role in brand perception and therefore no effect is found. Moreover, even if the manipulation succeeded and the brands differed on hedonic and utilitarian value, when looking at the averages it seemed that this differentiation was not that big. This may be a reason for why the hedonic and utilitarian brands did not significantly differ on brand perceived morality. For further research it is suggested to choose more distinct hedonic and utilitarian brands. Next to this, more brands should be used so the chance increases that a clearer differentiation between hedonic and utilitarian brands can be obtained.
Economic and Consumer Psychology | Leiden University 28 Limitations and Implications
The current study also has limitations. Firstly, the data collection for the study has been conducted through an online survey. Using an online survey brings certain limitations. First of all, the environment cannot be controlled. Participants can be in a very busy room, and therefore more distracted, whilst other participants can be in a quiet room and therefore more focused. This results in data bias. Also, participants might be less motivated to answer the survey, or misinterpret questions, resulting in less accurate answers (Ryan, Coughlan, & Cronin, 2009). These limitations can be solved by doing a controlled lab study where the environment can be controlled. Also, with an experimental study the researcher can make sure the participants are not distracted and can provide them with help, when needed.
Another limitation is the brands that were chosen for the hedonic and utilitarian brand differentiation. This research was part of a larger study, and therefore the brands that were chosen had multiple research purposes. For example, WWF and Red Cross were chosen as non-profit companies and could not be used for the hedonic and utilitarian brand
differentiation. This resulted in only four brands that could be evaluated on their hedonic and utilitarian value. Moreover, these brands could not be picked out individually; they had to meet certain requirements for other research questions. This resulted in a compromised choice and eventually, a lower differentiation between the hedonic and utilitarian brands, this might have led to a non-significant difference in product type on brand morality and evaluation. Future research should focus on finding brands which represent utilitarianism and hedonism well, so that a bigger differentiation between the brands can arise. Also, the brands should be chosen without any limitations of other research questions, resulting in purer results.
A last limitation of the study is that it only measures brand evaluation, and no further implications of brand evaluation on consumer behavior. This makes the practical implication of the findings less clear. Additional research showed that brand evaluation can influence
Economic and Consumer Psychology | Leiden University 29 brand attitude and purchase intention (Jung & Seock, 2016). This implies that a positive brand evaluation could result in a higher chance of the consumer buying the product. Yet, this is not tested with the current study.
For now, we know that brand morality has no unique contribution to brand evaluation. Further research must be conducted to find out why morality is less important in brand
perception compared to social perception and which brand trait can individually influence brand evaluation. Furthermore, research must be done on the influence of brand evaluation on consumer behavior.
Conclusion
For companies it is useful to know what could make their brand successful. This study contradicts findings from the existing literature that indicates that perceived brand morality plays a more important role in brand evaluation than perceived brand sociability and
competence. The results show that only a combination of all three traits will result in a higher brand evaluation. This is hard to manage, as a trade-off between morality and competence can arise. Further results showed that that trade-off between morality and competence is indeed present. When the relation between brand competence and brand evaluation becomes
stronger, the relation between brand morality and brand evaluation becomes weaker and vice versa. The results contradict each other. Therefore, further research is needed to get a clearer understanding of the processes of stimulating positive brand evaluation based upon brand perceived traits. Also, contrary to the hypothesis, it was found that brand perceived
competence is more important than brand perceived morality for positive eWOM intentions. Yet, the relation found is not that strong. Therefore, it is suggested to conduct further research on this topic. For now, companies must focus on promoting their perceived competence when they want to stimulate eWOM. Lastly, no effect for product type on brand perceived morality
Economic and Consumer Psychology | Leiden University 30 or evaluation could be found. For further research it is suggested to get a broader and better differentiation between hedonic and utilitarian brands, so this relation can be further analyzed. The findings of this research add to the current academic literature, giving new insights into brand perception in which morality does not seem to play as an important role as was expected based upon social perception. Also, perceived competence is more important for eWOM intentions which contradicts the literature that argues for morality as most important factor for stimulating positive eWOM intentions. Ideas for further research would be to focus on the most important brand trait for a positive brand evaluation, and to investigate which brand trait strongly relates to positive eWOM intentions. Also, to research the reason why morality plays a less important role in brand perception compared to social perception. Alongside this, the negative inverse interaction has to be further analyzed, as this can play an important role in brand perception.
Economic and Consumer Psychology | Leiden University 31
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Economic and Consumer Psychology | Leiden University 40 Appendix A
sWOM scale (Elsingericht, Chun and Jia, 2015)
1. To what extent is it likely that you say positive things about the brand on social sites such as Facebook?
2. To what extent is it likely that you use social sites to encourage friends and relatives to buy the brands’ products?
3. To what extent is it likely that you recommend the brands’ on social sites such as Facebook?
4. I would strongly recommend people buy products online from this brand
5. To what extent is it likely that you would become a fan of the brand pages on social sites such as Facebook?
