EVERYTHING BEAUTIFUL IS GOOD?

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EVERYTHING BEAUTIFUL IS GOOD?

The moderating role of The Liking Principle in the relationship between Resource Depletion and Purchase Intention

by

Celine Suijkerbuijk

University of Groningen Faculty of Economics and Business

MSc Marketing Management

June, 2019

Lissabonstraat 24

9718AZ Groningen

c.a.w.suijkerbuijk@student.rug.nl S2875128

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TABLE OF CONTENTS

1 INTRODUCTION ... 4

2 THEORETICAL BACKGROUND ... 6

Resource depletion ... 6

Physical attractiveness heuristic ... 6

Facial attractiveness ... 7

The liking principle ... 7

Conceptual framework ... 8

3 METHODOLOGY ... 10

Participants and design ... 10

Procedure ... 11

Independent variable ... 12

Moderator variable ... 12

Dependent variables ... 15

Analysis plan ... 15

Reliability ... 16

4 RESULTS ... 19

Recoding of the participants ... 19

Manipulation check attractiveness of the endorser ... 19

Testing the hypotheses ... 19

Auxiliary analyses ... 20

Covariates age and gender ... 21

5 DISCUSSION & CONCLUSION ... 22

6 LIMITATIONS & FUTURE RESEARCH DIRECTIONS ... 24

REFERENCES ... 26

APPENDIX 1: ONLINE EXPERIMENT ... 29

APPENDIX 2: DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF ENDORSERS’ FACE CHANGES ... 59

APPENDIX 3: HISTOGRAMS ... 61

APPENDIX 4: MEAN PLOT & BAR CHART OF TWO-‐WAY ANOVA ... 64

APPENDIX 5: CONGRUENCY PER QUESTION IN STROOP TASK ... 65

APPENDIX 6: SPSS OUTPUT PER ANALYSIS ... 66

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ABSTRACT

This study investigated purchase intentions resulting from resource depletion, possibly moderated by physically attractive endorsers who would induce activating the liking principle heuristic. In an online experiment, participants’ fulfilled an online experiment in which some of them would do the Stroop test (Stroop, 1935), which taxed their self-regulatory resources.

After that, their perceptions of the attractiveness, trustworthiness and expertise were inquired for and their purchase intentions towards a Lonely Planet Magazine was measured. Resource- depleted and not resource-depleted participants were equal in reporting purchase intentions when confronted with an attractive endorser in this study in comparison to when the unattractive endorser was presented. However, the attractive endorsers were significantly seen as more beautiful than their unattractive counterparts. Yet, it cannot be concluded from this research that resource depletion in combination with a physically attractive endorser in the advertisement increases purchase intentions.

Key words resource depletion  liking principle  physical attractiveness  endorser 

purchase intention

Research theme: Tracking down the effectiveness of marketing and sales techniques First supervisor: Prof. Dr. B.M. Fennis

Second supervisor: PhD Candidate J.A. Koch

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1 INTRODUCTION

veryday an overwhelming amount of consumption opportunities flood over the contemporary consumers, who are constantly confronted with products they did not even know they wanted. Resisting temptations can be difficult sometimes, especially when all self-regulatory resources are depleted (Vohs & Faber, 2007). It is almost too easy to give in to the urge of buying. Especially in the evening a failure in self-control can occur, since resources are restored during the night, while sleeping. This is because the day requires people to control themselves constantly and make many deliberate choices (Baumeister, 2002).

Being aware of the possibility to order something online and receive it the next day, makes purchase intentions rise even more. Proximity of online products causes this effect, since the feeling of loss is asymmetrically larger than the joyful feeling of a potential gain (Tversky and Kahneman 1981). Feeling worn out increases vulnerability and causes mindless behaviour. Consequently people rely on simple decision making rules, also called heuristics.

Responding on automatic pilot allows immediate buying when minimal conditions, that compose a ‘right’ choice, are met (Chen & Wang, 2016).

One of these heuristics is the liking principle, consisting of several determinants. In current literature there is no research done yet on resource depleted consumers, who might activate the liking principle heuristic, possibly leading to an increase in their purchase intentions (Janssen et al., 2008). This research induces liking through physical attractiveness of the product endorser. People have an innate tendency to like physical attractive others more (Langlois et al., 1990). But what specific characteristics of product endorsers make consumers surrender?

Expected is that a state of resource depletion has a positive influence on purchase intentions.

The liking principle, specifically the physical attractiveness of the product endorser, is hypothesized to moderate the relationship in a positive way. The research question is as follows: Does the liking principle serve as a heuristic before forming the intention to purchase a product, when an individual is resource depleted?

The scientific contribution of this paper consists of understanding in which contexts purchase intentions emerge and what they are enhanced by. Resource depletion is expected to magnify purchase intentions (Janssen et al., 2008). Increasing intentions, leads to more choices being made, causing the consumers to become even more resource depleted. It is essential to know for companies, if the liking principle inflates this effect.

E

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Marketing strategies suitable for customers low in self-control are ones about immediate gratification. Contrarily, customers high in self-control appreciate marketing communications aimed at long-term value more (Baumeister, 2002). Managers can adapt their strategy in designing product offerings and choosing endorsers, when they know what exact details make consumers succumb to seduction (Baumeister, 2002).

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2 THEORETICAL BACKGROUND Resource depletion

Exercising control or using willpower requires the use of energy resources that are finite, therefore the active self can become depleted (Janssen & Fennis, 2010). Comparable to muscle failure after intensive exercising, people can fail in self-regulation, when they are resource-depleted (Baumeister et al., 1998). Whether people can effectively control themselves depends on a state of resource depletion, self-control traits and careful monitoring of one’s own behaviour (Baumeister, 2002). Resource depletion results in increased vulnerability and causes them to act in mindless manners (Janssen & Fennis, 2010).

Physical attractiveness heuristic

Physical attractiveness can be seen as a stereotype or heuristic, which helps integrating a large amount of information, relatively easily, with the use of a shortcut (Macrae, Milne, &

Bodenhausen, 1993). This stereotype is activated automatically, unintentionally and effortlessly (Bargh, 1984). The common stereotype about physically attractive people is that they possess more positive qualities and have more satisfying life outcomes than their not so attractive counterparts (Vermeir & Van de Sompel, 2014). The attractiveness halo states that people have the tendency to generalize one characteristic of attractiveness to other unrelated ones such as honesty, kindness, intelligence, persuasiveness and being social (Eagly et al., 1991). This attractiveness heuristic is innate to some extent, according to research with babies from Langlois et al. (1990). Human beings thus have the natural propensity to like physically attractive people more. The environment encourages this, by movies, advertising and media.

All of these teach children cultural norms and reinforce their associations between beauty and goodness (Vermeir & Van de Sompel, 2014). Even though it is impossible to conclude

‘everything that is beautiful is good’. Being beautiful has its flaws, attractive women are found to be more narcissistic and have higher divorce rates (Kaner, 1995). Nevertheless, being attractive has its blessings; attractive people are more popular and adjust themselves better (Langlois et al., 2000). Attractive communicators are consistently liked more and have a positive impact on products with which they are associated (Joseph, 1982).

According to the theory of source congruity (Kirmani & Shiv, 1998), which reflects the match between cognitively accessible endorser associations and attributes associated with the brand, physical attractiveness of the endorser will affect brand attitudes. This is only the case under high processing intensity and when physical attractiveness is relevant for the product. The physical attractiveness will then namely be seen as a content cue and as an

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argument for product effectiveness (Fennis & Stroebe, 2016). When a consumer has low processing intensity the relevance of physical attractiveness to the product becomes unimportant (Kang & Herr, 2006). In that case physical attractiveness of the endorser is a heuristic cue (Fennis & Stroebe, 2016).

Facial attractiveness

Overall physical attractiveness consists of facial and bodily attractiveness, but the face is a slightly more powerful predictor (Mueser et al., 1984). Physical attractiveness embodies static components, which are relatively enduring properties such as the shape of a nose, and changeable components such as facial expression, grooming, make-up and clothes (Mueser et al., 1984). Smiling, for instance increases attractiveness, compared to a neutral facial expression (Reis et al., 1990). Someone attractive making eye contact is also being perceived as more rewarding in the brain (Kampe et al., 2001). Both will be taken into account when manipulating the attractiveness of the endorsers in this study.

Preferences in facial characteristics differ per individual, but some aspects are generally seen as attractive. The first determinant of facial physical attractiveness is symmetry, as it would reflect the ability of an individual to cope with challenges in its environment. Preference for symmetric faces could come from adaptive value in choosing a life partner, but other reasons than direct effects of symmetry can also lead to this preference (Fink & Penton-Voak, 2002). Secondly, people have a tendency to like average faces more, the same applies for liking of objects and animals. It remains unclear why averageness is preferred (Fink & Penton-Voak, 2002). Thirdly, it is considered more attractive if a female has a high level of estrogen and a man having a high level of testosterone, which is visible in their facial characteristics. Overall, feminine female faces are almost always considered more attractive. Feminine or masculine male faces can both be equally attractive (Little, Jones &

DeBruine, 2011). The three determinants of facial attractiveness will all be used to manipulate the attractiveness of the endorsers.

The liking principle

The liking principle is the most effective of all influence tactics that a marketer can use. It states that people are more likely to comply with the requests of someone we like than someone we dislike or feel neutral towards (Fennis & Stroebe, 2016, p. 307). Liking is defined as a state of pleasurable utility (Berridge, 2003). Determinants of the liking heuristic already researched are familiarity (Burger et al., 2001) and similarity (Allport, 1961), but physical attractiveness is still underexposed and provides a gap in current literature. The

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physical attractiveness heuristic could be activated and used when resource-depleted and this may lead to higher purchasing intentions (Janssen et al., 2008).

Hypothesized is that resource-depleted customers may lean more on the heuristic of the liking principle than usual, making their decisions easier and more rapidly. The information of the product offer is then processed through the peripheral route (Fennis &

Stroebe, 2016). When the cue of a physical attractive endorser is positive, the inference of it is also positive. This leads to an attitude change towards complying with the request (Fennis &

Stroebe, 2016), i.e. displaying an increase in purchasing intentions. Resource depletion leads to an increase in the use of heuristics and thus impairs careful processing (Pocheptsova et al., 2009); therefore these general attractive aspects are more easily relied on and used as a positive cue. The endorser of the product is physically very attractive, so the quality must be good, is the simple derivation made (Vermeir & Van de Sompel, 2014). In this research, liking will be induced by physical attractiveness of the product endorser.

Conceptual framework

The main research question, shown in figure 1, is: ‘Does the liking principle serve as a heuristic before forming the intention to purchase a product, when an individual is resource depleted?’ The liking principle may be a moderator with an expected positive influence on the relationship between resource depletion (independent variable) and purchase intention of a consumer (dependent variable). Vohs & Faber (2007) proved that resource depleted people feel stronger urges to buy, are willing to spend more and actually did spend more money in unanticipated buying situations. The first hypothesis that can be derived from this is:

H1: A state of resource depletion has an expected positive influence on purchase intentions.

The mindlessness caused by a state of resource depletion encourages deciding with the use of heuristics (Janssen et al., 2008). Individuals will then respond automatically and therefore comply more easily with requests (Baumeister et al., 2000; Burger et al., 2001; Janssen et al., 2008). Meaning that resource depleted persons might also display higher purchasing intentions (Vohs & Faber, 2007), most likely even more when the physical attractiveness heuristic is activated. The second hypothesis that can be derived from this is:

H2: The liking principle (physical attractiveness heuristic) has an expected positive influence on the relationship between resource depletion and purchase intention.

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FIGURE 1 Conceptual Model

Thus, when a consumer is resource-depleted and the endorser activates the use of the physical attractiveness heuristic, purchase intentions are hypothesized to increase even more.

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3 METHODOLOGY Participants and design

The researched population of a total of 112 participants (details shown in table 1, 2, 3) consists of adults in the age between 18 and 67. The sample will be drawn from my own network of family, friends and fellow students. They are all not informed about the aim of this research and the hypotheses. This means it is a convenience sample, which is necessary since time and resources for this masters’ thesis are limited. Data will be collected in the period of the 1^st until the 22^th of May 2019 through an online experiment in Qualtrics. Specific questions and the survey flow per group are depicted in appendix 1. The method for data analysis will be a Two-Way ANOVA, with a 2 (resource depleted vs. not resource depleted) x 2 (attractive vs. unattractive endorser) between subjects design, depicted in table 1. The control group and experimental group differ from each other in the treatment they receive, meaning this research is a between subjects factorial design.

TABLE 1

The four different experimental (1, 2) and control groups (3, 4)

Attractive endorser Unattractive endorser

Resource depleted Group 1 N = 29 Group 2 N = 28

Not resource depleted Group 3 N = 29 Group 4 N = 26

Two outliers were removed from the dataset before generating the descriptive statistics and running the analyses, namely participant 48 and 83, because their Z-scores of attractiveness, trustworthiness and expertise average were above 3. Furthermore, the records four participants who were not paying attention, since they gave a wrong answer in the control question (Appendix 1, question 45), during the experiment were removed as well.

To see what the data set’s characteristics are, the descriptive statistics of age (table 2, Appendix 3: figure 8) were generated. This shows that the mean age is 33, and that there are many participants in the age between 21 and 24. Thereafter, also the division of the gender of the participants was generated, depicted in table 3, which shows that the majority of the participants are female.

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TABLE 2 Descriptive statistics

Age

N 112

Mean 32.7

Median 24

Standard Deviation 15.1

Variance 228.4

Minimum 18

Maximum 67

TABLE 3

Distribution of the participants’ gender

Frequency Percentage (%)

Male 41 36.6

Female 71 63.4

Total 112 100

Procedure

Firstly, a pre-test will be done with a few participants; hereafter they will be asked how they interpreted every question and how this influenced their behaviour. This checks whether they believe the cover story written in appendix 1 that will be shown before they start the experiment. Afterwards, during the debriefing, the researched hypotheses will be explained.

To ensure every participant understands what is expected, relevant information will be told repeatedly in different ways (Rashotte, 2007). Using validated metric scales for the IV, DV and moderator ensure validity of the research. Capturing all the details in this thesis of how measurements are done, so that the experiment can be replicated, ensures its reliability (Rashotte, 2007). To be certain that every participant keeps paying attention during the experiment, an extra question (Appendix 1, question 45) will be added. The cover story is that the Stroop Task is presented as a response time test, to see which participant would be answering the fastest and with the most correct answers. This is done so that the participants do not feel like they have to answer a very extensive questionnaire and so that they might make more mistakes because of their speed and might become more depleted.

Participants will be randomly assigned to either the experimental or control group. The control group will not become resource depleted and therefore will not have to do the Stroop

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task, they will only be measured on whether they think the endorser is attractive, trustworthy and an expert or not and if they want to buy the product.

In a Stroop task, participants will receive questions with names of colours, while these words have a different colour font than their semantic meaning. They will have to choose between four options and pick the correct font colour. People might get confused, especially after having to do this several times, therefore self-regulatory resources will become taxed and eventually depleted (Gailliot et al., 2007). When self-regulatory resources are low, it will become harder to perform the task and their performance will decrease. Depleted participants will make more errors than non-depleted participants (Fennis et al., 2009).

Independent variable

Resource depletion manipulation and measurement. Self-regulatory resource depletion can be measured exactly with the number of correct answers in a Stroop task (Stroop, 1935).

Similar with the research of Fennis et al. (2009) participants will have to answer 32 questions, of which 8 have a congruent colour of the words and colour of the font, the other 24 are incongruent. Colours that are used are the following:

– Green – Purple – Yellow – Red – Blue – Orange – Pink

The specific Stroop task with the colours and questions the participants received can be found in appendix 1, congruency tables are shown in appendix 5.

Moderator variable

The Liking Principle: physical attractiveness manipulation. A physically attractive endorser induces the liking principle. A symmetric photograph of a face of the endorser will be the operationalization physical facial attractiveness. This person cannot be a famous celebrity, since they influence the image of the product favourably (Atkin, Block, 1983) and this can lead to a confound. Furthermore, the photographs of the models will have females with feminine facial characteristics and males with either feminine or masculine facial characteristics (Little, Jones & DeBruine, 2011). The male endorser on the advertisement is used for female respondents and the female endorser is used for male respondents. Individual differences in preference for attractive faces will be ruled out mostly by only inducing

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physical attractiveness with generally found attractive characteristics, which most people will agree with (Fink & Penton-Voak, 2002).

To rule out any differences in unattractiveness between the male and female endorser, the asymmetric characteristics in the face will be identical in nature. The faces of the endorsers will be made asymmetrically changed to the left with the app Facetune 2. A very detailed description of the exact changes that are made to both faces can be found in appendix 2. The following changes are made: noses are made larger, lips smaller, eyes smaller and placed more widely apart, chins are made bigger. Next to these changes, the eyebrows of the girl are made bigger, since this is considered more masculine. For the man, this change is made in reverse; his eyebrows are made thinner, which is considered more feminine.

The advertisements with either an attractive or unattractive endorser offering a Lonely Planet Magazine for €7.99 are shown below in figure 2-5.

Ohanian (1990) has examined a wide range of literature and has empirically tested and validated a reliable scale to measure source credibility in three constructs, namely attractiveness, trustworthiness and expertise. This 9-point ‘source credibility’ scale, ranging from 1 to 9 will be used to measure attractiveness of the endorser in line with Ohanian (1990).

The participants were asked to rate the person depicted on the advertisement on several scales. The first being ‘unattractive’ (1) to ‘attractive’ (9), secondly ‘not classy’ (1) to ‘classy’

(9), thirdly ‘ugly’ (1) to ‘beautiful/handsome’ (9), fourth ‘plain’ (1) to ‘elegant’ (9) and fifth

‘not sexy’ (1) to ‘sexy’ (9).

FIGURE 2

Advertisement for group 1 & 3, for females

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FIGURE 3

Advertisement for group 1 & 3, for males

FIGURE 4

Advertisement group 2 & 4, for females

FIGURE 5

Advertisement group 2 & 4, for males

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Dependent variables

Purchase intention measurement. The buying intention of participants will be measured with a 7-point Likert scale, ranging from 1 to 7 in three different questions (Spears & Singh, 2004).

The product will have a price of €7.99, the same as it costs in reality on https://shop.lonelyplanet.com. The offer will be a magazine from Lonely Planet, which is quite general and unisex in taste. This is done to ensure that individual preferences for the product are met. The Cronbach’s Alpha for the purchase intention scale is α = 0.94 and the standard deviation is SD = 1.40.

The following questions in table 5 were asked: ‘How likely is it that you would consider purchasing this Lonely Planet Magazine?’ on a 7-point scale, ranging from 1 to 7.

The first scale consisted of ‘definitely not intend to buy it’ (1) to ‘definitely intend to buy it’

(7). The second scale ranged from ‘very low purchase interest’ (1) to ‘very high purchase interest’ (7). The third ranged from ‘probably not buy it’ (1) to ‘probably buy it’ (7).

The measurement of auxiliary analyses for trustworthiness and expertise. The 9-point source credibility scale, ranging from 1 to 9, will also be used to measure trustworthiness and expertise of the endorser in line with Ohanian (1990). Both will be tested as a dependent variable, to see whether there is an influence of attractiveness on the trustworthiness and expertise of the endorser. The participants were asked to rate the person depicted on the advertisement on several scales. The first being ‘undependable’ (1) to ‘dependable’ (9), secondly ‘dishonest’ (1) to ‘honest’ (9), thirdly ‘unreliable’ (1) to ‘reliable’ (9), fourth

‘insincere’ (1) to ‘sincere’ (9) and fifth ‘untrustworthy’ (1) to ‘trustworthy’ (9).

Following were the questions on the expertise of the endorser, the first being ‘not an expert’ (1) to ‘expert’ (9), second was ‘inexperienced’ (1) to ‘experienced’ (9), third was

‘unknowledgeable’ (1) to ‘knowledgeable’ (9), fourth was ‘unqualified’ (1) to ‘qualified’ (9) and the fifth ‘unskilled’ (1) to ‘skilled’ (9).

Analysis plan

First, the manipulation of attractiveness and unattractiveness of the endorser will be checked with a Two-Way ANOVA of binary assigned attractiveness on the mean sum of the perceived attractiveness. Thereafter, the most important Two-Way ANOVA will test hypothesis 1 and 2, is a 2 (resource depleted vs. not resource depleted) x 2 (attractive vs. unattractive endorser) between subjects design, depicted in table 1. The moderator of physical attractiveness will be tested through an interaction with resource depletion on purchase intention, the dependent

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variable. Hereafter, auxiliary analyses will be conducted, namely a 2 by 2 Two-Way ANOVA of attractiveness of the endorser on trustworthiness of the endorser and a 2 by 2 Two-Way ANOVA of attractiveness on expertise of the endorser. The Two-Way ANOVA analysis is chosen because the independent variable will consist of binary values for resource depletion and for attractiveness, which means this data is nominal in nature. The dependent variables will consist of interval data, since the purchase intention is measured with a 7-point Likert scale and the 9-point source credibility scale (Ohanian, 1990) measures trustworthiness and expertise. All scales can be answered with a slider, visible at question 45, Appendix 1.

Reliability

First, the mean and standard deviation were gathered per scale in table 4. Reliability analyses of the questions per scale show that these questions can be summed together. The Cronbach’s Alpha would only decrease if these questions were not grouped; this is true for the buying intention (table 6), attractiveness (table 5) and expertise (table 8) scale. Only the trustworthiness scale (table 7) shows an increase of 0.04 in the Cronbach’s Alpha if question 46 would not be included. This difference is so minimal and a Cronbach’s Alpha of 0.85 is already sufficient, therefore question 46 stays included in the trustworthiness scale.

TABLE 4

Descriptive statistics per scale Statistic Attractiveness

scale

Trustworthiness scale

Expertise scale

Buying intention scale

M 5.72 5.42 4.69 3.17

SD 1.59 0.99 1.28 1.40

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TABLE 5 Attractiveness scale

Original Cronbach’s Alpha, α = 0.91

Questions Cronbach’s Alpha if item is deleted

Question 40 (Attractiveness 1) .87

TABLE 6

Buying intention scale Original Cronbach’s Alpha, α = 0.94

Questions Cronbach’s Alpha if item is deleted Question 37 (Buying intention 1) .89

Question 38 (Buying intention 2) .94

Question 39 (Buying intention 3) .93

TABLE 7 Trustworthiness scale

Question 46 (Trustworthiness 1) .89

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TABLE 8 Expertise scale

Question 51 (Expertise 1) .91

The mean of trust (M = 5.4) lies higher than the mean of expertise (M = 4.7). Trust and expertise are both normally distributed, just as the purchase intentions of the participants (visible in appendix 3, figure 10-12). The mean of attractiveness also lies somewhat higher (M

= 5.7). This distribution seems to be slightly skewed to the right as shown in appendix 3, figure 9. Each scale can thus be kept and the mean per scale will be calculated by summing the values that are answered to each question in the scale and dividing this by the number of questions in the scale.

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4 RESULTS

Recoding of the participants

Firstly, the experimental and control groups were recoded towards the following new variable: the resource depleted groups (group 1 & 2 from table 1), who filled in the Stroop task were recoded into ‘1’ meaning resource depleted, the participants who did not receive the colour test (group 3 & 4) received a ‘0’ as recode, meaning ‘not depleted’. Furthermore, the groups 1, 3 who saw an attractive endorser, received a ‘1’ as recode, in the new variable for attractiveness. The groups 2 & 4 received a ‘0’ as recode, because they saw the unattractive endorsers. The output from SPSS can be found in appendix 6: table 10 to 27.

Manipulation check attractiveness of the endorser

To see whether the attractiveness of the endorser is actually manipulated correctly, and has its influence on the mean sum of the perceived attractiveness, a Two-Way ANOVA was done.

The main effect for the assigned attractiveness on mean sum of the attractiveness score of the endorser F(1,108) = 58.82; p < 0.001 was significant. The mean of participants who were not assigned to an attractive endorser and perceived the endorser as unattractive (M = 4.74, SD = 1.54) differs significantly from the mean of participants who were assigned to an attractive endorser and perceived the endorser as attractive (M = 6.63, SD = 1.00).

These results thus show that attractive endorsers were actually perceived as more attractive than the unattractive endorsers, depicted in a mean plot and bar chart in Appendix 4:

figure 13 and 14.

Testing the hypotheses

To analyse whether attractiveness of the endorser influences the purchase intention, I submitted the pre-assigned attractiveness of the endorser as a binary value in the independent variable and the mean of the buying intention scale as dependent variable through a Two-Way ANOVA. The tests for the main effects and the interaction effect were not significant.

The main effect for resource depletion F(1,108) = 0.11; p = 0.75 on buying intention was not significant. The other main effect for attractiveness of the endorser on buying intention F(1,108) = 0.03; p = 0.86 was not significant. The interaction effect between resource depletion and attractiveness of the endorser was not significant F(1,108) = 0.10;

p = 0.75.

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The means of depleted versus non-depleted participants do not differ significantly, the same accounts for the difference between the means of participants who saw unattractive or attractive endorsers. This is not in line with hypothesis 1 and 2.

Auxiliary analyses

According to Ohanian (1990) it is interesting to study a causal effect between attractiveness, trustworthiness en expertise. Therefore, analyses have been done to see whether there is a difference in trustworthiness or expertise when an attractive or unattractive endorser is shown.

Trustworthiness of the endorser. To analyse whether resource depletion and attractiveness of the endorser influence the trustworthiness of the endorser, I also submitted resource depletion and attractiveness as independent variables and the trustworthiness of the endorser as a dependent variable through a Two-Way ANOVA.

The main effect for resource depletion F(1,108) = 0.47; p = 0.50 on trustworthiness of the endorser was not significant. The other main effect for attractiveness on trustworthiness of the endorser F(1,108) = 1.28; p = 0.26 was not significant. The interaction effect between resource depletion and attractiveness of the endorser was not significant F(1,108) = 0.09;

p = 0.77.

From this it can be concluded that the means of trustworthiness do not differ significantly for either participants who were resource depleted or not and for participants who saw either the unattractive or attractive endorser.

Expertise of the endorser. To analyse whether resource depletion and attractiveness of the endorser influence the expertise of the endorser, I also submitted resource depletion and attractiveness as independent variables and the expertise of the endorser as a dependent variable through a Two-Way ANOVA.

The main effect for resource depletion F(1,108) = 0.69; p = 0.41 on expertise of the endorser was not significant. The other main effect for attractiveness on expertise of the endorser F(1,108) = 1.74; p = 0.19 was not significant. The interaction effect between resource depletion and attractiveness of the endorser was not significant F(1,108) = 0.63;

p = 0.43.

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From this it can be concluded that the means of expertise do not differ significantly for either participants who were resource depleted or not and for participants who saw either the unattractive or attractive endorser.

Covariates age and gender

To know whether gender and age possibly influenced the relationship between the independent and dependent variables, a Two-Way ANOVA was done two times. The results of the Two-Way ANOVA with age (M = 32.7, SD = 15.1) as covariate showed that the age of the participant did not have a significant effect on purchase intention F(1, 111) = 1.561, p = .214. Thus, including age as covariate does not have an effect on the results.

The results of a Two-Way ANOVA with gender as third independent variable showed that the gender of the participant did not have a significant effect on purchase intention F(1, 111) = 1.101, p = .297. Thus, including gender as independent variable does not have an effect on the results.

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5 DISCUSSION & CONCLUSION

At the start of this paper it was hypothesized that resource depletion would have a positive influence on purchase intention. Expected was that the liking principle, an attractive endorser, would positively moderate and intensify the effect between resource depletion and purchase intention. The hypotheses were tested through an online experiment, in which participants had to fulfil an online experiment, some had to do a Stroop task and all had to answer questions on how they perceived the endorser that was shown to them, trying to sell them a Lonely Planet Magazine.

Concluded from the data derived from the sample is that the hypotheses cannot be confirmed in this research. The endorsers that were altered to be less attractive did actually prove to be unattractive. The participants significantly found the attractive endorsers more beautiful.

The 'what is beautiful is good' stereotype has been confirmed in many studies (Dion, Berscheid & Walster, 1972; Vermeir & Van de Sompel, 2014). Conforming with the attractiveness halo (Eagly et al., 1991) people have the tendency to infer that attractive persons possess more positive qualities such as being social, intelligent, interesting, warm, kind and outgoing (Dion, Berscheid & Walster, 1972; Vermeir & Van de Sompel, 2014).

However, attractiveness of the endorser did not spill over to perceptions of trustworthiness or expertise in this study. Besides, in some situations attractive sources need to be expert or provide supporting arguments to persuade consumers in order for them to purchase the product (Maddux & Rogers, 1980).

Nonetheless the results of this study do not convey the same to other contexts or research. There can still be situations in which attractive endorsers are preferred, also when consumers are resource depleted. Physical attractiveness of the endorser can for instance be an important characteristic in mass media campaigns for example, when consumers choose to attend to the communication or to simply ignore it (Maddux & Rogers, 1980). Past research of Vohs & Faber (2007) shows that resource depletion leads to stronger urges to buy and actually spending more. It is thus still probable that purchasing intentions will increase even more when the physical attractiveness heuristic is activated (Janssen et al., 2008).

This paper contributes to science in showing new insights in how purchase intentions originate and it can improve the understanding of how consumers react to attractive or unattractive endorsers in a state of resource depletion. Unique to this research is that resource

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depletion and physical attractiveness of endorsers is combined to search for an influence on purchase intention. This area provided a research gap in current literature (Janssen et al., 2008).

Contrastingly, a different stereotype can be posed: ‘what is beautiful is self-centered’

since attractive people are seen as egoists (Cash & Janda, 1984). Attractive people are also seen as more vain and less modest (Eagly et al., 1991). This can be an alternative explanation for the non-effect found on purchase intentions. Other possible clarifications are that the participants in this study might have been more trained in controlling the self, since it is possible to improve resistance to self-regulatory depletion without suffering from lower task performance through exercising (Gailliot et al., 2007). Participants may also have been more rational than expected, and deliberately considering the offer in the experiment. It could be that they relied more on central route processing from the Dual Process Theory (Stroebe, 2015) instead of the peripheral route. Or it could be that people low in impulsivity traits experience lower purchase intentions when resource depleted than others (Vohs & Faber, 2007).

Practical implications of this research for marketing managers can be to focus more on expert and trustworthy endorsers to support your products. Experts are perceived as more knowledgeable and competent and source expertise has a positive impact on attitude change (Maddux & Rogers, 1980). Additionally, expert salespersons let customers buy a significantly higher number of products (Woodside & Davenport, 1974). Trustworthiness and expertise of the communicator interact according to McGinnies and Ward (1980). A source who is perceived as trustworthy and an expert will lead to the highest opinion change. Yet, a trustworthy communicator alone will also be persuasive, whether an expert or not. Meaning that trustworthiness is the most important determinant of persuasiveness when regarding attractiveness, trustworthiness and expertise of the endorser.

The effectiveness of using attractive salespersons has not been established in this research, meaning that it might not be necessary to invest that much in finding an attractive endorser. Models used in advertisements are usually not average, which makes them non- relatable and not approachable. It is advised to be cautious with emphasizing the physical attractiveness stereotype too much, by only selecting physically attractive people in advertisements, since it can influence other people’s self-perception negatively (Vermeir &

Van de Sompel, 2014). Advertising practitioners must identify the most appropriate endorsers

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to sell their products by finding an endorser that is recognizable for people, someone familiar and someone that is similar to the target consumers (Burger et al., 2001; Allport, 1961).

6 LIMITATIONS & FUTURE RESEARCH DIRECTIONS

The first limitation of this study is that the manipulation of resource depletion should have been checked, by asking whether the participant felt cognitively tired. Control questions that should have been asked in this research are the following: does the participant like to travel?

Does the participant like Lonely Planet? Has he/she purchased Lonely Planet Magazine before? These questions would have provided a better explanation of why a participant would (not) like to buy the offered product.

Essential in determining whether the participants can effectively control themselves is asking if they monitor their own behaviour closely (Baumeister, 2002). When people are resource depleted, decision-making becomes harder and takes more time (Pocheptsova et al., 2009). Reaction times on the Stroop task can determine whether people are high or low in self-regulation. This could have been used in the analysis, since participants were already instructed to answer as fast and as correct as possible, in line with Fennis et al. (2009).

To know whether the attractiveness of the endorser is taken as content cue of product quality (Fennis & Stroebe, 2016) necessary is to determine if the participants are processing the product under low or high intensity. In future research it is important to control for this. In addition, it can be that the attractiveness of the sources was too extreme, leading to the participants becoming aware of this characteristic and their affective reaction (Maddux &

Rogers, 1980).

Furthermore, the price of the magazine was €7,99, which is quite high for a magazine.

The price was the same as it is in reality, but it can have led to participants feeling it was too expensive. Participants were not able to glance through the magazine, as one would usually do in a store. This provided them with less information about the product than usual.

However, many determinants of attractiveness have been taken into account in this study, such as presenting smiling endorsers in the advertisements (Reis et al., 1990) with symmetric faces for the attractive endorsers (Fink & Penton-Voak, 2002).

Other determinants of the liking principle, such as familiarity, similarity or ingratiation provide potentially fruitful research areas to investigate in the future. Advice for future research is thus to define a complete set of purchase intention determinants and testing all

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simultaneously. Moreover, elaboration on this topic can be made by investigating the effects of trustworthy and expert endorsers in combination with resource depletion.

This study namely leaves an open question of what these results mean for advertising with endorsers. What determinants and situational factors explain rising purchase intentions when resource depleted better? What is the role of personality of the consumer in responding to situations in which they are resource depleted? Do resource depleted people actually always activate heuristics? Or are some people not likely to make use of heuristics at all?

Hopefully, many more future explorations will be made of the interplay between resource depletion and consumer buying behaviour.

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APPENDIX 1: ONLINE EXPERIMENT

Participants were evenly and randomly assigned to one of the four groups of which each survey flow is shown below.

Survey flow: Group 1

• Stroop Task (32 Questions)

• Intro advertisement

• Advertisement Female group 1, 3 – attractive endorser

• Purchase intention (3 Questions)

• Attractiveness (5 Questions)

• Trustworthiness (6 Questions)

• Expertise (5 Questions)

• Debriefing

Welcome to the survey for my Marketing Management Master!

This study will take around 5-8 minutes to complete, but you can be much faster and show your speed in the response time test!

This research begins for some of you with a test of response time and after that your personal preferences for magazines will be inquired for. Please answer honestly, in the way you would react in real life.

If you have any questions regarding this study, you can contact me via this e-mail:

c.a.w.suijkerbuijk@student.rug.nl.

Your participation in this research is voluntary. You have the right to withdraw at any point during the study, for any reason. Please be assured that your responses will be kept

completely confidential.

Thank you very much for participating!

Celine

1. What is your age?

…

2. What is your gender?

– Woman – Man

3. The next part will consist of a response time test, answer as fast and as correct as you can.

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4. What is the colour font of the following word…?

Green

o Green (1) o Red (2) o Blue (3) o Yellow (4)

Purple

o Purple (1) o Pink (2) o Red (3) o Orange (4)

Red

o Red (1) o Blue (2) o Green (3) o Yellow (4)

Yellow

o Yellow (1) o Green (2) o Blue (3) o Red (4)

Blue

o Yellow (1) o Blue (2) o Purple (3) o Orange (4)

Orange

o Orange (1) o Green (2) o Purple (3) o Pink (4)

Pink

o Green (1) o Pink (2) o Orange (3) o Yellow (4)

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Yellow

o Green (1) o Yellow (2) o Orange (3) o Blue (4)

Red

o Yellow (1) o Red (2) o Purple (3) o Pink (4)

Orange

o Orange (1) o Red (2) o Blue (3) o Yellow (4)

Blue

o Green (1) o Blue (2) o Purple (3) o Pink (4)

Pink

o Red (1) o Purple (2) o Pink (3) o Blue (4)

Red

o Yellow (1) o Red (2) o Orange (3) o Pink (4)