본 논문은 소비자가 다양성 추구를 함에 따라 경험하게 될 것이라고 예측하는 만족 수준과 실제 경험하는 만족수준간의 차이를 연구하였다. 떠먹는 요거트를 일주일 동안 매일 하나씩 소비하는 사건을 대상으로 만족에 대한 예측집단과 실제 소비집단 간 차이를 검증한 본 연구 결과, 소비자들은 실제보다 다양성 추구로 인해 자신들이 경험할 만족 수준을 과대 예측 하는 경향이 있었다. 또한 예측과 경험의 차이는 전반적인 만족에 각각의 개별 소비에대한 평가가 미치는 영향에서도 나타났다. 예측집단의 경우 처음 소비에 대한 만족, 마지막 소비에 대한 만족, 그리고 만족 수준의 변화 추세가 전반적인 만족에 영향을 줄 것이라고 예측하였으나, 실제 만족은 이들 요인 보다 가장만족했던 경험과 유의한 연관이 있었다.
This research examines the discrepancies between predicted and experienced satisfaction when consumers seek variety for future consumptions. Prior research presents that consumers tend to seek excessive variety when they make a choice decision in a simultaneous purchase situation (i.e., purchasing multiple items within a product category for future consumptions).
The current research explores the consequences of such a diversification tendency in the simultaneous purchase setting. This paper addresses two research questions. The first goal of this research is to test the effect of variety seeking in a simultaneous choice on the consumption satisfaction. Specifically, we examine whether the level of satisfaction after actual experience of variety is the same as the level of predicted satisfaction when they make a variety choice. Drawing on the theories that predict the difference between the decision utility and the experience utility (i.e., decisions based on lay beliefs, focalism, and time contraction theory), we present two predictions on the difference between prediction and experience in variety seeking. First, it is anticipated that satisfaction after variety seeking will be lower than the level of expected satisfaction (hypothesis 1). This prediction is drawn from the previous studies showing that the prediction of future utility is often affected by lay beliefs and people tend to believe that they will be more satisfied when they seek variety. In addition, it is predicted that the extent to which one engages in repeated consumption is lower than the predicted repetition due to the overestimation of the satiation from repeated consumption of the same product or flavor (hypothesis 2). The second goal of this research is to compare between the predicted and experienced variety seeking in the influence of the specific aspects of the daily consumption experience on the overall, global satisfaction evaluation. It is anticipated that when consumers predict their variety seeking experience, the first experience, the last experience (i.e., end), and the trend in daily consumption experience are expected to be related to the global satisfaction (hypothesis 3).
In contrast, when the consumers experience their actual variety consumption, it is hypothesized that the best experience (i.e., peak) and the last experience (i.e., end) are related to the global evaluation (hypothesis 4).
Before the main test, a pretest was conducted to explore consumers’ lay beliefs about variety seeking. The results showed that consumers believe that the level of satisfaction is higher when the seek variety than when they consume the same product repeatedly. The main empirical study was conducted to compare the predicted and experienced satisfaction with seven yogurts that were consumed for seven consecutive days. In the study, participants were randomly assigned to either the prediction condition or the experience condition and asked to select seven yogurts that they wanted to consume over the next seven days. The stimulus set included yogurts of four different flavors. In the prediction condition, the participants were asked to imagine that they would consume yogurts for the next seven days, and chose seven yogurts they wanted to consume and predicted the extent to which they expect to be satisfied for each day’s yogurt consumption. In the experience condition, the participants chose seven yogurts and actually consumed the selected yogurts for the next seven days and reported their satisfaction after each day’s yogurt consumption. In both conditions, participants sought substantial variety (i.e., the number of different flavors). However, there was a significant difference in satisfaction between the predicted condition and the experience condition.
Specifically, the experienced satisfaction was lower than the predicted satisfaction, implying that overprediction of satisfaction from variety is one of the reasons for the diversification bias. This finding supported hypothesis 1. In addition, the extent to seek variety (i.e., number of different flavors) was negatively related to satisfaction, which contradicts to the lay belief about satisfaction. We also tested the differences in the consecutive consumption of the same flavor yogurts. As predicted by hypothesis 2, the occurrence of repetitive consumption of the same flavor was less frequent in the prediction condition than in the experience condition.
This finding implies that the participants tend to overestimate the extent to which they are satiated with the repeated consumption.
In order to test hypotheses 3 and 4, we examined the relationship between the features of daily consumption experience (i.e., the first day satisfaction, the last day satisfaction, the highest satisfaction, and the trend of daily satisfaction) and the overall, global satisfaction. The discrepancies between prediction and actual experience also exist in the factors affecting overall satisfaction. In the predicted condition, the overall satisfaction was strongly related to the satisfaction with the first and the last consumption experiences and the increasing trend in daily experiences. By contrast, in the experience condition, the satisfaction in the experience condition was related to the most favorable consumption experience. These results supported hypotheses 3 and 4.
