Adrian B. Ryans

Consumer Dynamics in Nonprofit Organizations

This study provides useful new insights on attendance behavior of theater subscribers over time. The results are described and their implications explored—both for attracting subscribers and obtaining contributors.

A Second Look at Children and the Advertising of Premiums

The effects of advertising to children on the desire for a cereal product, product requests, and product selection, while varying the levels of premium emphasis, are examined in an experimental setting involving childrens interaction with their mothers. The results suggest that such advertising may have a marginal impact on preferences, but little effect on final choice.

Sales Force Management: Integrating Research Advances

Recently, much research attention has been focused on personal selling and sales management issues and this research has followed a variety of approaches. In this article, the authors propose a threestage model to help managers organize and interrelate these approaches.

Using price discounts for a competitive advantage

Abstract A carefully designed price discount program affords opportunities for strengthening a companys long-run competitive position. This article reviews types of discount programs and how they can be used to strengthen a firms competitive position. It then develops a series of questions to aid in the evaluation of a strategic price discount program.

Task effects on decision quality in traveling salesperson problems

Abstract In this study, the time allocation problem faced by a traveling salesperson is used as a context in which to test hypotheses about information processing. A laboratory experiment is used to test hypotheses about the effects on decision quality of (1) varying the degree of congruence between the information provided and the type of processing required by the decision task, and (2) increasing the information processing load. It was found that these task manipulations did influence decision quality in the expected directions. Furthermore, in this decision context, subjects had little intuitive feeling for how well they had performed on the decision task.

Children and Commercial Persuasion: Some Comments

In their recent paper Robertson and Rossiter (1974) have reported a non-experimental study of children and commercial persuasion. This is an emotional subject of high concern to consumer, business and government groups. It is therefore critical that any research in such a topical area be very thorough, since the results are apt to be utilized without careful regard for the underlying research. Unfortunately, Robertson and Rossiters study suffers from several limitations which make it questionable whether their research makes a major contribution to our understanding of children and commercial persuasion. In this paper we will not only point out some of the areas of weakness in their report, but also we will attempt to indicate some further analyses on the available data that might strengthen or weaken their conclusions.