Nak Hwan Choi

The impact of emotional arousal levels and valence on product evaluations: From regulatory goal perspective

Purpose – This paper aims to investigate the moderating roles of emotional arousal levels (elevated vs mild) and emotional valence (positive vs negative) stemming from outcomes of self-regulatory goal pursuit in understanding effectiveness of the product attribute type on product evaluation. Design/methodology/approach – Drawing on the literature on goals, emotions and behaviors, this research advances and tests hypotheses with two studies and an ANOVA. Findings – This study shows that when consumers experience positive emotions stemming from the success of self-regulatory goals (approach vs avoidance), the impact of product attribute type on product evaluations is primarily driven by the emotional arousal levels and that the type of regulatory goals does not matter. In contrast, when consumers experience negative emotions stemming from the failure of goal pursuit, the impact of product attribute type is determined not only by the emotional arousal levels but also by the type of goals. Practical implicati...

The roles of hotel identification on customer-related behavior

Purpose - Past researches have not explored the roles of staffs hotel identification on customer-related behaviors and the relationship between hotel identification inducing factors (trust in supervisor, job satisfaction, perceived external prestige) and hotel identification. The purpose of this paper is to examine the roles of staffs hotel identification as a mediator of the relationship between hotel identification inducing factors and customer-related behaviors. Through reviewing the existing literature concerned, the authors propose a research model involving staffs trust in the supervisor, job satisfaction, perceived external prestige, hotel identification, organization citizenship behavior, and customer satisfaction behavior and test it. Design/methodology/approach - Hotel samples were from the south-west area of Korea. Questionnaires were given to 250 staff of the hotels and 224 were returned with no problems. The sample was used to purify the measures and test their convergent and discriminant validity. The final measurement model includes 24 items across six constructs. The authors conducted exploratory factor analysis to show that there are convergent validities of measurement items related to each construct, and explored correlations between the constructs and calculated average variance extracted to verify that there are discriminant validities between constructs. LISREL 8.30 was used to verify the hypotheses. Findings - The results provided evidence that hotel identification plays important mediating roles between them. Identification with the hotel will be strengthened when job satisfaction and trust in the supervisor becomes strong. Trust in the supervisor plays a more important role in forming hotel identification than job satisfaction does. The role of organization citizenship behavior on the customer satisfaction behavior is also explored. Hotel identification affects organization citizenship behavior which in turn positively affects customer satisfaction behavior. But the results do not provide support for a central role of perceived external prestige. Practical implications - The study gives information to hotel managers who want to encourage customer-related behaviors that they should induce staffs identification with the hotel by improving the level of trust in the supervisor and job satisfaction. Originality/value - Little past literature has explored the role of hotel identification as the substance of staff action. This study explored the influence of hotel identification on staff behavior that results in contributing to theoretical development and hotel management.

To buy for whom? The effects of money’s pride and surprise tag on spending behaviors

Purpose This paper aims to examine the interesting but largely unexamined effects of pride-tagged money and surprise-tagged money on consumers’ spending and product-choosing behaviors. Design/methodology/approach The present research utilizes experimental design and survey methods to collect data and the ANOVA and bootstrap analysis methods to verify the assumed hypotheses. Findings Study 1 shows that people with pride-tagged (vs surprise-tagged) money are more likely to spend the money for themselves (vs others) and the personal achievement-expression motive plays a mediating role between the pride-tagged money and self-spending behavior. Study 2 replicates the findings of Study 1 and suggests that people with pride-tagged money are less likely to spend the money for others (e.g. donating). Study 3 shows that people with pride-tagged (surprise-tagged) money are more likely to purchase a self-relevant (other-relevant) product than those with surprise-tagged (pride-tagged) money. Practical implications The current research has classified products into self-relevant products (e.g. fitness card, supermarket gift card and mobile game equipment) and other-relevant products (e.g. restaurant set meal, pizza, movie ticket and hot pot) on the basis of perceived self-relevance on the products. Therefore, marketers could frame certain conditions that elicit self-relevant versus other-relevant choices and manipulate self-relevant versus other-relevant primes to shift preferences in favor of certain options. For example, around graduation time, graduates often feel proud of their accomplishments. In this case, marketers could take advantage of that feeling with a message like “treat yourself”, which could prompt them to spend more money for themselves. In addition, the marketers selling other-relevant products (e.g. pizza and hot pot) might develop and promote advertisements that deliver information about “sharing with your friends”. For example, in 2016, Pizza Hut began to use its new slogan of “love to share” to convey the idea of “double happiness as a result of sharing”. Originality/value From a theoretical standpoint, first, this research contributes to the emotional accounting research by advancing the notion that money associated with different positive feelings could influence consumers’ spending behaviors in different ways. Second, the research distinguishes self-relevant products from other-relevant products. Third, it shows that people with pride-tagged money and those with surprise-tagged money have different preferences for products. Self-relevant products, such as fitness card, supermarket gift card and mobile game equipment, that represent a certain degree of independence are more used and/or consumed by consumers with pride-tagged money, whereas other-relevant products, such as restaurant set meal, pizza, movie ticket and hot pot, that involve the perceptions of interdependence are more bought by consumers with surprise-tagged money to share with others.

Causes Attributable to Achieving Consumers’ Personal Goals in Advance, Deservingness and Indulgent Consumption

Purpose - Previous studies have not paid attention to pride type and effort type when consumers feel pride. In the present paper, the pride was...

Actor, Brand in Korean Soap Opera, Chinese Consumer's Ideal Self and Intent to Purchase the Brand

본 연구는 한국 드라마를 시청한 중국 소비자를 대상으로, 주인공 배우와 그들이 사용한 브랜드가 중국 소비자의 이상자아와 연결되어 구매의도를 형성하는 심리적 과정을 살펴보았다. 연구결과, 한국 드라마에서 주인공 배우의 능력이미지가 드라마 주인공과 중국 소비자의 이상자아를 연결시켜 준다. 그리고 주인공과 중국 소비자의 이상자아를 연결성 정도는 구매의도에 직접적인 영향을 주지는 않지만, 이상자아와 브랜드 연결성에 긍정적 영향을 주어 구매의도를 높여준다. 또한 드라마 주인공 배우의 이미지가 브랜드에 부여정도는 중국 소비자의 이상자아와 브랜드를 연결시켜 브랜드 구매의도에 긍정적인 영향을 준다. 그러므로 드라마 한류를 통해 중국 소비자의 브랜드 구매의도를 높이기 위해서는 첫째, 브랜드를 사용하는 주인공 배우의 능력 이미지가 형성되도록 드라마를 구성해야 한다. 둘째, 드라마에서 브랜드에 주인공의 이미지가 부여되도록 주인공이 브랜드를 사용하는 맥락을 관리해야 한다. 마지막으로, 중국 소비자의 이상자아와 브랜드가 심리적으로 연결되도록 주인공 배우가 중국 소비자의 이상자아에 연결될 수 있는 역할을 수행해야 한다.

Chinese Consumers’ Identity Relevance to Foreign Brand Inducing Consumer-brand Identification and Their Brand Loyalty and Advocacy

본 연구는 중국 소비자-브랜드 동일시의 원인 요인을 소비자의 아이덴티티 관련성의 관점에서 객체 관련성, 목적 관련성, 행동 관련성으로 접근하고, 중국 소비자-브랜드 동일시의 브랜드 충성도와 옹호도 효과를 탐색하였다. 실증연구에서 중국 소비자 511명을 설문조사하여 실증분석 한 결과, 첫째, 소비자-브랜드 동일시는 브랜드 충성도와 옹호도에 긍정적인 영향을 미치는 것으로 나타났다. 둘째, 외생변수로써 객체 관련성, 목적 관련성, 행동 관련성 모두 중국 소비자-브랜드 동일시에 긍정적인 영향을 미치는 것으로 나타났다. 본 연구는 소비자-브랜드 동일시의 원인 요인으로 객체 관련성, 목적 관련성, 행동 관련성을 식별하였다는 점에서 이론의 발전에 기여하고 있다. 마케팅 관리자는 브랜드가 소비자와 객체 관련성을 갖고, 소비 목적 및 행동 관련성을 갖도록 다양한 체험 마케팅을 통해 브랜드 경험을 유도할 필요가 있다.

Interaction Effects of Arousal Level of Positive Ambient Emotion and Advertisement Type on Product Evaluation

The purpose of this study is to show that the effectiveness of utilitarian versus hedonic attributefocused advertisement on product evaluation depends on the arousal level of positive emotion, and to explore mediation effect of cognitive response to utilitarian attribute-focused advertisement and affective response to hedonic attribute-focused advertisement on the effectiveness of utilitarian versus hedonic attribute-focused advertisement. This research employs a 2 (arousal level: mild vs. elevated) × 2 (advertisement type: utilitarian vs. hedonic) between-subjects design, and 200 undergraduate students participate in the experiment, in which there are 50 students at each experimental group. The results of ANCOVA with positive emotion level as a covariate on advertised product evaluation show significant interaction effect of arousal level and advertisement type, and no effect of positive emotional level. Both of the mediation effects of the cognitive response and those of the affective response are significant. Participants under mild (elevated) arousal of positive emotion more positively evaluate the product in utilitarian (hedonic) attribute-focused advertisement. The positive effect of utilitarian (hedonic) attributefocused advertisement on product evaluation is partially mediated by cognitive (affective) response to the advertisement when consumers are under the mild (elevated) arousal of positive emotion. The results of this study show that advertisers should use utilitarian (hedonic) attribute-focused advertisement to consumers under the mild (elevated) arousal of ambient positive emotion, which should be searched by exploring what kind of event they have experienced.

How to Increase Chinese Consumer’s Loyalty to Korean Fashion Clothing Brand Store in China

The current research aims to explore two important predictors of Chinese consumers’ loyalty to the South Korean fashion clothing store, namely, their attachment toward the South Korean fashion clothing brand and perceived connection with the salespeople of the store. The results of our research suggest that both the brand attachment and the connection with salespeople have positive effects on the store loyalty. In addition, our research investigated two antecedents influencing Chinese consumer’s attachment toward the South Korean fashion clothing brand. We found that South Korean fashion clothing brand’s social acceptability and self-expressiveness positively affect Chinese consumer’s attachment to the brand. However, the brand’s functionality did not have a positive impact on the brand attachment. Therefore, to increase Chinese Consumer’s Loyalty to the store in China, marketers should strengthen the brand attachment by puting emphasis on the self-expressive functions and social acceptance of the South Korean fashion clothing brands, and should also help salespeople attempt to develop close connection with customers.