I Know What You re Doing and Why You re Doing It

Transcription

1 21 I Know What You re Doing and Why You re Doing It The Use of the Persuasion Knowledge Model in Consumer Research Margaret C. Campbell University of Colorado at Boulder Amna Kirmani Southern Methodist University A consumer is shopping for a suit for an upcoming job interview. When he tries on one suit, a salesperson mentions how good it looks on him. What does the consumer think of the salesperson? A teenager is eagerly watching American Idol and notices a can of Coke on the judge s table. What is the teenager s response toward Coke? A shopper on a Web site sees that the default option on the computer system she is putting together is the most expensive option. Is she more or less likely to choose the default? The answers to these questions depend on the extent to which consumers activate and use their persuasion knowledge, i.e., theories and beliefs about how marketers try to influence them. The extent that a consumer imputes an ulterior persuasion motive to the salesperson s comment, the product placement, or the default option, is likely to affect the consumer s response. If these tactics are considered inappropriate, unfair, or manipulative, the consumer is likely to respond by discounting the salesperson s comments, reducing his or her attitude toward Coke, and steering away from the default option. Hence, an understanding of marketplace interactions is often dependent upon understanding the consumer s use of knowledge about marketplace persuasion. However, the role of consumers persuasion knowledge and the interaction of consumer and marketing agent within a persuasion episode have received direct research attention only in the last few years. The impetus for research on persuasion knowledge was Peter Wright s 1985 ACR Presidential Address, which introduced the concept of schemer schema to capture the idea that consumers have knowledge about persuasion that they sometimes use in interpreting marketers persuasion attempts (Wright, 1986). Wright argued that consumer researchers were more focused on the persuasion agent than the persuasion target, and that our role as consumer researchers suggested that we should focus on the consumer, i.e., the target of persuasion. Focusing on the consumer and, particularly, on consumers knowledge about persuasion, could provide greater insight into how consumers interpret and respond to marketers persuasion attempts. 549 Haugtvedt_ER5603X_C021.indd 549 7/24/ :09:21 PM

2 550 MARGARET C. CAMPBELL AND AMNA KIMANI These ideas were formalized into the Persuasion Knowledge Model or PKM (Friestad & Wright, 1994). Drawing from work on persuasion schemata (Rule, Bisanz, & Kohn, 1985), the PKM proposes that consumers develop knowledge about persuasion and others persuasion attempts and delineates how people develop and use this knowledge. The PKM significantly contributes to the fields of consumer behavior and marketing by focusing on the central role that consumers knowledge about persuasion plays in persuasion episodes. The PKM (see Figure 21.1) depicts consumers as bringing three types of knowledge to a persuasion interaction: topic knowledge, agent knowledge, and persuasion knowledge. These three types of knowledge interact to influence consumers persuasion coping behaviors, i.e., their personal responses to a persuasion attempt. On the other side, persuasion agents also have topic, target, and persuasion knowledge that interact to influence Figure 21.1 Reproduced from Friestad and Wright (1994) Haugtvedt_ER5603X_C021.indd 550 7/24/ :09:28 PM

3 I KNOW WHAT YOU RE DOING AND WHY YOU RE DOING IT 551 their persuasion attempts. Together, the consumer target s persuasion coping behaviors and the marketing agent s persuasion attempts comprise a persuasion episode. The PKM points out that consumers persuasion knowledge is critical to how consumers respond to marketing efforts and can be used in a variety of ways to help consumers to achieve their own goals within the situation. In this chapter we provide an overview of the status of current research related to persuasion knowledge and the Persuasion Knowledge Model. Friestad and Wright (1994) provide a detailed discussion and delineation of the PKM itself as well as an excellent review of related research published prior to their article. Thus, the focus of this chapter is on persuasion-knowledge-related research generated since the publication of the Persuasion Knowledge Model. Our hope is to create a sense of where we have come since 1994 in terms of understanding important issues of consumers persuasion knowledge and identifying gaps or opportunities in our understanding of the PKM. The chapter outlines directions for a future research agenda to further develop understanding of the PKM, consumers persuasion knowledge, and its role in consumer behavior and marketplace interactions. A basic thesis is that research thus far has captured only a small portion of the potential of the PKM. The extant research primarily focuses on persuasion knowledge (as opposed to other aspects of the PKM). The research on persuasion knowledge spans a variety of contexts, including advertising, sponsorship, interpersonal persuasion, cause-related marketing, retailing and decision-making. However, this research is only the tip of the iceberg. Much more remains to be done within the framework of the PKM, both in terms of other components of the model and in terms of furthering development of the model itself. Therefore, in the final section of the chapter, we offer some prescriptions for future research. The rest of the chapter is organized as follows. We first discuss research on the three target knowledge structures proposed by the PKM. This is followed by a discussion of the content of persuasion knowledge, antecedents to the use of persuasion knowledge, consequences of persuasion knowledge, and target-agent interplay. We then consider research on the development of persuasion knowledge. We conclude by presenting research that addresses issues of measurement of persuasion knowledge. We conclude with prescriptions for future research. THREE TYPES OF KNOWLEDGE The PKM proposes that there are three types of knowledge specifically, persuasion, agent, and topic that influence responses and outcomes to persuasion attempts. Consumers persuasion knowledge includes beliefs about marketers motives, strategies, and tactics; causality in persuasion; the effects of persuasion tactics; appropriateness of tactic use; psychological mediators of persuasion; and strategies to respond to others influence attempts. Thus, persuasion knowledge includes implicit theories about the persuasion context, as well as causal inferences drawn about motives (Kardes et al., chapter 6, this volume). After discussing agent and topic knowledge, we describe the content of persuasion knowledge in more detail in the next section. Agent knowledge includes beliefs about the traits, competencies, and goals of the persuasion agent (Friestad & Wright, 1994, p. 3). Agent knowledge can include general knowledge or schemas about marketing agents, such as salespeople, companies, or brands. For example, a consumer could have a general stereotype about salespeople (e.g., Sujan, Bettman, & Sujan, 1986) or a general belief about brands, e.g., well-known brands provide better products. Agent knowledge could also include knowledge about a specific salesperson, company, or brand. For instance, a consumer who sees the same salesperson every time he visits Nordstrom is likely to have specific agent knowledge. This might include impressions about the agent s credibility, product knowledge, likeability, Haugtvedt_ER5603X_C021.indd 551 7/24/ :09:30 PM

4 552 MARGARET C. CAMPBELL AND AMNA KIMANI or dependability. A variety of research streams explore the role of agent knowledge. For example, the literature on source effects gives insight into some ways that agent knowledge affects consumer behavior (e.g., Dholakia & Sternthal, 1977). Likewise, research on brand or company familiarity can be applied to agent knowledge (Campbell & Keller, 2003). Perhaps because of these literatures, thus far little PKM-inspired research specifically focuses on agent knowledge. Topic knowledge refers to the consumer s knowledge about the topic, or content, of the persuasion attempt. Thus, product or issue expertise would be part of topic knowledge, with experts displaying higher topic knowledge than novices. For example, when the consumer above visits Nordstrom, he is likely to have some knowledge about the product under consideration. If shopping for home accessories, he may have some knowledge about bedding, such as that higher thread counts indicate higher quality sheets. When the consumer interacts with the salesperson, the consumer s topic knowledge is likely to be accessed in the interaction. Research from streams other than PKM emphasizes the important role of topic knowledge in consumer behavior (see, for example, Alba & Hutchinson, 1987, 2000). However, much of this work looks at the role of expertise for product acceptance (e.g., Moreau, Lehmann, & Markman, 2001), less examines topic knowledge in terms of persuasion. Thus, there is an opportunity for research that examines the role that topic knowledge plays directly within persuasion episodes. The line between persuasion, agent, and topic knowledge is sometimes blurred, suggesting that they are not as independent as depicted in the PKM. For example, if a consumer in a marketplace interaction infers the persuasion agent s motive or goals, is the consumer drawing upon persuasion, agent or both types of knowledge? If the consumer interprets a car salesperson s statement that the car of interest has been selling quickly as a persuasion tactic, is this because the consumer has agent knowledge that car salespeople use this tactic to increase consumer interest or persuasion knowledge that allows understanding of persuasion tactics? Similarly, does the consumer who knows a good deal about how promotions work have high persuasion knowledge or topic knowledge? There are two approaches to dealing with these unclear lines. The first is that rather than trying to create artificial distinctions between these three types of knowledge, the knowledge structures be viewed as partially overlapping. The overlap between persuasion and agent knowledge consists of persuasion-related beliefs about the traits and goals of marketing agents. Similarly, the overlap between persuasion and topic knowledge contains persuasion-related topic information. Aside from these overlaps, persuasion, topic and agent knowledge also have independent (nonoverlapping) components. The second approach, which we follow, is to use the terms to definitionally delineate and specify independent, nonoverlapping, types of knowledge. Thus, persuasion knowledge is defined as all knowledge related to persuasion, including persuasion-related knowledge of an agent or topic. Agent knowledge includes all non-persuasion-related knowledge having to do with characteristics of the agent. Likewise, topic knowledge includes all non-persuasion-related knowledge about the topic or content of the persuasion attempt. Thus, the terms are defined as separable constructs. The advantage of this approach is that it allows for distinctions and enables research to more clearly focus on each type of knowledge, as well as on interactions among levels of the three types of knowledge. Consumers persuasion knowledge is proposed to interact with their (nonpersuasion) agent knowledge and topic knowledge to shape persuasion interactions and influence the consumer s responses to persuasion attempts. For example, imagine Frank is shopping for a new car and goes to the closest Audi dealership. Frank likes cars and occasionally buys Car and Driver magazine. He has read some background information and seen ads from which he has gained some topic knowledge about the Audi A4. He has bought cars before and certainly knows the societal ste- Haugtvedt_ER5603X_C021.indd 552 7/24/ :09:30 PM

5 I KNOW WHAT YOU RE DOING AND WHY YOU RE DOING IT 553 reotype of car dealers; thus, Frank has some agent knowledge about car salespeople in general. His wife purchased a car from the same dealer the previous year, so Frank even has some specific agent knowledge about Audi salespeople, including the person helping him at this time. Based on a combination of societal information and past experience, Frank also has some persuasion knowledge about the strategies and tactics the car salesperson (this particular one or car salespeople in general) may use to persuade him to purchase the Audi A4 Wagon. All of these types of knowledge may be brought to bear upon Frank s interactions at the dealership. To date, most research that builds upon the PKM has focused on persuasion knowledge. Only a few studies have examined the interactions among the three different knowledge structures; for instance, Brown and Krishna (2004) show that the effects of topic knowledge are influenced by persuasion knowledge. They distinguish between persuasion knowledge and topic knowledge (note that they call these marketplace metacognition and category expertise, respectively) and explore differences in the effects of topic knowledge on response to default levels, depending on the level of persuasion knowledge. They found no effect of topic knowledge (product category expert vs. novice) when there was low persuasion knowledge, but an effect of topic knowledge when persuasion knowledge was high. Specifically, for people with high levels of persuasion knowledge, novices responded more favorably to low default options, whereas experts responded more favorably to high default options (Brown & Krishna, 2004). In a second example of exploration of interactions between knowledge types, Ahluwalia and Burnkrant (2004) show that persuasion knowledge interacts with agent knowledge to affect message persuasion. Using the PKM, they hypothesized that when rhetorical questions become salient, consumers may focus on why the persuasion agent is using a rhetorical. Consumers may use existing agent knowledge, specifically, attitudes toward the agent, to interpret the use of rhetorical questions in advertising. When individuals have high persuasion knowledge, positive prior attitudes toward the agent enhance message persuasion, while negative prior attitudes toward the agent diminish message persuasion. However, low PK individuals are not sensitive to the source of the rhetorical questions. Thus, for high PK individuals, prior attitude toward the source determines whether the rhetorical is interpreted positively or negatively, but low PK individuals do not use their agent knowledge in their responses to rhetorical questions. Similarly, Hardesty, Carlson, and Bearden (2002) find an interaction between skepticism (persuasion knowledge) and brand familiarity (agent knowledge) in the context of reference price advertising. These papers indicate the value in considering persuasion, agent, and topic knowledge as three different structures. The results support the interaction of different knowledge structures as proposed by the PKM and demonstrate the need for further research in this area. It is clear that there are many questions remaining about these three types of knowledge and their inter-relationships. For example, can some generalizations be drawn about when persuasion knowledge will be used more than (or instead of) agent or topic knowledge? What is required for the use of each and when and why are they likely to interact? THE CONTENT OF PERSUASION KNOWLEDGE Figure 21.2 depicts what research has shown thus far about the content of persuasion knowledge, its antecedents, and its consequences. In this section, we will examine in detail the research on the content of persuasion knowledge. In the next section we will discuss antecedents, followed by a section on consequences. Friestad and Wright (1994) indicate that persuasion knowledge involves beliefs about motives, tactics, appropriateness of motives and tactics, and how persuasion works. Most research on Haugtvedt_ER5603X_C021.indd 553 7/24/ :09:30 PM

6 554 MARGARET C. CAMPBELL AND AMNA KIMANI Cognitive Resources Accessibility of Motive Persuasion expertise Activation of Persuasion Knowledge: beliefs about motives, tactics, appropriateness, how persuasion works Coping behaviors, Response strategies Negative Consequences: judgments, attitudes, choice Positive Consequences: judgments, attitudes, choice Figure 21.2 Antecedents and Consequences of Persuasion Knowledge persuasion knowledge focuses on one of these categories. That is, the bulk of PKM research focuses on one of these types of persuasion knowledge. Prior to discussing each category, we distinguish between persuasion knowledge and marketplace metacognition. Persuasion Knowledge vs. Marketplace Metacognition Just as schemer schema was a precursor to persuasion knowledge, marketplace metacognition appears to be a further step in Wright s (2002) thinking about consumers knowledge of the marketplace. Marketplace metacognition is defined as everyday individuals thinking about market-related thinking (Wright, 2002, p. 677). It includes people s beliefs about their own mental states and about the states of others, as well as about processes, strategies, and intentions as these relate to the social domain of marketplace interactions. Thus, marketplace metacognition is knowledge and thinking about one s own knowledge about the marketplace and interactions between market players. Is marketplace metacognition just another term for persuasion knowledge or is it a different construct? Persuasion knowledge focuses on knowledge and beliefs about how persuasion works, how people persuade, and how to effectively respond to persuasion. Persuasion knowledge may be either a chronic, individual difference variable (Bearden, Hardesty & Rose, 2001) or a situationally induced variable that can be accessed in a variety of persuasion interactions. Persuasion knowledge spans both marketing and nonmarketing persuasion situations. For instance, a consumer may have knowledge about how a marketer is likely to persuade a consumer as well as knowledge about how a husband is likely to persuade a wife or how friends persuade each other. Moreover, persuasion knowledge is focused on coping with persuasion and does not necessarily involve the consumer s thoughts about the non-persuasion-based marketplace. Marketplace metacognition, on the other hand, is somewhat different in terms of topics and agents to which it applies. Marketplace metacognition focuses solely on marketplace agents and includes both persuasion and non-persuasion contexts. Marketplace metacognition centers on consumers thinking about their knowledge about procedures, strategies and tactics for marketplace interaction and exchange. While persuasion is clearly one important component of the marketplace, more than persuasion is involved. Marketplace metacognition could include beliefs about Haugtvedt_ER5603X_C021.indd 554 7/24/ :09:30 PM

7 I KNOW WHAT YOU RE DOING AND WHY YOU RE DOING IT 555 the meaning of prices and price changes, reactions to different distribution channels, thoughts about a product and product attributes, and so forth. In short, persuasion knowledge and marketplace metacognition clearly overlap in terms of consumers beliefs about own and others strategies and intentions about marketplace persuasion. However, they have distinct components as well. This chapter will primarily address issues of consumers knowledge about persuasion in the marketplace, that is, topics that fall in the overlap between persuasion knowledge and marketplace metacognition. Consistent with the PKM, we will use the term persuasion knowledge to refer to consumers thoughts and beliefs about marketplace persuasion, reserving the term marketplace metacognition for consumers thinking about their marketplace-related thinking. Consideration of Motives Beliefs about marketers motives are a centerpiece of persuasion knowledge. In fact, a consumer s consideration of a marketer s motives can be measured as an indicator of whether persuasion knowledge has been activated. Following research on suspicion in the person perception literature (e.g., Fein, 1996), Campbell and Kirmani (2000) suggested that use of persuasion knowledge can involve consideration of whether persuasion agents have ulterior motives. In other words, in order to use persuasion knowledge within a particular interaction, the consumer must recognize the potential for persuasion. This entails consideration of whether there is a persuasion motive, as opposed to some nonpersuasion motive, behind the action(s) to which the consumer is responding. If the consumer does not think about the possibility of persuasion, she does not use persuasion knowledge. If the consumer infers that there is no persuasion motive, she is likely to curtail use of persuasion knowledge because it does not usefully apply to the situation (although some other knowledge structure may be used). If the consumer infers that there is a persuasion motive, she is likely to continue to use persuasion knowledge in coping with the interaction. Thus far, a large proportion of research that directly relates to persuasion knowledge focuses on inferences of motive as an indicator of a consumer s use of persuasion knowledge. Acknowledging that consumers will not always draw inferences about the motives and/or trustworthiness of a source and, in fact, consumers often assume that a source is cooperative (cf., Schwarz, 1994), this research has examined factors that influence such inference making. Research has shown that suspicion 1 of firms motives may be raised by a variety of marketing stimuli, including flattery (Campbell & Kirmani, 2000), the use of rhetorical questions (Ahluwalia & Burnkrant, 2004), incongruent placement of brands in television shows (Russell, 2002), advocacy advertising (Menon & Kahn, 2003), cause-related marketing (Szykman, Bloom, & Blazing, 2004), negative ad comparisons (Jain & Posavac, 2004), partially comparative pricing (Barone, Manning, & Miniard, 2004), biased sources (Williams, Fitzsimons, & Block, 2004), and expensive default options (Brown & Krishna, 2004). The presence of these tactics is likely to trigger persuasion knowledge by making consumers consider the marketer s ulterior motives. In turn, use of persuasion knowledge is seen to lead to negative evaluations of marketers and/or marketing agents. This will be discussed further in the section on consequences. In short, research strongly supports consideration of persuasion motive as a critical type of persuasion knowledge use. Consumers appear to make positive or negative attributions about marketers motives in different situations, and these attributions affect how they respond to the marketer s actions. However, consideration of motives is not the only demonstration of persuasion knowledge activation. As discussed next, persuasion knowledge is also activated when consumers consider the marketer s behavior as a persuasion tactic. Haugtvedt_ER5603X_C021.indd 555 7/24/ :09:31 PM

8 556 MARGARET C. CAMPBELL AND AMNA KIMANI Beliefs about Tactics and How Persuasion Works An important component of persuasion knowledge is knowledge or beliefs that a person holds about others persuasion tactics. It makes sense that consumers think about the methods that marketers have for achieving their marketplace persuasion goals. In order for a marketer s behavior (e.g., advertising approach, promotional reward, product positioning) to be thought of as a tactic, i.e., a means for achieving a goal, as opposed to merely an action, there must be a change of meaning (Friestad & Wright, 1994). A change of meaning occurs when a consumer conceives of an action that previously was not assigned any particular meaning as being a tactic used to persuade the target. The notion that an action is a tactic is based on the idea that the action can give rise to some psychological reaction that is believed to create persuasion. That is, belief in an action as a persuasion tactic rests on the consumer s lay theory about how persuasion occurs, or at the very least, the consumer s theory of how marketers believe that persuasion occurs. Once an action is identified as a tactic, in addition to considering the effectiveness of the tactic, consumers may begin to think about the appropriateness of the marketer s motive and specific tactic use. There is some research that addresses each of these, namely, consumers beliefs about tactics, consumers theories of causality in persuasion, change of meaning, and appropriateness of tactics and motives. Beliefs about Tactics. Some research has directly explored beliefs that consumers have about marketing tactics. While the majority of studies in this area provide respondents with a list of tactics and ask them to indicate what they believe is the goal of each tactic, there are a few studies that examine consumers own identification of persuasion tactics. Tactics that respondents have identified on their own include: borrowed interest appeals, i.e., an advertiser s use of something for which the audience has inherent interest, e.g., a cute puppy or sexy woman (Campbell, 1995); amount of money spent on advertising (Kirmani, 1997); advertising repetition (Campbell & Keller, 2003; Kirmani, 1997); context effect of the other alternatives presented with an item (Hamilton, 2003); intention questions (Williams et al., 2004); rhetoricals (Ahluwalia & Burnkrant, 2004); and guilt appeals (Cotte, Coulter, & Moore, 2005). Research indicates that consumers sometimes recognize, think about, and respond to these actions as persuasion tactics. Beliefs about How Persuasion Works. The idea that an action is a persuasion tactic must rest on some type of conceptualization of how persuasion occurs. Researchers have uncovered some consumer beliefs about causality in persuasion. Bousch, Friestad, and Rose. (1994) examined adolescents beliefs about why advertisers use particular tactics. This research shows that adolescents have theories about advertisers intentions and how persuasion works and that these theories become more similar to those of adults as adolescents get older. Examination of adult consumers beliefs about the psychology of advertising persuasion reveals that adults likewise have ideas about how advertising tactics affect persuasion (Friestad & Wright 1995). Friestad and Wright collected data on consumers beliefs about the various roles 13 different psychological events play in advertising persuasion. Consumers believe that psychological events are important to the persuasion process and believe that different events have different roles. Importantly, there is evidence of folk knowledge about advertising persuasion based on shared beliefs about the roles that different psychological events play in persuasion (Friestad & Wright, 1995). Consumers have ideas about the difficulty of eliciting a variety of psychological events (e.g., attention, feeling emotion, connecting, etc.), as well as of the importance of these psychological events to advertising effectiveness. Change of Meaning. Surprisingly little research has examined change of meaning, i.e., the transformation of a consumer s understanding of a particular action as a persuasion tactic. It is important to note, however, that there is some evidence that consumers can be taught that an action is a tactic. In other words, a change of meaning in which an action becomes understood as a tactic Haugtvedt_ER5603X_C021.indd 556 7/24/ :09:32 PM

9 I KNOW WHAT YOU RE DOING AND WHY YOU RE DOING IT 557 can occur because of external influence. Providing information on marketers actions as tactics and/or their appropriate usage can help consumers think of the action as a persuasion tactic. After being exposed to this information, respondents are more likely to respond to the marketers actions as persuasion tactics, becoming more resistant and thus, exhibiting less change in response to the actions than when they are not exposed to the information on the tactical nature and effects of the marketers actions (Sagarin, Cialdini, Rice, & Serna 2002; Williams, Fitzsimons, & Bloch 2004). For example, by providing some respondents with an article describing the mere-measurement effect, Williams et al. (2004) elicited a change of meaning such that those respondents exposed to the article responded to an intention question from a biased source as if it were a persuasion tactic, whereas respondents who did not see the article, did not. While there is evidence that change of meaning can be externally prompted, there is less understanding about the internal process by which changes of meaning naturally occur. There are a variety of questions that still need answers. For example, what is the process by which change of meaning occurs? What factors influence the process? When is a change of meaning likely to arise? Are there developmental stages at which changes of meaning are more or less likely to occur? Are there aspects of marketplace actions that make it more or less likely that a consumer will experience a change of meaning, identifying the actions as persuasion tactics? How does a consumer respond at the time that he or she first comes to believe that an action is a persuasion tactic? Examination of the process by which consumers begin to identify marketplace actions as persuasion tactics is necessary to develop better understanding of how consumers respond within the marketplace and factors that affect likely responses. Beliefs about Appropriateness. Once a consumer is using persuasion knowledge to consider a marketer s actions, she may begin to think about the appropriateness of the marketer s motives and tactics. Appropriateness differs from effectiveness in that appropriateness has to do with the consumer s belief that it is right or wrong to use the tactic, regardless of whether the tactic works. Evaluations of appropriateness are quite important to consumer exchange because consumers sometimes respond negatively to punish what they perceive to be inappropriate behavior. Consideration of motive and/or tactic appropriateness can be elicited by borrowed interest advertising appeals (Campbell, 1995), negative framing (Shiv, Edell, & Payne, 1997); negative comparative advertising (Jain & Posavac, 2004), pricing practices (Campbell, 1999); and guilt appeals (Cotte et al., 2005). There are undoubtedly other important marketplace variables that could likewise be perceived as inappropriate. A consumer s perception that a marketer s persuasion attempt is inappropriate can result in inferences of manipulative intent (Campbell, 1995; Cotte et al., 2005), perceived unfairness (Campbell, 1999; Shiv et al., 1997) and negative attitudes (Jain & Posavac, 2004). While all of these negative outcomes are important, recently there has been strong interest in perceptions of (un)fairness, particularly price (un)fairness, so much so that perceptions of price (un)fairness are a topic of exploration in their own right. Campbell (1999) drew from both the economic and the persuasion knowledge literatures, showing that consumers make inferences about the firm s motive for changing a price and that the inferred motive influences perceptions of (un)fairness above and beyond the influence of the firm s profits. Since this research, a variety of factors have been found to give rise to perceptions of unfairness, including several that appear to be based in consumers persuasion, agent, and topic knowledge. For instance, attributions about the salesperson (Vaidyanathan & Aggarwal, 2003), comparisons to what other consumers receive (Feinberg, Krishna, & Zhang, 2002), the source of the price change information (Campbell, 2005), and external reference prices and consumer skepticism (Hardesty et al., 2002) all can influence consumer perceptions of price fairness. Haugtvedt_ER5603X_C021.indd 557 7/24/ :09:32 PM

10 558 MARGARET C. CAMPBELL AND AMNA KIMANI The research discussed above finds instances when consumers perceive particular marketer motives and tactics to be inappropriate. Warlop and Alba (2004) suggested that consumers would perceive the blatant copying of market leaders trade dress to be inappropriate. However, while respondents unfavorable responses to national or high-priced brands that copied the marketer leaders trade dress indicated some perceived inappropriateness, respondents did not penalize follower brands (store or low-priced brands) for blatantly copying market leaders trade dress. These results suggest that consumers may believe that there are conditions under which visual similarity is an acceptable, rather than deceptive or inappropriate, persuasion tactic. Important questions remain as to when consumers are likely to judge tactic use as appropriate versus inappropriate. Summary Persuasion knowledge consists of a variety of components, including consideration of motives, beliefs about tactics, appropriateness of tactics, and how persuasion works. While research provides preliminary insight into each of these areas, there are still unaddressed questions that remain to be researched. Some research covers each of these areas, however, the largest amount of research has focused on consideration of motives. Many other aspects and components of persuasion knowledge can add richness to our understanding of consumers interactions with marketers. ANTECEDENTS TO THE USE OF PERSUASION KNOWLEDGE A more complete development of the PKM requires understanding of when consumers are more or less likely to use their persuasion knowledge. That is, in any given persuasion episode, how likely is it that a consumer will access and utilize personal knowledge about persuasion? What factors influence the use of persuasion knowledge? Although the PKM discusses some possible issues surrounding use of persuasion knowledge, it does not delineate conditions that evoke or suppress persuasion knowledge. Recent research has identified three antecedents of persuasion knowledge: cognitive resources, accessibility of motives, and persuasion expertise. Cognitive Resources Friestad and Wright (1994) state that persuasion knowledge is a resource to which people must have immediate access during any interaction in which the need may arise to recognize and manage, or to construct and deliver, a persuasion attempt. In short, for consumers it is a necessary resource in virtually all interactions with marketers (p. 3). Thus, one reasonable proposition is that persuasion knowledge can be fairly automatically applied to any interaction in which persuasion may play a role. However, a plausible alternative hypothesis is that persuasion knowledge is not accessed automatically, and instead may require more effortful, higher-order processing. For example, tactic-related cognitions appear to be more effortful than claims-related cognitions, such that tactic-related cognitions have greater influence when processing resources are unconstrained (Shiv et al., 1997). In fact, Campbell and Kirmani (2000) proposed that activation and use of persuasion knowledge requires cognitive resources. In a series of studies of interpersonal persuasion between a salesperson and a consumer, they conceptualized activation of persuasion knowledge as consideration of ulterior motives. They suggested that cognitive resources were necessary to use persuasion knowledge because inferences of motives require higher order, attributional thinking. Using multiple manipulations of cognitive resources, the research demonstrated that consumers are less likely to use persuasion knowledge within a marketplace interaction when processing resources are constrained than when resources are unconstrained. Haugtvedt_ER5603X_C021.indd 558 7/24/ :09:32 PM

11 I KNOW WHAT YOU RE DOING AND WHY YOU RE DOING IT 559 The determining role of cognitive resources in the use of persuasion knowledge was replicated in research on the mere measurement effect (Williams et al., 2004). Using a blink counting distraction task to manipulate cognitive capacity, this research showed that consumers were less likely to use persuasion knowledge to interpret a marketer s intention question when cognitive capacity was constrained and more likely when capacity was unconstrained. Consistent with the flexible correction model (Wegener & Petty, 1997), when consumers had sufficient capacity, they used persuasion knowledge to consider whether a source of an intention question was biased. When the source was perceived as biased, respondents used their persuasion knowledge to correct for the effect of an intention question on their behavior. However, when cognitive capacity was constrained, correction of the mere measurement effect did not occur (Williams et al.). In short, cognitive capacity appears to be an important antecedent of persuasion knowledge use. Accessibility of Motives In addition to the critical role of cognitive capacity, accessibility of persuasion motives is an important antecedent for the use of persuasion knowledge. Research shows that consumers are more likely to use persuasion knowledge within a persuasion episode when ulterior motives are highly accessible, but unlikely to use persuasion knowledge when ulterior motives are less accessible (Brown & Krishna, 2004; Campbell & Kirmani, 2000). Accessibility of ulterior motives may be increased with information about the status of the firm s business (Brown & Krishna, 2004), priming of motives or tactics (Campbell & Kirmani, 2000; Morales, 2005), blatancy of persuasion tactics (Campbell & Kirmani, 2000), agent knowledge (e.g., priors about car salespeople), and consumer goals. Accessibility of motives has been shown to interact with cognitive resources to affect use of persuasion knowledge (Campbell & Kirmani, 2000). High accessibility may make consumers likely to use persuasion knowledge even when cognitive resources are low. For instance, cognitively busy targets may be able to see through blatant persuasion tactics, such as ingratiation, because of high levels of motive accessibility. Persuasion Expertise The third antecedent of use of persuasion knowledge that has thus far been identified is the individual s persuasion expertise. Whereas persuasion knowledge has often been conceptualized as a situational variable (i.e., activated when cognitive resources or accessibility of motives are high), it could also be a chronic, individual difference variable. Differential experience with persuasion might lead individuals to have higher or lower levels of persuasion expertise. As noted above, Friestad and Wright (1994) suggested that experience would be important for the development of persuasion knowledge. In support of this, research has found that older adults (over 30 years of age), who typically have more persuasion experience, demonstrate more sophisticated use of persuasion knowledge than younger adults (Kirmani & Campbell, 2004). Experience is likely to lead to individual differences in the quantity and content of persuasion knowledge. The notion of an individual difference in the use of persuasion knowledge led to the development of an individual difference scale that measures persuasion knowledge as a subcomponent of consumer self-confidence (Bearden et al., 2001). This scale has been used to divide people into high and low PKs, with clear behavioral differences between the two groups (Ahluwalia & Burnkrant, 2004; Brown & Krishna, 2004). Thus, research shows that persuasion knowledge may be situationally or chronically activated. More research into both situational and individual differences in use of persuasion knowledge is needed at this time. Haugtvedt_ER5603X_C021.indd 559 7/24/ :09:32 PM

12 560 MARGARET C. CAMPBELL AND AMNA KIMANI Summary Several studies have explored when consumers are more or less likely to utilize persuasion knowledge within a particular persuasion episode. Cognitive capacity, motive accessibility, and persuasion expertise all influence the extent to which persuasion knowledge is used. Overall, consumers are more likely to use persuasion knowledge when they have high motivation, ability and opportunity to elaborate about marketers intentions. This fits nicely with other theories of consumer behavior. At this time, research opportunities exist to identify and explore additional factors that increase or suppress the use of persuasion knowledge. It is highly likely that there are other, unexplored antecedents of persuasion knowledge use. For instance, since consumers are goal-directed (Friestad & Wright, 1994), a consumer s goals are likely to influence the extent to which s/he activates persuasion knowledge. Consumers may have persuasion-related goals, such as not succumbing to persuasion or getting the best deal, which might increase the likelihood of using persuasion knowledge. The effect of goals on persuasion knowledge is largely unexplored. Likewise, it would be useful to identify factors that are antecedents to the combined use of persuasion knowledge with either topic or agent knowledge. CONSEQUENCES OF PERSUASION KNOWLEDGE ACTIVATION What are the outcomes of the use of persuasion knowledge and where do they appear in the PKM? One important type of outcome of persuasion knowledge use is persuasion coping behaviors, which refers to the target s cognitive and physical actions before, during, and after a persuasion episode (Friestad & Wright, 1994, p. 3). Other, more terminal outcomes are beliefs, attitudes, and choices. The PKM depicts the persuasion episode as the combination of the target s coping responses with the part of the marketing agent s persuasion attempt that the consumer is able to observe directly. Following the model, the consequences of persuasion knowledge activation and use would thus appear to be found in the persuasion episode (see Figure 21.1). Several types of consequences of persuasion knowledge have been studied empirically, including consumers coping behaviors and response strategies, beliefs, attitudes, and choices. Since the persuasion episode is the overlap of the marketer s persuasion attempts and the target s coping responses, there will be back-and-forth give-and-take among the coping responses and other outcomes. That is, we expect that the consumer s use of persuasion knowledge will allow him or her to consider the marketer s motives and tactics. The consumer is likely to form beliefs about what the marketer is doing and then engage in some response. The marketer is likely to also engage in further behaviors, which may change the consumer s beliefs, attitudes, etc. Thus, while coping behaviors and response strategies can be thought of as precursors to more terminal outcomes of beliefs, attitudes, and choices, it is clear that persuasion response and outcomes involve a recursive process and that all are outcomes of the use of persuasion knowledge. We first address coping responses that result from the use of persuasion knowledge and then outcomes of beliefs, attitudes and choices. While the majority of research has found that activation of persuasion knowledge leads to negative outcomes in terms of persuasion, research does find positive consequences of persuasion knowledge usage. Thus, we discuss negative and positive outcomes in turn. Target Coping Response Behaviors Persuasion coping behaviors arise when the consumer target s topic, persuasion, and agent knowledge come together in interpreting and responding to the marketer. As noted above, persuasion coping behaviors are consequences of persuasion knowledge activation as well as antecedents to Haugtvedt_ER5603X_C021.indd 560 7/24/ :09:33 PM

13 I KNOW WHAT YOU RE DOING AND WHY YOU RE DOING IT 561 the terminal outcomes of attitudes, choices, etc. The PKM proposes that consumers coping responses are central to their marketplace behavior (Friestad & Wright 1994). Thus, it is surprising that thus far, little research has directly examined responses strategies that consumers use to cope with marketplace influence. One exception to this uses both qualitative and experimental methodologies to explore and identify strategies that consumers use to respond to marketers (Kirmani & Campbell 2004). This research identified 15 strategies by which consumers respond to persuasion attempts and conditions under which the strategies are used. Importantly, the research revealed that consumers have two general modes of response: consumers act as persuasion sentries, guarding against unwanted persuasion, and they also act as goal seekers, using persuasion agents to achieve their own marketplace goals (Kirmani & Campbell). Whereas persuasion sentries exhibit negative response strategies (e.g., resistance, withdrawal to avoid persuasion), goal seekers exhibit positive response strategies (e.g., directing the agent to best fulfill the consumer s needs, establishing a relationship with the agent to get better deals). Although some of the resistance-related strategies have been considered in work in psychology on resistance to persuasion (e.g., Knowles & Linn 2004), the positive response strategies follow uniquely from the PKM perspective. The findings support the proposition of the PKM that consumers strive to achieve their own goals within marketplace interactions. At this time, it would be beneficial to further understand consumers response strategies and, importantly, conditions and moderators that affect their use. Negative Consequences of Persuasion Knowledge Activation Most of the work that draws upon the PKM proposes and finds negative persuasion outcomes arising from the consumer s use of persuasion knowledge. In particular, research on suspicion of ulterior motives finds that when consumers infer that a marketer s action is driven by a self-serving ulterior motive, there is greater resistance to persuasion. For instance, the use of persuasion knowledge has been shown to lead to less favorable perceptions of a sales agent s sincerity (Campbell & Kirmani, 2000), less favorable perceptions of corporate social responsibility (Menon & Kahn, 2003), less favorable attitudes toward the brand or firm (Ahluwalia & Burnkrant, 2004; Campbell, 1995; Forehand & Grier, 2003; Jain & Posavac, 2004; Russell, 2002), higher perceptions of unfairness (Campbell, 1999; Hardesty, Carlson, & Bearden, 2002), increased skepticism, even in the face of honest claims (Koslow, 2000), lower willingness to pay (Morales, 2005), lower purchase intention (Barone, Manning, & Miniard, 2004), and lower choice (Brown & Krishna, 2004; Williams et al., 2004) relative to when persuasion knowledge is not used. It is likely that many outcomes of the use of persuasion knowledge are negative because of reactance that arises in response to believing that someone else is trying to persuade, and thereby control, the self (e.g., Brehm, 1966). Because of this, the majority of research to date has examined negative reactions. However, the outcomes of persuasion knowledge use do not have to be negative. As noted earlier, consumers often assume that communicators are cooperative, rather than competitive (e.g., Schwarz, 1994). Consumers may use their knowledge to achieve their own goals; goal attainment will not always involve resisting marketers persuasion. A few studies demonstrate situations in which people do not display reactance when they know that an ulterior motive is present. Examining context effects in decision-making, Hamilton (2003) finds that people intuitively understand how to use context effects to influence others decisions, e.g., by creating a choice environment that will lead others to select a particular outcome. Despite this knowledge, however, people are still influenced by others menu creation even when they realize that the other person has an ulterior motive (Hamilton, 2003). That is, even though the respondent appears to consider the persuader s Haugtvedt_ER5603X_C021.indd 561 7/24/ :09:33 PM

14 562 MARGARET C. CAMPBELL AND AMNA KIMANI ulterior motive, the respondent in positively influenced by the persuasion attempt. In this case, we do not see a negative persuasion outcome. Recent research specifically examines when suspicion of a self-serving motive does and does not lead to negative consumer response (Forehand & Grier, 2003). This suggests that consumer inference of self-serving ulterior motive gives rise to negative responses to marketplace persuasion only when there is a consumer perception of firm deception or dishonesty about the firm s motives. When a firm only states that it is engaging in cause-related marketing in order to help others, but the situation suggests to consumers that the cause-related behavior will also help the firm, consumers are seen to respond more negatively. However, when the firm expresses that the cause-related marketing will help others and help themselves, consumers do not appear to respond negatively to the firm (Forehand & Grier, 2003). This research suggests that in some cases, consumers have sophisticated, conditionally based concepts of persuasion appropriateness that influence important responses to persuasion. Positive Consequences of Persuasion Knowledge Activation Thus far, we have shown that persuasion knowledge use can lead either to negative outcomes or does not affect outcomes. Can persuasion knowledge activation lead to positive outcomes, such that people respond more positively to the marketer who is trying to persuade them? There is little research that shows positive outcomes of persuasion knowledge. An exception is Kirmani and Campbell (2004), who investigated consumers response strategies when interacting with interpersonal marketing agents (e.g., salespeople and service personnel). As discussed above, this research shows that consumers have both negative, persuasion-sentry response strategies, and positive, goal-seeker strategies. Consumers do not merely react against marketers, they use persuasion coping behaviors to both positively and negatively respond to marketers in order to attain their own goals. An important aspect of this research is that the findings demonstrate that consumer use of persuasion knowledge does not necessarily result in negative responses to marketing agents. Persuasion knowledge may also lead to positive outcomes when consumers are able to understand firms incentives, such as the incentive to signal product quality. Thus, consumers may attribute higher product quality to firms that exert greater effort in advertising (Kirmani, 1997) and offer more extensive warranties (Boulding & Kirmani, 1993). In order for this type of attribution to occur, consumers need to believe that firms that spend more on advertising or offer higher warranties could not do so if the quality of the product was so bad that these expenditures could not be recouped by a large number of sales. This type of persuasion knowledge can lead to positive firm evaluations. Summary There is nothing within the Persuasion Knowledge Model that suggests that persuasion knowledge will always result in less positive outcomes for the persuasion agent than when persuasion knowledge is not used. However, much more research depicts negative than positive consequences of the use of persuasion knowledge. Clearly, the activation of persuasion knowledge may make consumers suspicious, leading to less favorable marketer perceptions, and thus allowing consumers to avoid being persuaded unnecessarily. However, consumers may also use persuasion knowledge to more positively achieve their goals. More research is needed into conditions under which the use of persuasion knowledge may lead to positive outcomes. Future research will contribute to a more Haugtvedt_ER5603X_C021.indd 562 7/24/ :09:33 PM