Motivated Beliefs and Transaction Utility: Effects of Pricing Format on Willingness to Pay

Transcription

1 Russell Ackoff Doctoral Student Fellowship for Research on Human Decision Processes and Risk Management 2017 Application Motivated Beliefs and Transaction Utility: Effects of Pricing Format on Willingness to Pay Zheng Jai Jennie Huang Third Year Doctoral Student Wharton Business Economics and Public Policy Department Mailing Address 3620 Locust Walk Suite 3000 Steinberg Hall - Dietrich Hall Philadelphia, PA huangzh@wharton.upenn.edu Faculty Advisor Professor Judd Kessler Assistant Professor The Wharton School Business Economics and Public Policy Requested Support $

2 Background The recent switch by ride sharing companies from a multiplier surge pricing to a fixed value pricing is of great interest as it is the opposite strategy that most companies use to advertise discounts and promotions. Given the rise of gig-economics and their flexible pricing as well as the prominent usage of discounts and promotions, it is important to understand how pricing and pricing format influences a consumer s purchasing decisions. Firstly, there has been a rise in class action lawsuits against various prominent companies for using pricing and discount information to manipulate consumer behavior. Secondly, the increasing reliance on gig-economies such as Uber and Lyft, which allow for prices to fluctuated depending on demand and supply, increases the need of price saliency. In this project, I intend to test the effect of different reference price types single value versus range of prices and pricing format fixed price value compared to multiplier value on good deals versus bad deals saliency and its effect on consumer purchasing decisions. Firstly, understanding the effect of pricing format on consumer purchasing decisions can have significant implications due to transaction utility. Richard Thaler proposed that individuals not only get utility from consumption but also from the transaction itself. 1 As such, the perception of a good deal or bad deal can influence purchasing decisions. More importantly, transaction utility could lead a consumer to forgo the purchase of a good that is welfare enhancing due to the perception of a bad deal or purchase a good that is not welfare improving due to the perception of a good deal. For example, retailers have been known to prominently display the discounting percentage or provide the original price as a comparison to the new discounted price, even though only the final price should matter for consumers purchase decisions. Another example is that known discount retailers such as Costco, Walmart, factory stores, and outlet malls, will use their history of discounted prices in order to engage consumers and increase sales. However, recent news has shown that retailers have started to take advantage and manipulate price information in order to induce, possibly welfare-reducing, purchases. In fact, the discovery of this type of false advertisement has led to a large number of class action lawsuits against big retail chains such as: Homegoods, Marshall, Kohl's, Kate Spade, Michaels, Gap, and many others. 2 Secondly, the rise of gig-economics and their flexible pricing increases the need for price saliency to understand what is the true baseline price. For example, ride share services such as Uber and Lyft introduced surge pricing based on market demand conditions. While Uber and Lyft used a multiplier pricing format to make surge pricing salient, starting on April 2016, Uber changed the way they displayed the price of each ride from a multiplier to a fixed value. 3 Although the value of a ride still fluctuates with market conditions, given the point-to-point travel and the variety of external conditions, it is now much harder to estimate or perceive when one is being shown a surge price, and thus it is harder to calculate what the baseline market price is. Prior literature has utilized Thaler s theory on transaction utility and shown that consumers are loss averse with regards to prices changes suggesting that consumer s do take good deals and bad 1 Thaler, Richard, (1985), Mental Accounting and Consumer Choice, Marketing Science, 4, issue 3, p Berkoff v. Homegoods Inc., United States District Court Central District of California Eastern Division, No. 5:15-cv-01480, July 23, 2015; Berkoff v. Marshalls of CA, LLC, United States District Court Central District of California Eastern Division, No. 5:15-cv , July 23, 2015; Gennock v. Ann Inc., United States District Court Southern District of New York, No. 1:16-cv JPO, May 5, 2016; Munning v. The Gap, Inc., United States District Court Northern District of California, No. 3:16-cv TEH, July 7, 2016; Kang, Peter Y., Kohl s Hit With False Ad Class Action Over Brand Discounts, Law 360, July 22, 2015; Anderson v. Kate Spade and Company, United States District Court Southern District of New York, No. 1:16-cv-07300, September 19, 2016; Holter, Mike., Michaels to Pay $1.8M Settlement Over Deceptive Advertising, Top Class Actions, October Singh, Arundhati and Zhao, Dennis, Upfront fares: no math no surprises, Uber Newsroom, June 23, 2016.

3 deals into account in their decision process. 4 However, Thaler s theory on transaction utility relies on comparing the differences between the sticker price and a reference price. 5 Although there is extensive work on formation of reference prices, there is not a single unifying theory, and recent work proposes that there is not a single reference price rather, reference prices are fluid. 6 Furthermore, prior research on price recall and reference price formation also shows that most consumers are uncertain about the reference price at the time of purchase and this can cause ambiguity on whether they are getting a good or bad deal for the consumer. 7 Understanding how reference prices and pricing display affects consumer s willingness to pay and purchasing choices can teach us a great deal about how behavioral biases affect economic decision making. In addition, this knowledge provides insights into how industries should be regulated to mitigate the harm from pricing manipulation. In my current research, I seek to better model where reference prices come from and better understand how the pricing display used by companies affects these reference prices and subsequent consumer choices. This research will seek to (1) establish the fact that pricing display can have an effect on consumer choice and (2) show that consumers can use motivated beliefs and the fluidity of reference prices to induce or prevent a purchase and pricing display can aid or block this channel. Experimental Design I, under my advisor Professor Judd Kessler, aim to explore the effects of pricing display and reference prices on consumer decisions by conducting a lab experiment where we vary the pricing display format and manipulate reference prices ranges and observe their effect on an individual s decision. In this experiment, we will vary if the price display is fixed pricing (F), multiplier value (M), or both (B) and if the subjects are told a single reference price (S) or a range of reference prices (R). As such, subjects will be randomly assigned into one of six groups: SF, SM, SB, RF, RM, and RB. All subjects will be assigned to be buyers with a valuation of 100 experimental points and will decide if they want to buy a widget for a randomly determined price. A computer will randomly choose the price of the widget in each round and if the price will have a discount, surge pricing, or neither. Individuals with fixed pricing (F) will only see the final (including discount or surge pricing) price, those with multiplier value (M) will only be told the multiplier they are paying, and those in the fixed and multiplier pricing (B) will be told both the final fixed price and the multiplier value. Individuals will decide whether they want to purchase the item at that value or not. Moreover, individuals with the single reference price (S) will be told the mean of the distribution that the computer will be picking the prices from while those in the range of reference prices (R) will be told a range around the mean. Subject will participate in 30 rounds where they will decide if they want to purchase the widget at the random price. I will also ask individual s belief whether each purchase was a good deal, neutral, or a bad deal. This experiment will enable us to understand the effect of different reference prices and pricing display on purchase behavior and individual s beliefs behind their actions. 4 Weaver, R, and S. Frederick. (2012). A Reference Price Theory of the Endowment Effect. Journal of Marketing Research 49: Neumann, N., and U. Böckenholt. (2014). A Meta-analysis of Loss Aversion in Product Choice. Journal of Retailing 90: Thaler, Richard, (1985), Mental Accounting and Consumer Choice, Marketing Science, 4, issue 3, p Mazumdar, T., S.P. Raj, and I. Sinha. (2005). Reference Price Research: Review and Propositions. Journal of Marketing 69(4): Kőszegi, B., and M. Rabin. (2006). A Model of Reference-Dependent Preferences. Quarterly Journal of Economics 121: Ericson, K.M. M., and A. Fuster, A. (2011). Expectations as Endowments: Evidence on Reference-Dependent Preferences from Exchange and Valuation Experiments. Quarterly Journal of Economics 126(4): Moon, S., G. J. Russell, and S.D. Duvvuri. (2006). Profiling the Reference Price Consumer. Journal of Retailing 82(1):1 11

4 Requested Support For these studies we will use Qualtrics and lab subjects at a cost of ~$5.00 per subject for 600 subjects in each experiment which would amount to approximately $3000 in support for subject payment. It is my hope that the Ackoff Fellowship will allow me to pursue these lab studies and attend the ESA Conference where I hope to present my work and get feedback from leading academics and researchers in the fields of experimental and behavior economics. I thank you for your consideration of this proposal. Please feel free to contact me if you have any questions. Item Cost per Number Total Unit Subject Payment $ $ ESA Conference Conference Registration $ $ Conference Hotel $ $ Airfare (Tucson, AZ) $ $ Total $

5 Statement from Faculty Advisor: Professor Judd Kessler. I, Professor Judd Kessler, certify that I have read and approve this proposal and will be in residence to supervise the proposed research over the forthcoming year. The proposed researched has also been previously discussed at great length to ensure that it is innovative and feasible. Furthermore, Jennie and I currently have, and will continue to have, weekly or bi-weekly meetings where we discuss the progress and direction of the research project proposed. Professor Judd Kessler Assistant Professor The Wharton School Business Economics and Public Policy

6 Summary of the Research Project Supported by 2016 Ackoff Fellowship Title: Click Here to Save the World: Slacktivism in Charitable Giving. In a series of experiments testing the effects of advocacy message on giving, results suggest that advocacy messages are substitutes to giving. Writing a message (regardless of whether the advocacy message is sent or not sent) fulfills an individual's altruistic self-perception and leads to a statistically significant reduction in donations. This suggest that individual s perception of altruism is satisfied by the process of doing something rather than the outcome. Delivery of the advocacy message produces some inoculation but there are gender differential effects. I attribute this effect to a stronger need for internal consistency when the message is sent and it affects others. This is consistent with prior theory that there is a stronger internal consistency or cognitive dissonance effect when the action that you do has an effect on others. The gender differential effects show that the inoculation effect is only observed in males. In a subsequent experiment, I expanded the previous experimental design to isolate the types of individuals that switch from activism (giving) to slacktivism (advocacy messages) when their action choice set is expanded from just donating to donating and/or doing an act of token support. Results from a pilot in the Wharton Behavioral Lab replicated the previous result: advocacy messages decreased donations. However, I found little evidence that receiving an advocacy message increases or decreases donation. As such, my pilot study suggest that the direction of change in donations is consistent with the theory of slacktivism. Since the results from the pilot where underpowered, thus we took the experiment to Amazon Mechanical Turk were we ran the experiment on 1200 MTurk workers. Unfortunately, the results did not replicate using the Amazon Mechanical Turk population. Funding from the 2016 Ackoff Fellowship allowed for the establishment of these statistically significant results in the first experiment and the implementation of the subsequent expanded experiments. Funding was also used to cover the registration and travel costs of attending various conferences were I was able to meet and discuss my work with various leading academics in the fields of behavioral and experimental economics. Results from this project were also included in my second year paper, were I was able to gather crucial feedback. Budget Justification The 2016 fellowship was used for travel costs to attend various experimental and behavioral economics conferences where I was able to interact with academic researchers as well as policy makers and discuss my research ideas. Funds were also used for subject payment in various studies including various laboratory studies in the Wharton Behavioral Lab and on Amazon Mechanical Turk which have led to my current results. Item Cost per Unit Units Total Wharton Behavioral Lab Experiment $ $ Experiment 2 on Amazon MTurk $1.25x $ AFE Conference Travel Costs $ $ ESA Conference Travel Costs $ $ Spring School UCSD Travel Costs (Estimated) $ $ Total $