Survey Participation Effects on Customer Purchase Behavior: Increased Judgment Accessibility or Positivity? UTPAL M. DHOLAKIA* VICKI G.

Transcription

1 Survey Participation Effects on Customer Purchase Behavior: Increased Judgment Accessibility or Positivity? UTPAL M. DHOLAKIA* VICKI G. MORWITZ ROBERT A.WESTBROOK March 2004 * Utpal M. Dholakia is assistant professor of management at the Jesse H. Jones Graduate School of Management, Rice University, 6100 Main Street, Houston, TX (dholakia@rice.edu). Vicki G. Morwitz is associate professor of marketing at the Stern School of Business, New York University, 44 West 4 th Street, KMC 8-89, New York, NY (vmorwitz@stern.nyu.edu). Robert A. Westbrook is the William Alexander Kirkland Professor of Management at the Jesse H. Jones Graduate School of Management, Rice University, 6100 Main Street, Houston, TX (westbro@rice.edu). The authors thank the firm that sponsored this study. 1

2 Survey Participation Effects on Customer Purchase Behavior: Increased Judgment Accessibility or Positivity? Participating in a satisfaction survey has broad-based and persistent influences on customers purchase behaviors. The goal of this research is to better understand why such influences occur, through a field study conducted in a U.S. automotive services firm. Past research has shown that survey participation increases accessibility of expressed judgments, resulting in behaviors more consistent with such judgments. We add to this stream by also positing and providing evidence for a positivity effect. Our results suggest that participation in a firm-sponsored survey leads customers to subsequently engage in more positive behaviors, even when their expressed judgments are negative. We also find that this positivity effect is moderated by customers prior experience with the firm, such that it is strongest for the firm s novice or less-experienced customers. For customers having more experience with the firm, increased judgment accessibility seems to primarily influence post-survey behaviors. Implications for research and practice are discussed. 2

3 Survey Participation Effects on Customer Purchase Behavior: Increased Judgment Accessibility or Positivity? INTRODUCTION The conventional wisdom in marketing research is that measures of customer satisfaction and purchase intentions obtained from well-designed and executed surveys accurately reflect true customer beliefs and attitudes, and that the process of measurement has no subsequent effects on customers. However, an accumulating body of evidence suggests that survey participation and measurement may itself trigger changes in the attitudes, intentions and behavior being studied (Chandon, Morwitz and Reinartz in press; Dholakia and Morwitz 2002; Fitzsimons and Morwitz 1996; Morwitz, Johnson and Schmittlein 1993; Simmons, Bickart and Lynch 1993). Known as the mere measurement effect, this phenomenon manifests itself as increased purchase incidence at both product category and brand levels, over and above that which would naturally have occurred without survey participation. Furthermore, recent research has observed its impact on behavior to be pervasive and long-lasting. For example, Dholakia and Morwitz (2002) found that bank customers participating in a fifteen minute firm-sponsored satisfaction survey via telephone made significantly more purchases afterward, maintained higher balances in their accounts, and had lower defection rates, when compared to a control group of similar customers who had not participated in the survey. Moreover, these effects persisted up to one year after participation in the survey. These findings point to important questions for both theory and practice. From a theoretical perspective, how can such persistent and broad-based changes occur in 3

4 customer behavior following such transient stimulus exposure, i.e. a single instance of participation in a relatively short firm-sponsored customer satisfaction survey? Inquiries into the psychological mechanisms underlying the mere measurement effect in laboratory studies (Morwitz and Fitzsimons in press; Fitzsimons and Williams 2000) suggest the explanation lies in increased accessibility. That is, expressing one s judgment such as a purchase intention increases its accessibility in memory afterward, leading to behavior that is consistent with the expressed judgment. However, these investigations have been limited to laboratory settings where the mere measurement effect occurs within minutes of judgment elicitation. Furthermore, these studies have not been undertaken with a particular firm s existing customers, nor have they considered the impact of firm sponsorship of the survey. As a consequence, it is unknown whether the accessibilitybased explanation advanced for short-duration mere measurement effects accounts for long-term influences of firm-sponsored survey participation on customers as well. Nor is it known whether other explanations relevant to firm-sponsored surveys contribute to the mere measurement effect. A second theoretical question raised by mere measurement research is why the influence on purchase incidence depends on the extent of customers experience with the selling firm. Morwitz, Johnson and Schmittlein (1993) found that at the aggregate level, consumers who did not have experience with the product were more susceptible to mere measurement effects than those having product experience. Subsequent research, however, has not examined why such differences occur. Understanding the reasons why customers who have more extensive experience with the firm are more resistant to the mere measurement effect is also important to both theory and practice. With respect to 4

5 the latter, such knowledge may provide marketing researchers with specific means to mitigate mere measurement influences on survey participants when designing research studies. From a practical vantage point, it is important to understand the full scope of consequences from conducting survey research with one s customers. For example, does the mere measurement effect on purchase incidence generalize to customer responsiveness to a firm s sales and promotions efforts, or is the effect of survey participation limited only to customer-initiated purchase of products and services they currently use? While extant research does not address this issue, it has substantial import for firms undertaking marketing research. If survey participation in fact increases customer response to sales and promotional efforts in addition to customer purchase incidence, the economics of survey-based marketing research is altered. Specifically, the net cost of survey-based marketing research would be reduced, since surveys would also contribute to the revenues of sponsoring firms, whether in the form of increased purchase incidence or greater sales response to promotional efforts. Alternately, one might choose to view such research expenditures not as expenses but rather as investments, inasmuch as future revenue generation is resulting from the spending. Thus, an improved understanding of the consequences of survey research on customers would facilitate the calculation of the return on investment on the research expenditures. At the same time, it would also challenge the widely-held view among marketing scholars and public policy makers that opinion elicitation should be kept completely separate from sales efforts. At present, sales and research are segregated to avoid customer deception from selling under the guise of research, i.e. sugging, by 5

6 aggressive sales organizations. Establishing the immediate revenue benefits of survey research would render the segregation of research and promotion increasingly difficult to maintain. The goals of this research are to better understand why participation in a satisfaction survey has such broad-based and persistent influences on customers. We employ a conceptual framework based on self-generated validity theory (Feldman and Lynch 1988), and test hypotheses with data from a longitudinal field experiment conducted by an automotive services industry firm, within the context of its ongoing customer satisfaction measurement program. We explicitly study the behavioral differences between different groups of survey participants and an equivalent control group of non-participants over the course of a year following survey participation. In addition to measures of service purchase and use, we explicitly examine the influence of survey participation on customers subsequent responsiveness to an important type of firm-initiated sales initiative, namely coupon-based promotions. Finally, we examine the moderating role played by customer experience level in the subsequent behaviors of survey participants. CONCEPTUAL FRAMEWORK The Effect of Increased Accessibility of Judgments Since several recent articles have reviewed the research on mere measurement effects thoroughly, we refer the interested reader to those works (Fitzsimons and Williams 2000; Morwitz and Fitzsimons in press). Instead, we focus on what is known regarding the processes underlying the mere measurement effect. Existing research generally relies on self-generated validity theory (Feldman and Lynch 1988; Simmons, 6

7 Bickart, and Lynch 1993) as the basis for understanding why mere measurement effects occur. This theory suggests that participating in a survey in conjunction with answering attitudinal and intentions questions during the survey -- induces respondents to form judgments regarding the sponsoring firm and its products or services that they otherwise would not have formed in the absence of survey questioning to that effect. These measurement-induced judgments not only mediate the generation of responses to the particular question at hand, but they also remain accessible in customers memories, thereby influencing the generation of other responses within the survey as well (Dholakia and Morwitz 2002). Mere measurement studies have theorized that the increased accessibility of the expressed judgment persists, and is thereby also responsible for the subsequent postsurvey behavior of participants (e.g., Fitzsimons and Williams 2000; Morwitz and Fitzsimons, in press). According to this explanation, when survey respondents are asked to express their purchase intentions, many are unlikely to have formed such judgments spontaneously beforehand or indeed given much thought to the issues pertaining to such questions (Weiner 1985). Upon being asked about their intentions, the respondent engages in thoughtful processing, forms an intention, or in some cases may retrieve an existing one, and then expresses it. This cognitive processing and the articulation of the judgment increase its subsequent accessibility for the respondent, resulting in behaviors that are consistent with the expressed judgment (Alba, Hutchinson and Lynch 1991; Kardes, Allen and Pontes 1993). Supporting such an explanation, in a series of laboratory experiments, Morwitz and Fitzsimons (in press) showed that measuring intentions to purchase candy bars 7

8 increased participants accessibility of attitudes toward the brands of candy bars that were most salient to them. The authors also ruled out several alternative explanations stemming from purchase intention elicitation including enhanced label accessibility (i.e., the increased salience of thoughts regarding the names or labels of specific choices), and attitude polarization (i.e., the increased extremity of attitudes following intention elicitation). Fitzsimons and Williams (2000) also supported the role of increased accessibility, and demonstrated that it operates through automatic rather than effortful cognitive processing. These studies all involved the measurement of purchase intentions (versus satisfaction), have been conducted in the laboratory, and have measured customer purchase behaviors within a few minutes after judgment-elicitation. However, the increased accessibility explanation indicated by these studies could well generalize to customer satisfaction judgments and persist over time, thus explaining the long-term influence of providing one s satisfaction in a firm-sponsored survey on customers (cf. Dholakia and Morwitz 2002). The following hypothesis summarizes this conjecture: H 1a : Participating in a satisfaction survey influences customer behaviors by increasing the accessibility of the judgment expressed in the survey. The Positivity Effect A second explanation consistent with self-generated validity theory but yet unconsidered by mere measurement researchers is that participation in a firm-sponsored survey itself conveys favorable information about the firm to the customer. Such information may lead the customer to form positive cognitions regarding the firm, e.g. the 8

9 firm values my opinions, is making a bona fide effort to please me, is caring and concerned about customers in general, etc., which may then have a directive influence on the participant s behaviors. Such an explanation seems especially plausible for marketing research surveys where the firm first identifies itself as the survey s sponsor before obtaining customers judgments, as is the case with most satisfaction surveys. We note that such an explanation is consistent with recent findings that positive inferences drawn by customers from a single employee s actions can influence their subsequent evaluation of the firm as a whole (Folkes and Patrick 2003). It is also congruent with the theory of selective hypothesis testing in consumer behavior (Deighton 1984; Sanbonmatsu et al. 1998). This theory posits that consumers often use information from a few sources or even a single source such as advertising (or in this case, participation in the firm-sponsored survey) to form focal hypotheses regarding firms (i.e., the firm is a good company to do business with). Consumers then engage in biased information processing to confirm this focal hypothesis. If true, this account would help to explain why firm-sponsored survey participation has such broad-based and longlasting impact on customer behaviors. Accordingly, we hypothesize the following: H 1b : Participating in a satisfaction survey influences customer behaviors by increasing positive cognitions regarding the firm. In the interest of brevity, henceforth we refer to the explanation in Hypothesis 1b as the positivity effect. Testing Alternative Explanations in a Field Experiment Setting Since past research (Chandon et al in press, Dholakia and Morwitz 2002) has demonstrated that mere measurement effects persist over time, our experimental 9

10 procedures must allow us to test the hypothesized processes over a relatively long time horizon. Therefore, the appropriate dependent variables should consist of customer behavior over the course of a lengthy post-survey period (one year in the present field study). To test the hypotheses, we rely on observed behavioral differences between an experimental group of customers whose satisfaction was measured, and a control group of customers whose satisfaction was not measured, with the expectation of a unique pattern of results in support of the hypotheses, described next. Both the increased judgment accessibility and the positivity effects predict that respondents in the experimental group who have high satisfaction ratings should engage in a greater extent of customer purchasing behavior, compared to customers in the control group. The increased judgment accessibility explanation makes this prediction since the high satisfaction levels of participants will become more accessible to them afterward, directing their behavior relative to the firm accordingly. The positivity effect explanation makes a similar prediction by suggesting that these survey participants will form even greater positive cognitions regarding the firm based on the survey, which in turn will have a positive influence on their subsequent purchase behaviors. However, the predictions made by the two explanations for customers expressing low satisfaction levels in the survey are different. The increased judgment accessibility explanation predicts that survey participants with low satisfaction levels should engage in less intense as well as fewer forms of purchase behavior, when compared to the control group whose satisfaction was not measured. This is because the negative judgment expressed in the survey should become more accessible to such low-satisfaction respondents afterward, directing their subsequent behaviors. In contrast, the positivity 10

11 effect explanation predicts the opposite pattern of results for survey participants expressing low satisfaction, namely, more behaviors toward the firm when compared to the control group, because the survey leads them to create positive firm related cognitions. We note here that given the latent (i.e., unexpressed) satisfaction levels in the non-surveyed control group, the test we propose above for the positivity effect is conservative. Specifically, the control group of consumers, although their satisfaction is not measured, is likely to have high average (latent) satisfaction levels, since the literature on customer satisfaction indicates most existing customers of a firm are satisfied with it (e.g., Fornell 1995; Peterson and Wilson 1992). Thus our test for positivity compares the behavior of consumers in the experimental group who have expressed low satisfaction to control group participants who on average have high satisfaction. Therefore, if the resulting behavior is more positive for the experimental group than the control, our test is conservative since we would expect an even greater difference if we instead could directly compare them to low satisfaction consumers in the control group. Along similar lines, the composition of the control group provides for a liberal test of the increased judgment accessibility explanation. Thus, if our results find support for accessibility, as have past intentions studies, the results should be interpreted with caution, since they may be at least in part due to our comparing the behavior of low satisfaction experimental respondents to control group participants who are likely to have high satisfaction levels. However, if instead our results support positivity, we can have more confidence in the findings. 11

12 We also note that both explanations of the mere measurement effect (increased judgment accessibility or the positivity effect) are consistent with the results reported in Dholakia and Morwitz (2002). In their study, since a vast majority of participants expressed high levels of satisfaction with the firm, they observed, in aggregate, significant increases in purchase and product use with survey measurement. Such increases are consistent with either greater judgment accessibility or the presence of a positivity effect as we noted earlier. However, since there were so few customers with low reported satisfaction levels, the researchers were not able to determine whether survey participation led to increases or decreases in product purchase and use for less satisfied customers. The Moderating Role of Customer Experience with the Firm Prior research has found customers experience level to be an important moderator of the mere measurement effect in two ways (Fitzsimons and Morwitz 1996; Morwitz et al. 1993). First, these studies suggest that high levels of prior experience seem to attenuate the mere measurement effect. For instance, in their study of personal computer users, Morwitz et al. (1993) found that novices who had never used a personal computer before showed such effects to a greater extent when compared to established users of personal computers. Second, prior research findings also show that the choices of novice and experienced customers are different following judgment elicitation. For instance, Fitzsimons and Morwitz (1996) found that current car owners tended to re-purchase their current brand regardless of its market share after they had expressed their intentions to purchase a car. In contrast, first-time car buyers purchases gravitated to brands having 12

13 large market shares. These findings, although limited to studies eliciting product-category purchase intentions, suggest how firm-sponsored satisfaction survey participation might have differential influences on different experience-based customer groups. Specifically, existing work on integration of information (Anderson 1981) and the role of prior knowledge (e.g., Wood, Rhodes and Biek 1995) in judgment formation provides useful insights regarding how the underlying process (increased judgment accessibility or the positivity effect) might vary for customers with different experience levels. Briefly, information integration theory posits that consumers form and modify judgments as they receive, interpret, evaluate, and then integrate information regarding any given object with the knowledge that they currently possess (Anderson 1981). In the case of survey participation, two different types of information are pertinent: (1) knowledge regarding the firm, its products, etc. that customers already have, and use in providing their satisfaction judgments, and (2) cognitions formed from survey participation itself. Our prediction is that the customer s experience level will dictate which of these two types of information is more influential, and therefore which of the two processes is more influential in determining the impact of survey participation. Consider the firm s experienced customers first. These customers are likely to know more about the firm, i.e., to have a greater store of prior experiences and opinions regarding the firm. They are also likely to be more confident regarding their knowledge (Reder and Ritter 1992). Therefore, participating in the survey and providing their satisfaction assessment is likely to increase the accessibility of this existing knowledge and judgment for such customers (Fazio 1995; Kardes et al. 1993). 13

14 For some experienced customers, the satisfaction judgment may even be available and well-formed as such, even prior to the survey. In the case of such customers, in line with self-generated validity theory, survey participation may have no influence since the satisfaction judgment provided in the survey is pre-existing, not measurement-induced. Such reasoning also helps explain why prior research has found a diminished mere measurement effect for experienced consumer groups (e.g., Morwitz et al. 1993). Survey participation itself is likely to be less informative for such experienced customers (Wood et al. 1995). Therefore, to the extent that survey participation influences experienced customers, we expect that it will be driven mainly by increased accessibility of their expressed judgments, rather than due to the positivity effect. In contrast, consider the firm s more recent customers, i.e. those with less firmspecific service purchasing and usage experience. Such individuals are likely to have relatively less information on which to base their judgments at the time of the survey. They are also more likely to have lower confidence in their expressed judgments (Fazio 1995; Wood et al. 1995). Consequently, we expect the expressed judgment to be less influential on the subsequent purchase behaviors of novice customers, i.e. those with less firm-specific experience. Instead, survey participation and satisfaction response elicitation are likely to provide valuable and diagnostic information to novice customers, leading them to form positive inferences regarding the firm. The mere measurement effect from survey participation is therefore likely to be driven mainly by the positivity effect for the novice or less experienced customers. This discussion is summarized in the following hypothesis: H 2 : For the firm s more experienced customers, participation in a survey influences behavior primarily through increased 14

15 judgment accessibility. In contrast, for the firm s novice customers, it occurs primarily through the positivity effect. Hypothesis 2 further informs our understanding of why survey participation influences customer purchase behavior, namely, by identifying a theoretically meaningful and practically important moderating variable. It is useful to note here that although there may be evidence for increased judgment accessibility effect (H 1a ) or the positivity effect (H 1b ) in the aggregate, customer segments differing in length of experience with the firm may still be susceptible to primarily accessibility-based influences or to the positivity effect, in accord with Hypothesis 2. STUDY DESIGN Data from a large-scale naturalistic field experiment, conducted by a leading U.S. automotive services firm, was used to test the research hypotheses. This field experiment was naturalistic in the sense that the experimental group consisted of all randomly selected customers who had participated in the firm s ongoing customer satisfaction survey during a particular quarter, and the control group consisted of a matching group of randomly selected customers who did not participate in any firm-sponsored survey. We gathered a number of behavioral measures of these customers from a six-year period prior to the survey (pre-survey measures), and for a one year period after the survey (post-survey measures) to test the research hypotheses. In this sense, the structure resembles a pretest-posttest experimental design (Maris 1998) with the exception that rather than assigning customers randomly to the experimental and control groups, we randomly selected a matching control group afterward while the experimental group had been randomly selected earlier by the firm. 15

16 Randomly chosen customers participated in a customer satisfaction survey within seven days after a service visit. Conducted by telephone, the survey first identified the firm as the survey s sponsor, and then asked respondents to rate their overall satisfaction with the service visit, followed by ratings of ten service quality attributes. The overall satisfaction measure was I'd like you to think about your satisfaction with your recent visit in particular. Using a scale from one to ten, where 10 is SUPERIOR, where 5 is GOOD, and where 1 is POOR, how would you rate the service you received at (name of firm)? The experimental group consisted of all the single-automobile customers that participated in the survey during the quarter, for a total sample size of 20,119. We excluded multiple-automobile households from the analysis to prevent unknown factors from contaminating our results, e.g. the possibility that the person purchasing the service might not be the automobile s owner, that the patterns of intra-household communication influence the survey respondent, or other forms of interpersonal influence. The control group consisted of 4,078 randomly-selected single-automobile customers who never participated in any firm-sponsored survey during the time frame of the study, but who had received service during that same quarter. One concern that has been raised by prior research examining influences of survey participation (e.g., Morwitz et al. 1993) is that such effects may be explained, at least in part, by non-response bias because responders to the survey may be more involved and interested than non-responders and therefore more prone to engage in product purchase and use subsequently. Fortunately, non-response bias was not an issue in the present case. The firm s customer satisfaction study reported response rates of 16

17 around 90%-95% on average (i.e., 90-95% of contacted customers responded to the survey). We also verified this by using data available to us from the last weeks of two recent quarters. We found response rates to be 89.9% and 95.3% in these two timeperiods. We compared the experimental and control groups on a number of pre-survey behavioral measures, and found them to be generally well-matched. Analyses showed that prior to the survey, control group customers had been with the firm for about a month less (41.5 months vs months, p <.05), had.28 more total service visits to the firm (4.29 visits vs visits, p <.01), and had spent virtually the same amount of money on each service visit ($42.35 vs. $42.10, p >.45), when compared to experimental group customers. Although the differences for tenure and total service visits were small, since they were statistically significant, all analyses reported below were re-computed controlling for these variables. Our results do not differ whether or not we control for these initial levels. Key performance metrics were obtained from the firm s customer database for all customers belonging to both groups. Pre-survey measures were collected for a period of six years prior to the survey, while the post-survey measures were those collected during the period of one year afterward. The following measures were gathered in both pre- and post-survey periods: (a) annualized frequency of service use: the number of service visits per year, pre- and post-survey, (b) annualized purchase amount: the total dollar amount of purchases annually, pre- and post-survey, (c) number of services purchased per visit: the average number of services purchased per visit, pre- and post-survey, and (d) 17

18 likelihood of coupon redemption: the proportion of coupons redeemed out of those sent by the firm, pre- and post-survey. We note that both (a) and (b) measures not only constitute key service usage and purchase behaviors that directly impact the customer s profitability to the firm, but they also adjust for differences among customers in their respective tenure with the firm, since they are annualized for each customer, pre-survey. The date of each customer s first service visit in relation to the date at which the analysis was performed defined the customer s tenure in months with the firm. Customers were classified as Low, Medium or High in satisfaction with their service visit based on their response to the overall satisfaction measure. Participants responding 1, 2, or 3 on the 10-point scale described earlier were classified as Low, those responding 4, 5, 6, or 7 were classified as Medium, and those responding 8, 9, or 10 were classified as High in satisfaction. Using this scheme, 412 participants were classified as Low, 3,966 participants were classified as Medium, and 15,741 customers were classified as High in overall satisfaction with their service visit 1. RESULTS H 1 : Test of Alternative Explanations As hypothesized, both increased judgment accessibility (H1a) and the positivity effect (H1b) explanations predict that the high satisfaction group should engage in more of each form of purchase behavior in the post-survey period when compared to the 1 All of the analyses reported below were repeated using three other classification schemes to test for the robustness of the findings. According to alternative scheme 1: Low satisfaction = 1-4, Medium satisfaction = 5, High satisfaction = 6-10; for alternative scheme 2: Median split into low and high satisfaction levels, and for alternative scheme 3: tercile split into low, medium, and high satisfaction levels. A similar pattern of results were obtained using each of these alternative schemes. 18

19 control group. But whereas the increased judgment accessibility hypothesis suggests that the low satisfaction group should engage in fewer such behaviors than the control group, the positivity effect hypothesis makes the opposite prediction: the low satisfaction group should engage in more of each form of purchase behaviors relative to the control. We tested these hypotheses for the four dependent measures of purchase behavior by employing a 4 group (High, Medium, Low, Control) X 2 time period (pre-survey, post-survey) repeated measures MANOVA. Results showed that the main effect of group was significant (F(3, 35,200) = 206.9, p <.001) as was the effect of time (F(2, 35,200) = 126.8, p <.001). Of greater importance, the two-way group X time interaction was significant (F(3, 35,200) = 153.9, p <.001). To evaluate the interaction, we compared the relevant experimental (high satisfaction and low satisfaction) groups to the control group, finding consistent results for the four dependent variables. The post-survey levels of the four dependent variables by group are summarized in Table Insert Table 1 about here For annualized frequency of service use, as predicted by both the accessibility and the positivity hypotheses, the high satisfaction group (M = 2.08) used the firm s services significantly more times, when compared to the control group (M = 1.87, p <.001). More importantly, when comparing the low satisfaction group to the control group, results supported the positivity hypothesis (1b) instead of the increased judgment accessibility hypothesis (1a). The low satisfaction group engaged in more post-survey annualized service visits to the firm (M = 1.92) than the control group (M = 1.87; p =.05). 19

20 This pattern of results, supporting the positivity effect over increased judgment accessibility, was repeated for two of the remaining three dependent measures, number of services purchased per visit (M high = 1.75 and M low = 1.65 vs. M control = 1.43, p s <.001), and likelihood of coupon use (P high =.28 and P low =.25 vs. P control =.17, p s <.001). The difference for the remaining dependent measure, annualized purchase amount (M high = $96.50 and M low = $85.2 vs. M control = $87.6, p high vs. control <.001, p low vs. control : ns) was not statistically significant for the low satisfaction comparison group. Taken together, these results provide support for hypothesis 1b and not hypothesis 1a. Further, from Table 1, we can see that the ordering of behavior levels across the three experimental groups was low satisfaction < medium satisfaction < high satisfaction. The high satisfaction group engaged in significantly higher levels of behavior when compared to either the low or the medium satisfaction groups, for three of the four dependent variables (the exception was likelihood of coupon use). The medium and low satisfaction groups, although numerically ordered, did not differ significantly from one another in any of the four cases. We note that such an ordering of behaviors among the three customer groups is consistent with the corpus of studies in the customer satisfaction literature that have shown that satisfaction levels of customers impact their subsequent firm-relevant behaviors (e.g., Anderson and Mittal 2000; Kamakura, Mittal, derosa and Mazzon 2002; Newman and Werbel 1973). Finally, the findings regarding the likelihood of coupon redemption in Table 1 are noteworthy. We found that all three experimental customer groups (low, medium, and high satisfaction) had significantly higher probabilities of coupon redemption postsurvey, when compared to the control customer group. These results demonstrate 20

21 unequivocally that survey participation not only influences service purchase and use, but also customers subsequent responsiveness to the firm s promotional initiatives. H 2 : Moderating Role of Firm-specific Experience Hypothesis 2 stated that the influences of survey participation for the firm s more experienced customers should occur primarily because of increased judgment accessibility, whereas the influences for the firm s less experienced customers should result from judgment positivity. We operationalized firm-specific customer experience level as customer tenure 2, a widely used descriptor in commercial customer databases. Customer tenure signifies firm-specific experience since it captures a wide range of experience with the firm, including purchasing and consuming its services, interacting with employees, receiving marketing communications from the firm, contacting the firm directly, etc. Using a median split on customer tenure, customers were classified into either high or low on firm-specific experience. Customers high in firm-specific experience had an average tenure of 5.4 years (s.d. = 1.8) at the time of the survey, whereas those of low firm-specific experience had an average tenure of 1.6 years (s.d. =.85). Hypothesis 2 was tested with the same four dependent variables used earlier: annualized frequency of service use, annualized purchase amount, number of services purchased per visit, and likelihood of coupon redemption. A 4 group (High, Medium, Low, Control) X 2 firm-specific experience (High, Low) X 2 time (pre-survey, postsurvey) repeated measures MANOVA on the four dependent variables indicated that all 2 We repeated the analysis using service purchase frequency prior to the survey as yet another operationalization of firm-specific customer experience. To avoid redundancy, the results for this operationalization are provided in Appendix 1 for interested readers. We note that the pattern of findings is substantively similar to that for customer tenure. 21

22 three main-effects, i.e. those of group (F(3, 35,208) = 202.4, p <.001), time (F(1, 35,208) = 122.0, p <.001), and customer tenure (F(1, 35,208) = 95.8, p <.001), were all significant. In addition, the two-way group X firm-specific experience interaction was also significant (F(3, 35,208) = 14.0, p <.001). The other two-way interactions, time X group (F(3, 35,208) = 148.1, p <.001), and time X customer tenure (F(1, 35,208) = 104.5, p <.001) were also significant, as was the three-way interaction (F(3, 35,208) = 6.35, p <.001). To test Hypothesis 2 specifically, we examined cell means for the four dependent measures separately. The results for annualized frequency of service use are presented first. Customers high in firm-specific experience who participated in the survey, pooled across satisfaction levels, engaged in significantly more post-survey service visits (M = 2.06) compared to the control group (M = 1.99, F(1, 11,973) = 3.8, p =.05, Contrast estimate = -.034). These results show that on the whole, participation in the survey influenced customers high in firm-specific experience significantly. Similarly, customers low in firm-specific experience who participated in the survey, pooled across satisfaction levels, also engaged in significantly greater post-survey service visits (M = 2.07) compared to control group customers (M = 1.76, F(1, 11,951) = 86.7, p <.001, Contrast estimate = -.155). As evidenced by the contrast estimate sizes, these results are consistent with previous studies (e.g., Morwitz et al. 1993), which found the influence of survey participation stronger for novice customers (i.e. those low in firm-specific experience) than for experienced customers (i.e. those high in firm-specific experience). Note this also shows that measurement seemed to increase the number of service visits of the novice surveyed customers to the level of the experienced survey customers. In other 22

23 words, participating in the survey eliminated the effect of differences in customer tenure on future service visits. To explore the role of the firm-specific experience on the influence of survey participation relative to Hypothesis 2, we further decomposed the group X customer tenure interaction. Figure 1 provides the annualized service visits by customers in each of the cells in the one year following the survey Insert Figure 1 about here To test Hypothesis 2, we compared the low satisfaction group to the control group separately for customers high and low in firm-specific experience. We expected the judgment accessibility effect to dominate for customers high in firm-specific experience, and the positivity effect to dominate for customers low in firm-specific experience. Considering high experience customers first, a planned contrast showed that the Low Satisfaction group visited fewer times post-survey (M = 1.88) when compared to the control group (M = 1.99, p <.05, one-tailed). This result supports an increased accessibility explanation for the influence of survey participation, but not a positivity effect account. In contrast, for the firm s newer customers, the contrast showed that the low satisfaction group was significantly higher (M = 1.96) when compared to the control group (M = 1.76, p <.05). This result is supportive of the positivity effect, but not judgment accessibility effect, and also supports Hypothesis 2. Table 2 summarizes these results, as well as the results for the remaining three dependent measures Insert Table 2 about here

24 As can be seen in Table 2, the pattern of results shown for annualized frequency of service use by customers of low firm-specific experience was repeated for each of the the three remaining dependent measures. In each case, the Low Satisfaction group engaged in significantly more purchase behaviors when compared to the control group, providing evidence for the positivity effect, but not the judgment accessibility effect (Annualized purchase amount: M low = $90.4 vs. M control = $81.8; Services purchased per visit: M low = 1.73 vs. M control = 1.38; likelihood of coupon use: M low =.28 vs. M control =.12). For customers with high firm-specific experience, in contrast, those in the Low Satisfaction group had a significantly lower annualized purchase amount (M low = $81.3 vs. M control = $94.2) and purchased significantly fewer services per visit (M low = 1.43 vs. M control = 1.60) than the control group. These results provide evidence of an increased judgment accessibility effect, instead of the positivity effect. However, the difference in the likelihood of coupon redemption between the Low Satisfaction group and the control group was not statistically significant for these customers. Overall, for most measures these results provide support for Hypothesis 2. GENERAL DISCUSSION Theoretical Contributions The results of the field experiment contribute to a greater understanding of the mere measurement effect -- why participating in a firm-sponsored satisfaction survey influences the subsequent purchase behavior of surveyed customers. Past studies on mere measurement have found support for an accessibility-based explanation (Morwitz et al 24

25 1992, Fitzsimons and Morwitz 1996, Morwitz and Fitzsimons in press). In contrast, the findings from this study provide consistent evidence across a number of measures of purchase behavior for a positivity effect in the aggregate. Since the field experiment rules out alternative causes of the positivity effect, including successful advertising campaigns or new service introductions (presumably any such effects would have occurred equally in both experimental and control groups), it is apparently the result of participating in the firm s customer satisfaction survey and responding to the included satisfaction measure. The findings also indicate that whether increased judgment accessibility or the positivity effect explains the influence of survey participation on customer purchase behavior, depends on the level of firm-specific experience possessed by the customer. When customers have high levels of firm-specific experience, our results indicate that the influence of survey participation on purchase behavior appears to occur primarily because of enhanced accessibility of their expressed judgments. In contrast, for customers with low levels of firm-specific experience, the effect appears to be driven primarily by positive cognitions resulting from survey participation. These differences imply that devising effective means to mitigate such influences will depend on the extent of firmspecific experience of the customers participating in the survey. Extant research on mere measurement effects based on laboratory experiments suggests that accessibility-driven influences may be automatic (Fitzsimons and Williams 2000) and therefore potentially difficult to counter or correct. In contrast, the positivitydriven influences occurring for customers low in firm-specific experience, even if greater in magnitude, may have a more deliberate cognitive basis (Folkes and Patrick 2003). In such cases, providing respondents with suitable instructions or warnings about this 25

26 influence and asking them to attempt to correct for it after the survey may be an effective means of mitigating mere-measurement effects for customers with low experience. Practical Contributions The findings of the research also have substantial implications for commercial marketing research practice. Although recent concerns have been raised over the growing resistance of consumers to survey participation (Bearden, Madden and Uscátgui 1998; Shea and LeBourveau 2000), we find that for firm-sponsored satisfaction surveys, customers do not appear to be disposed against future participation in marketing research. Survey participants engaged in more of each form of purchase behavior, indicating greater support of the firm relative to a control group of non-participants, even if they had expressed dissatisfaction with the firm s services. The cost of surveys of customer satisfaction and intentions is presently treated as an expense, because the surveys are not believed to directly result in measurable revenues to the firm. The prevailing wisdom is that such survey expenditures are returned to the firm only in the form of improved management decisions. Our findings challenge this assumption by showing that at least certain types of surveys research enjoy direct and measurable revenue benefits. Specifically, the customers participating in the surveys engage in greater purchase behavior than others not participating, providing an incremental revenue stream. In addition, customers participating in the surveys are more responsive to the firm s promotional efforts. Also, past research has also shown that survey participants are less likely to defect to competitors (Dholakia and Morwitz 2002), resulting in yet a third incremental revenue stream to the firm sponsoring the survey. All of these outcomes are quantifiable, and if the surveys are based on large samples relative 26

27 to the customer population, their combined economic effects may offset much if not all of the cost of the survey itself. Alternately, the revenue streams may be used to determine the return on investment of the research expenditure, a topic accorded high priority by the Marketing Science Institute (2002). Research Limitations and Opportunities for Future Research The limitations of the present research must be acknowledged in weighing our findings. Even though the pattern of behaviors we observed is consistently supportive of a positivity effect in the aggregate and for customers low in firm-specific experience, and consistently indicative of an increased judgment accessibility influence on those high in firm-specific experience, the field experiment methodology enables us only to infer the underlying psychological processes from the observed pattern of outcomes. While corroborative data from observational and process measures would add certainty to our explanations, the necessity of field experimentation, the year-long time frame of the study, and other practicality constraints for the sponsoring firm did not allow us to obtain these types of alternative information sources. Building on the findings of this research, further study of the specific psychological mechanisms through which the mere measurement effect influence customers purchase behaviors would be helpful. Recent research showing that many effects of advertising on brand choice occur through processes of implicit, rather than explicit, memory (Lee 2002) is useful in this regard. Whereas explicit memory refers to the consumer s conscious recollection of the past event with direct reference to it, implicit memory is inferred by an influence on the performance of a subsequent task without any direct reference to the past event being made. Understanding whether the 27

28 influences of the positivity effect and increased judgment accessibility are governed by explicit memory, implicit memory, or both, would advance current understanding of how behavior on subsequent occasions is influenced by prior survey participation. Further understanding the specific cognitive process through which the positivity effect occurs would also be appropriate. At least two possibilities seem evident in this regard. First, the positivity effect could occur because of an improved relationship of the customer with the firm. According to this view, when asked to participate in a satisfaction survey, customers may form inferences that such a request is a relationship-enhancing attempt by the firm directed specifically at them. In response to such an overture, customers may experience positive affect toward the firm, and seek to reciprocate, leading to more favorable behavior than if they had not been asked to participate. In this case, the measurement process may actually create a higher level of satisfaction subsequently than would otherwise be obtained without prior survey participation. Customers would subsequently behave as more satisfied patrons, and engage in stronger and more frequent relational behaviors toward the firm. An alternative possibility that is also consistent with the positivity effect observed here is an expectancy explanation, which holds that customers selected for the survey attribute the firm s request to its customer orientation and commitment to providing superior service. Since these are nearly universally-held beliefs about salient desirable characteristics of firms, customers may come to view the firm conducting the survey as a superior one seeking above others to please and be responsive to its customers. As a result of their enhanced perceptions and expectations of the firm, these customers would display correspondingly stronger relational behaviors toward the firm. 28