The Trivial Pursuit
Den modererande effekten av kunskap och engagemang på utvärderingen av produkter med triviala attribut.
Research has concluded that meaningless differentiation with trivial attributes sometimes can be a successful strategy. However, the effect varies with respect to certain aspects such as the price of the product and the decision context. How the characteristics of the consumer influence the effect of trivial attributes has until now been unknown. This thesis investigates how the consumer?s level of knowledge and personal involvement influence the effects of trivial attributes on product preferences and product attitudes. By adding a trivial attribute to a fictive product and at the same time measuring the consumer?s knowledge and involvement towards the product category we investigated whether the evaluation of the product differed among consumers with different levels of knowledge and involvement. The results show that the level of knowledge and personal involvement does have an impact on the evaluation of a product with a trivial attribute. Consumers with a high level of knowledge evaluate a product with a trivial attribute more positively than consumers with a low level of knowledge. Consumers with high involvement evaluate a product with a trivial attribute more positively than consumers with low involvement. The results indicate that it can be a successful strategy to add trivial attributes to products which are targeted at consumer segments with high level of knowledge or high involvement.