The Effects of the Selective Consideration of Alternatives on Consumer Choice and Attitude-Decision Consistency

There are many instances of consumer decision making in which more consideration is given to 1 brand than to others in the choice set. This research explored how selective consideration of a brand affects attitudes toward the brand, relative standing of the focal brand within the choice category, and decision making. Experiment 1 demonstrated that when participants were prompted to consider a randomly determined focal alternative, that alternative was more likely to be chosen than nonfocal alternatives. Moreover, willingness to pay for an alternative was higher if it was the focus of consideration. Attitudinal data suggest that the selective consideration effect occurred because attitudes toward the focal alternative became more positive compared to those toward other alternatives in the choice set. Experiment 2 elucidated this attitudinal effect by demonstrating that selective consideration could cause the extremity of consumers' attitudes toward a focal brand to become more positive. Experiment 3 explored the potential of the selective consideration of a focal alternative to influence the consistency between consumers' attitudes and decisions and established that the initial attitude toward a focal alternative moderated the selective consideration effect