EXPLORING THE CONCEPT OF AFFECTIVE QUALITY - EXPANDING THE CONCEPT OFRETAIL PERSONALITY

Recently, there has been increasing attention paid to the affective si de of consumer and patronage behavior. Whereas previous store image st udies have focused primarily on its traditional cognitive or functiona l antecedents, this paper more fully accounts for a store's personalit y by considering its perceived affective, as well as functional, quali ty. A study is described which provides evidence that affect associate d with retail environments is an important element in defining more fu lly the meaning of an environment in consumers' semantic networks. In addition, the study demonstrates a fairly strong degree of relatedness between affective quality and consumer perceptions of a store's more tangible or functional characteristics. Implications and extensions of this exploratory research are discussed.