Meh. Creusen et Jpl. Schoormans, THE NATURE OF DIFFERENCES BETWEEN SIMILARITY AND PREFERENCE JUDGMENTS- A REPLICATION WITH EXTENSION, International journal of research in marketing, 14(1), 1997, pp. 81-87
Similarity and preference judgements often do not correspond, in that
products which are perceived as very similar are not similarly preferr
ed. Lefkoff-Hagius and Mason (1993) found that this effect is due to t
he consumers' use of different product attributes in making similarity
and preference judgements. We extended their study, by using actual p
roducts and letting subjects write down the reasons underlying their j
udgements, instead of using verbal product descriptions in a conjoint
measurement framework. In accordance with the hypotheses of Lefkoff-Ha
gius and Mason, we found that more subjects mentioned beneficial and i
magery attributes underlying their preference judgement. The hypothesi
s that more subjects mention characteristic attributes as underlying t
heir similarity judgement is only partially supported The implications
of these findings are discussed.