Evaluating Ambiguous Offerings

• 成果类型: Article
• 署名作者: Boulongne, Romain; Durand, Rodolphe
• 署名单位: University of Navarra; IESE Business School; Hautes Etudes Commerciales (HEC) Paris
• 刊物名称: ORGANIZATION SCIENCE
• ISSN/ISSBN: 1047-7039
• DOI: 10.1287/orsc.2020.1402
• 发表日期: 2021
• 页码: 257-272
• 关键词: Social evaluation; CATEGORIES; ambiguity; Experimental methods

摘要

This paper studies how audience members categorize and evaluate ambiguous offerings. Depending on whether audience members categorize ambiguous offerings based on prototypes or goals, they activate two distinct cognitive mechanisms and evaluate differently ambiguous offerings. We expect that when audiences engage in goal-versus prototype-based categorization, their evaluation of ambiguous products increases. We theorize that, under goal-based categorization, the perceived utility of unclear attributes increases for audiences, which leads them to evaluate more positively ambiguous product offerings. We test and find support for these direct and mediated relationships through a series of laboratory, online, and field experiments. Overall, this study offers important implications for research on product and market categories, optimal distinctiveness, and market agents' cognitive ascription of value.