The Federal Trade Commission seems to be moving toward more stringent regulations that would disallow certain omissions in one-sided comparative ad claims. The changes would address long-standing concerns that such claims erroneously imply that the advertised brand is superior, not only on the featured attribute, but also on omitted and seemingly related attributes. The author substantiates such concerns: Subjects who saw comparative price claims mistakenly infered that the advertised brand was least expensive overall and made suboptimal choices, though they could have found the omitted prices. As predicted, subjects were most likely to overgeneralize the most reliable-looking and informative claim— the one that (1) named the targeted competitor and (2) specified the savings amount. In addition, a disclosure was ineffective. The author concludes with recommendations for limited added regulations.
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