Despite substantial prior research regarding the effect of context on choices, uncertainty remains regarding when particular context effects will be observed. In this article, the authors advance a new perspective on context-dependent choices, according to which context effects are a function of the relative advantage of one option over another and of the different strategies that decision makers evoke when making a choice. They propose that context effects resulting from the addition of a third option to a two-option set are more frequently observed when the added option is relatively similar (adjacent) to the “disadvantaged” alternative (i.e., the lower-share option) in the set. The authors conduct a series of studies to analyze the occurrence of context effects and find support for predictions related to asymmetric dominance and extremeness aversion.
AmirOn, and LevavJonathan (2008), “Choice Construction Versus Preference Construction: The Instability of Preferences Learned in Context,”Journal of Marketing Research, 45 (2), 145–58.
2.
ArrowKenneth J. (1963), Social Choice and Individual Values.New Haven, CT: Yale University Press.
3.
BhatiaAndrew (2013), “Associations and the Accumulation of Preference,”Psychological Review, 120 (July), 522–43.
4.
BrandstätterEduard, GigerenzerGerd, and HertwigRalph (2008), “The Priority Heuristic: Making Choices Without Trade-Offs,”Psychological Review, 113 (April), 409–32.
5.
BusemeyerJerome R., BarkanRachel, MehtaShailendra, and ChaturvediAlok (2007), “Context Effects and Models of Preferential Choice: Implications for Consumer Behavior,”Marketing Theory, 7 (March), 39–58.
6.
ChatterjeeSubimal, and HeathTimothy B. (1996), “Conflict and Loss Aversion in Multiattribute Choice: The Effects of Trade-Off Size and Reference Dependence on Decision Difficulty,”Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, 67 (August), 144–55.
7.
EvangelidisIoannis, and LevavJonathan (2013), “Prominence Versus Dominance: How Relationships Between Alternatives Drive Decision Strategy and Choice,”Journal of Marketing Research, 50 (6), 753–66.
8.
FarquharPeter H., and PratkanisAnthony R. (1987), “Phantom Choices: The Effects of Unavailable Alternatives on Decision Making,” Technical Report 87-2, Carnegie Mellon University.
9.
FarquharPeter H., and PratkanisAnthony R. (1993), “Decision Structuring with Phantom Alternatives,”Management Science, 39 (October), 1214–26.
10.
FischerGregory W., and HawkinsScott A. (1993), “Strategy Compatibility, Scale Compatibility, and the Prominence Effect,”Journal of Experimental Psychology. Human Perception and Performance, 19 (June), 580–97.
11.
FishburnPeter C. (1974), “Lexicographic Orders, Utilities and Decision Rules: A Survey,”Management Science, 20 (July), 1442–71.
12.
FrederickShane, LeeLeonard, and BaskinErnest (2014), “The Limits of Attraction,”Journal of Marketing Research, 51 (4), 487–507.
13.
González-VallejoClaudia (2002), “Making Trade-Offs: A Probabilistic and Context-Sensitive Model of Choice Behavior,”Psychological Review, 109 (January), 137–55.
14.
HeathTimothy B., and ChatterjeeSubimal (1995), “Asymmetric Decoy Effects on Lower-Quality Versus Higher-Quality Brands: Meta-Analytic and Experimental Evidence,”Journal of Consumer Research, 22 (3), 268–84.
15.
HedgcockWilliam, and RaoAkshay R. (2009), “Trade-Off Aversion as an Explanation for the Attraction Effect: A Functional Magnetic Resonance Imaging Study,”Journal of Marketing Research, 46 (1), 1–13.
16.
HuberJoel, PayneJohn W., and PutoChristopher (1982), “Adding Asymmetrically Dominated Alternatives: Violations of Regularity and the Similarity Hypothesis,”Journal of Consumer Research, 9 (1), 90–98.
17.
HuberJoel, PayneJohn W., and PutoChristopher (2014), “Let's Be Honest About the Attraction Effect,”Journal of Marketing Research, 51 (4), 520–25.
18.
HuberJoel, and PutoChristopher (1983), “Market Boundaries and Product Choice: Illustrating Attraction and Substitution Effects,”Journal of Consumer Research, 10 (1), 31–44.
19.
IacobucciAndrew (2012), “Mediation Analysis and Categorical Variables: The Final Frontier,”Journal of Consumer Psychology, 22 (October), 582–94.
20.
LevavJonathan, ReinholtzNicholas, and LinClaire (2012), “The Effect of Ordering Decisions by Choice-Set Size on Consumer Search,”Journal of Consumer Research, 39 (3), 585–99.
21.
LockwoodPenelope, JordanChristian H., and KundaZiva (2002), “Motivation by Positive or Negative Role Models: Regulatory Focus Determines Who Will Best Inspire Us,”Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 83 (October), 854–64.
22.
LouieKenway, KhawMel W., and GlimcherPaul W. (2013), “Normalization Is a General Neural Mechanism for Context-Dependent Decision Making,”Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America, 110 (15), 6139–44.
23.
LuceR. Duncan (1977), “The Choice Axiom After Twenty Years,”Journal of Mathematical Psychology, 15, 215–33.
24.
LuchinsAbraham S. (1942), “Mechanization in Problem Solving,”Psychological Monographs, 54 (6), 1–95.
25.
MontgomeryAndrew (1983), “Decision Rules and the Search for a Dominance Structure: Towards a Process Model of Decision Making,”Advances in Psychology, 14, 343–69.
26.
NeumannNico, BöckenholtUlf, and SinhaAshish (2016), “A Meta-Analysis of Extremeness Aversion,”Journal of Consumer Psychology, 26 (6), 193–212.
27.
PettiboneJonathan C., and WedellDouglas H. (2007), “Testing Alternative Explanations of Phantom Decoy Effects,”Journal of Behavioral Decision Making, 20 (July), 323–41.
28.
PratkanisAnthony R., and FarquharPeter H. (1992), “A Brief History of Research on Phantom Alternatives: Evidence for Seven Empirical Generalizations About Phantoms,”Basic and Applied Social Psychology, 13 (March), 103–22.
29.
RayAndrew (1973), “Independence of Irrelevant Alternatives,”Econometrica, 41 (September), 987–91.
30.
RoeRobert M., BusemeyerJermone R., and TownsendJames T. (2001), “Multialternative Decision Field Theory: A Dynamic Connectionist Model of Decision Making,”Psychological Review, 108 (April), 370–92.
31.
RooderkerkRobert P., Van HeerdeHarald J., and BijmoltTammo H.A. (2011), “Incorporating Context Effects into a Choice Model,”Journal of Marketing Research, 48 (4), 767–80.
32.
ShafirEldar, SimonsonItamar, and TverskyAmos (1993), “Reason-Based Choice,”Cognition, 49 (October/November), 11–36.
33.
SimonsonAndrew (1989), “Choice Based on Reasons: The Case of Attraction and Compromise Effects,”Journal of Consumer Research, 16 (2), 158–74.
34.
SimonsonAndrew (2014), “Vices and Virtues of Misguided Replications: The Case of Asymmetric Dominance,”Journal of Marketing Research, 51 (4), 514–19.
35.
SimonsonItamar, BettmanJames R., KramerThomas, and PayneJohn W. (2013), “Comparison Selection: An Approach to the Study of Consumer Judgment and Choice,”Journal of Consumer Psychology, 23 (January), 134–49.
36.
SimonsonItamar, and TverskyAmos (1992), “Choice in Context: Tradeoff Contrast and Extremeness Aversion,”Journal of Marketing Research, 29 (3), 281–95.
37.
SingelisTheodore M. (1994), “The Measurement of Independent and Interdependent Self-Construals,”Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, 20 (October), 580–91.
38.
TruebloodJennifer S., BrownScott D., and HeathcoteAndrew (2014), “The Multiattribute Linear Ballistic Accumulator Model of Context Effects in Multialternative Choice,”Psychological Review, 121 (April), 179–205.
39.
TverskyAndrew (1972), “Elimination by Aspects: A Theory of Choice,”Psychological Review, 79 (July), 281–99.
40.
TverskyAmos, SattathShmuel, and SlovicPaul (1988), “Contingent Weighting in Judgment and Choice,”Psychological Review, 95 (July), 371–84.
41.
TverskyAmos, and SimonsonItamar (1993), “Context-Dependent Preferences,”Management Science, 39 (October), 1179–89.
42.
UsherMarius, and McClellandJames L. (2004), “Loss Aversion and Inhibition in Dynamical Models of Multialternative Choice,”Psychological Review, 111 (July), 757–69.
43.
YangSybil, and LynnMichael (2014), “More Evidence Challenging the Robustness and Usefulness of the Attraction Effect,”Journal of Marketing Research, 51 (4), 508–13.
Supplementary Material
Please find the following supplemental material available below.
For Open Access articles published under a Creative Commons License, all supplemental material carries the same license as the article it is associated with.
For non-Open Access articles published, all supplemental material carries a non-exclusive license, and permission requests for re-use of supplemental material or any part of supplemental material shall be sent directly to the copyright owner as specified in the copyright notice associated with the article.
