IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/oup/jconrs/v16y1989i3p289-99.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Product-Level Choice: A Top-Down or Bottom-Up Process?

Author

Listed:
  • Park, C Whan
  • Smith, Daniel C

Abstract

Examination of the process by which consumers form decision criteria and subsequently evaluate and choose product-level alternatives when purchase goals are well defined indicates that decision criteria are formulated in a goal-driven, top-down fashion rather than a product-driven, bottom-up fashion. Evaluations of alternatives follows a within-product strategy, as opposed to a within-attribute strategy, and is characterized by less reliance on price information than reported in previous research. Even without a specific goal for product decisions, the formation and utilization of decision criteria did not follow the bottom-up process. Alternative explanations are offered for these contrasts along with implications for future research on product-level decisions. Copyright 1989 by the University of Chicago.

Suggested Citation

  • Park, C Whan & Smith, Daniel C, 1989. "Product-Level Choice: A Top-Down or Bottom-Up Process?," Journal of Consumer Research, Journal of Consumer Research Inc., vol. 16(3), pages 289-299, December.
    • Handle: RePEc:oup:jconrs:v:16:y:1989:i:3:p:289-99
    DOI: 10.1086/209215
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://dx.doi.org/10.1086/209215
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1086/209215?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Devetag, M Giovanna, 1999. "From Utilities to Mental Models: A Critical Survey on Decision Rules and Cognition in Consumer Choice," Industrial and Corporate Change, Oxford University Press and the Associazione ICC, vol. 8(2), pages 289-351, June.
    2. Piggott, Nicholas E. & Wright, Vic, 1992. "From Consumer Choice Process To Aggregate Analysis: Marketing Insights For Models Of Meat Demand," Australian Journal of Agricultural Economics, Australian Agricultural and Resource Economics Society, vol. 36(3), pages 1-16, December.
    3. Olshavsky, Richard W. & Aylesworth, Andrew B. & Kempf, DeAnna S., 1995. "The price-choice relationship: A contingent processing approach," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 33(3), pages 207-218, July.
    4. Koschmann, Anthony & Isaac, Mathew S., 2018. "Retailer Categorization: How Store-Format Price Image Influences Expected Prices and Consumer Choices," Journal of Retailing, Elsevier, vol. 94(4), pages 364-379.
    5. Maier, Erik, 2019. "Serial product evaluations online: A three-factor model of leadership, fluency and tedium during product search," International Journal of Research in Marketing, Elsevier, vol. 36(4), pages 558-579.
    6. Punj, Girish & Moon, Junyean, 2002. "Positioning options for achieving brand association: a psychological categorization framework," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 55(4), pages 275-283, April.
    7. Silvana Taschek Hastreiter & Renato Zancan Marchetti, 2016. "An Analysis of the Hierarchy of Goals that Guides the Consumer’s Decision to Attend Shopping Malls: a Contrast Between Men and Women," Brazilian Business Review, Fucape Business School, vol. 13(1), pages 92-114, January.

    More about this item

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:oup:jconrs:v:16:y:1989:i:3:p:289-99. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    We have no bibliographic references for this item. You can help adding them by using this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: the person in charge (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://academic.oup.com/jcr .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.