IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/inm/ormnsc/v59y2013i11p2450-2469.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Price Competition with Consumer Confusion

Author

Listed:
  • Ioana Chioveanu

    () (Department of Economics and Finance, Brunel University, Uxbridge, Middlesex UB8 3PH, United Kingdom)

  • Jidong Zhou

    () (Department of Economics, Stern School of Business, New York University, New York, New York 10012)

Abstract

This paper proposes a model in which identical sellers of a homogeneous product compete in both prices and price frames (i.e., ways to present price information). Frame choices affect the comparability of price offers and may cause consumer confusion and lower price sensitivity. In equilibrium, firms randomize their frame choices to obfuscate price comparisons and sustain positive profits. The nature of the equilibrium depends on whether frame differentiation or frame complexity is more confusing. Moreover, an increase in the number of competitors induces firms to rely more on frame complexity, and this may boost industry profits and lower consumer surplus. This paper was accepted by J. Miguel Villas-Boas, marketing.

Suggested Citation

  • Ioana Chioveanu & Jidong Zhou, 2013. "Price Competition with Consumer Confusion," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 59(11), pages 2450-2469, November.
    • Handle: RePEc:inm:ormnsc:v:59:y:2013:i:11:p:2450-2469
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://dx.doi.org/10.1287/mnsc.2013.1716
    Download Restriction: no

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Raj Chetty & Adam Looney & Kory Kroft, 2009. "Salience and Taxation: Theory and Evidence," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 99(4), pages 1145-1177, September.
    2. Kenan Kalaycı & Marta Serra-Garcia, 2016. "Complexity and biases," Experimental Economics, Springer;Economic Science Association, vol. 19(1), pages 31-50, March.
    3. Hossain Tanjim & Morgan John, 2006. "...Plus Shipping and Handling: Revenue (Non) Equivalence in Field Experiments on eBay," The B.E. Journal of Economic Analysis & Policy, De Gruyter, vol. 5(2), pages 1-30, January.
    4. Susan E. Woodward & Robert E. Hall, 2010. "Consumer Confusion in the Mortgage Market: Evidence of Less Than a Perfectly Transparent and Competitive Market," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 100(2), pages 511-515, May.
    5. Jean Tirole, 1988. "The Theory of Industrial Organization," MIT Press Books, The MIT Press, edition 1, volume 1, number 0262200716, March.
    6. Carlin, Bruce I., 2009. "Strategic price complexity in retail financial markets," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 91(3), pages 278-287, March.
    7. Baye, Michael R. & Kovenock, Dan & de Vries, Casper G., 1992. "It takes two to tango: Equilibria in a model of sales," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 4(4), pages 493-510, October.
    8. Alexia Gaudeul & Robert Sugden, 2012. "Spurious Complexity and Common Standards in Markets for Consumer Goods," Economica, London School of Economics and Political Science, vol. 79(314), pages 209-225, April.
    9. KalaycI, Kenan & Potters, Jan, 2011. "Buyer confusion and market prices," International Journal of Industrial Organization, Elsevier, vol. 29(1), pages 14-22, January.
    10. Wilson, Chris M., 2010. "Ordered search and equilibrium obfuscation," International Journal of Industrial Organization, Elsevier, vol. 28(5), pages 496-506, September.
    11. Spiegler, Ran, 2006. "Competition over agents with boundedly rational expectations," Theoretical Economics, Econometric Society, vol. 1(2), pages 207-231, June.
    12. Jennifer Brown & Tanjim Hossain & John Morgan, 2010. "Shrouded Attributes and Information Suppression: Evidence from the Field," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, Oxford University Press, vol. 125(2), pages 859-876.
    13. David Laibson & Xavier Gabaix, 2004. "Competition and Consumer Confusion," Econometric Society 2004 North American Summer Meetings 663, Econometric Society.
    14. Glenn Ellison & Alexander Wolitzky, 2012. "A search cost model of obfuscation," RAND Journal of Economics, RAND Corporation, vol. 43(3), pages 417-441, September.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    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:inm:ormnsc:v:59:y:2013:i:11:p:2450-2469. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: (Mirko Janc). General contact details of provider: http://edirc.repec.org/data/inforea.html .

    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.

    If CitEc recognized a reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with 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.

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

    IDEAS is a RePEc service hosted by the Research Division of the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis . RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.