Memory-Based Product Judgments: Effects of Involvement at Encoding and Retrieval

Two experiments investigated the proposition that memory retrieval is affected by consumer involvement with a product at the time product information is first received as well as when a memory-based judgment is formed. Results suggest that involvement at the time of a memory-based judgment increases the intensity of search for judgment-relevant information in memory. Further, subjects seemed to base their memory-based judgment on a prior evaluation (stored in memory) when involvement was either low at the time of memory-based judgment or high both at the time of this judgment and when the prior evaluation was formed. In contrast, subjects recalled (and presumably used) specific product information when their level of involvement at the time of judgment increased relative to when the prior evaluation was constructed. These findings are consistent with the cognitive economy principle. Implications for the role of memory in product judgment and evaluation are discussed. Copyright 1994 by the University of Chicago.