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1
THE MOTIVATIONAL POWER OF BEAUTY:
HOW AESTHETICALLY APPEALING PRODUCTS DRIVE PURCHASE EFFORT
IN CONSUMERS
by
Gratiana Denisa Pol
A Dissertation Presented to the
FACULTY OF THE USC GRADUATE SCHOOL
UNIVERSITY OF SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA
In Partial Fulfillment of the
Requirements for the Degree
DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY
(BUSINESS ADMINISTRATION)
May, 2013
Copyright, 2013 Gratiana Denisa Pol
Object Description
| Title | The motivational power of beauty: how aesthetically appealing products drive purchase effort in consumers |
| Author | Pol, Gratiana Denisa |
| Author email | gpol@usc.edu;gratiana_pol@yahoo.de |
| Degree | Doctor of Philosophy |
| Document type | Dissertation |
| Degree program | Business Administration |
| School | Marshal School of Business |
| Date defended/completed | 2013-03-08 |
| Date submitted | 2013-05-08 |
| Date approved | 2013-05-08 |
| Restricted until | 2013-05-08 |
| Date published | 2013-05-08 |
| Advisor (committee chair) | Park, C. Whan |
| Advisor (committee member) |
MacInnis, Deborah J. Folkes, Valerie S. Biederman, Irving |
| Abstract | Why does aesthetic appeal have such a powerful influence on consumers, who become willing to go to great lengths in order to acquire products with a good-looking design? Despite the substantial progress that has been made in recent years in the area of consumer aesthetics research, this important question still remains unanswered. My dissertation proposes and empirically shows that high-aesthetics product designs elicit two distinct responses— instantaneous desire (i.e., a sudden urge to possess an aesthetically appealing product) and ownership pride (i.e., the buyer’s expected pride of being associated with a good-looking product)—which in turn motivate consumers to expend a substantial amount of effort towards purchasing high-aesthetics products (Studies 1-4). I further show that the alternative accounts of positive mood or the beautiful-is-good stereotype—which have been previously acknowledged in the literature as consequences of a product’s high aesthetic appeal—are comparatively less effective at explaining the aesthetic appeal—purchase effort relationship (Studies 1-4). I finally illustrate how another product attribute that is also visually hedonic in nature—namely, humor in product design—represents a poorer motivator of purchase effort when compared to a product’s aesthetic appeal, and show that the motivational advantage of aesthetic appeal over humor can be traced back to differences in instantaneous desire and ownership pride (Studies 3 and 4). This research contributes toward a much needed theory development in the field of product aesthetics, while also shedding light on the possibly unique nature of product aesthetics among visual product attributes that are hedonic in nature. |
| Keyword | aesthetics; beauty; attractive; design; product aesthetics; motivation; effort; beautiful is good; halo effect; mood; product; consumer |
| Language | English |
| Format (imt) | application/pdf |
| Part of collection | University of Southern California dissertations and theses |
| Publisher (of the original version) | University of Southern California |
| Place of publication (of the original version) | Los Angeles, California |
| Publisher (of the digital version) | University of Southern California. Libraries |
| Provenance | Electronically uploaded by the author |
| Type | texts |
| Legacy record ID | usctheses-m |
| Contributing entity | University of Southern California |
| Rights | Pol, Gratiana Denisa |
| Physical access | The author retains rights to his/her dissertation, thesis or other graduate work according to U.S. copyright law. Electronic access is being provided by the USC Libraries in agreement with the author, as the original true and official version of the work, but does not grant the reader permission to use the work if the desired use is covered by copyright. It is the author, as rights holder, who must provide use permission if such use is covered by copyright. The original signature page accompanying the original submission of the work to the USC Libraries is retained by the USC Libraries and a copy of it may be obtained by authorized requesters contacting the repository e-mail address given. |
| Repository name | University of Southern California Digital Library |
| Repository address | USC Digital Library, University of Southern California, University Park Campus MC 7002, 106 University Village, Los Angeles, California 90089-7002, USA |
| Repository email | cisadmin@dots.usc.edu |
| Filename | etd-PolGratian-1664.pdf |
| Archival file | uscthesesreloadpub_Volume7/etd-PolGratian-1664.pdf |
Description
| Title | Page 1 |
| Contributing entity | University of Southern California |
| Repository email | cisadmin@dots.usc.edu |
| Full text | 1 THE MOTIVATIONAL POWER OF BEAUTY: HOW AESTHETICALLY APPEALING PRODUCTS DRIVE PURCHASE EFFORT IN CONSUMERS by Gratiana Denisa Pol A Dissertation Presented to the FACULTY OF THE USC GRADUATE SCHOOL UNIVERSITY OF SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA In Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY (BUSINESS ADMINISTRATION) May, 2013 Copyright, 2013 Gratiana Denisa Pol |
