Get 20M+ Full-Text Papers For Less Than $1.50/day. Start a 14-Day Trial for You or Your Team.

Learn More →

How consumers respond to social norms: an evidence from pay-what-you-want (PWYW) pricing

How consumers respond to social norms: an evidence from pay-what-you-want (PWYW) pricing This paper aims to investigate consumer behaviour in response to social norms under pay-what-you-want (PWYW) pricing. Specifically, it explores the critical role of social norms such as norm priming and consumer prior trust in the retailer on consumers’ perceived price fairness, trust, willingness to pay, purchase intentions and intentions to spread negative word of mouth about the retailer.Design/methodology/approachData on dependent measures were collected through the scenario-based online experimental approach and assessed using MANOVA analysis.FindingsResults confirm the significance of norms by indicating the critical role of norm belief on consumer responses. Also, increasing the salience of norms by priming them usually intensifies negative behaviour, and pre-existing trust in the retailer serves as an imperfect cushion against consumer negative reactions to norm violation, but this effect is observed to be decreasing with increase in prior trust.Research limitations/implicationsFurther research should consider the contextual (time, place, media) influences and assumptions to increase the generalizability of the findings.Originality/valueTo the best of the authors’ knowledge, this is the first paper to explicitly examine the effects of social-norm compliance by sellers on consumer behaviour in the context of PWYW pricing. http://www.deepdyve.com/assets/images/DeepDyve-Logo-lg.png Journal of Consumer Marketing Emerald Publishing

How consumers respond to social norms: an evidence from pay-what-you-want (PWYW) pricing

Download PDF
12 pages

Loading next page...
 
/lp/emerald-publishing/how-consumers-respond-to-social-norms-an-evidence-from-pay-what-you-Ch4CZOG1G8
Publisher
Emerald Publishing
Copyright
© Emerald Publishing Limited
ISSN
0736-3761
DOI
10.1108/jcm-05-2018-2677
Publisher site
See Article on Publisher Site

Abstract

This paper aims to investigate consumer behaviour in response to social norms under pay-what-you-want (PWYW) pricing. Specifically, it explores the critical role of social norms such as norm priming and consumer prior trust in the retailer on consumers’ perceived price fairness, trust, willingness to pay, purchase intentions and intentions to spread negative word of mouth about the retailer.Design/methodology/approachData on dependent measures were collected through the scenario-based online experimental approach and assessed using MANOVA analysis.FindingsResults confirm the significance of norms by indicating the critical role of norm belief on consumer responses. Also, increasing the salience of norms by priming them usually intensifies negative behaviour, and pre-existing trust in the retailer serves as an imperfect cushion against consumer negative reactions to norm violation, but this effect is observed to be decreasing with increase in prior trust.Research limitations/implicationsFurther research should consider the contextual (time, place, media) influences and assumptions to increase the generalizability of the findings.Originality/valueTo the best of the authors’ knowledge, this is the first paper to explicitly examine the effects of social-norm compliance by sellers on consumer behaviour in the context of PWYW pricing.

Journal

Journal of Consumer Marketing – Emerald Publishing

Published: Jun 18, 2019

Keywords: Social norms; External reference price; Online buying; Pay-what-you-want pricing

References

  • Inequality in social exchange
    Adams, J.S.
  • The impact of salesperson customer orientation on the evaluation of a salesperson’s ethical treatment, trust in the salesperson, and intentions to purchase
    Bateman, C.; Valentine, S.
  • Developing a model of antecedents to consumers’ perceptions and evaluations of price unfairness
    Bechwati, N.N.; Sisodia, R.S.; Sheth, J.N.
  • Covenants without swords: group identity, norms, and communication in social dilemmas
    Bicchieri, C.
  • Consumer evaluation of low price guarantees: the moderating role of reference price and store image
    Biswas, A.; Pullig, C.; Yagci, M.I.; Dean, D.H.
  • Price fairness: good and service differences and the role of vendor costs
    Bolton, L.E.; Alba, J.W.
  • Consumer perceptions of price (un) fairness
    Bolton, L.E.; Warlop, L.; Alba, J.W.
  • Angry consumers don’t come back, they get back: the experience and behavioral implications of anger and dissatisfaction in services
    Bougie, R.; Pieters, R.; Zeelenberg, M.
  • Perceptions of price unfairness: antecedents and consequences
    Campbell, M.C.
  • Fairness and discounts: the subjective value of a bargain
    Darke, P.R.; Dahl, D.W.
  • Information technology–enhanced pricing strategies: managerial and public policy implications
    Dixit, A.; Braunsberger, K.; Zinkhan, G.M.; Pan, Y.
  • Effects of price, brand, and store information on buyers’ product evaluations
    Dodds, W.B.; Monroe, K.B.; Grewal, D.
  • Consumer response to online/offline price differentiation
    Fassnacht, M.; Unterhuber, S.
  • Dynamic pricing in internet retail: effects on consumer trust
    Garbarino, E.; Lee, O.F.
  • Consumer response to norm-breaking pricing events in e-commerce
    Garbarino, E.; Maxwell, S.
  • Selection in a field experiment with voluntary participation
    Gautier, P.A.; Klaauw, B.V.D.
  • E-commerce: the role of familiarity and trust
    Gefen, D.
  • Pay-what-you-want pricing: an integrative review of the empirical research literature
    Gerpott, T.
  • Shared social responsibility: a field experiment in pay-what-you-want pricing and charitable giving
    Gneezy, A.; Gneezy, U.; Nelson, L.D.; Brown, A.
  • Pay-what-you-want, identity, and self-signaling in markets
    Gneezy, A.; Gneezy, U.; Riener, G.; Nelson, L.D.
  • The effects of relationship quality on consumer retaliation
    Grégoire, Y.; Fisher, R.J.
  • Consumer betrayal and retaliation: when your best consumers become your worst enemies
    Grégoire, Y.; Fisher, R.J.
  • Pay what you want-but pay enough! information asymmetries and PWYW pricing
    Greiff, M.; Egbert, H.; Xhangolli, K.
  • Do retail store environmental factors affect consumers’ price acceptability? An empirical examination
    Grewal, D.; Baker, J.
  • The effects of buyer identification and purchase timing on consumers’ perceptions of trust, price fairness, and repurchase intentions
    Grewal, D.; Hardesty, D.M.; Iyer, G.R.
  • Effort for payment: a tale of two markets
    Heyman, J.; Ariely, D.
  • The effects of social interaction and social norm compliance in pay-what-you-want situations
    Hilbert, L.P.; Suessmair, A.
  • Cutoff criteria for fit indexes in covariance structure analysis: conventional criteria versus new alternatives
    Hu, L.T.; Bentler, P.M.
  • To influence or not to influence: external reference price strategies in pay-what-you-want pricing
    Johnson, J.W.; Cui, A.P.
  • Anchoring in payment: evaluating a judgmental heuristic in field experimental settings
    Jung, M.H.; Perfecto, H.; Nelson, L.D.
  • Paying more when paying for others
    Jung, M.H.; Nelson, L.D.; Gneezy, A.; Gneezy, U.
  • Fairness and the assumptions of economics
    Kahneman, D.; Knetsch, J.L.; Thaler, R.H.
  • The permissibility of nudging for sustainable energy consumption
    Kasperbauer, T.J.
  • Trust and satisfaction, two stepping stones for successful e-commerce relationships: a longitudinal exploration
    Kim, D.J.; Ferrin, D.L.; Rao, H.R.
  • Pay what you want: a new participative pricing mechanism
    Kim, J.Y.; Natter, M.; Spann, M.
  • Effect of dealing patterns on consumer perceptions of deal frequency and willingness to pay
    Krishna, A.
  • Emotional trade-off difficulty and choice
    Luce, M.F.; Payne, J.W.; Bettman, J.R.
  • Psychological contract violation and customer intention to reuse online retailers: exploring mediating and moderating mechanisms
    Malhotra, N.; Sahadev, S.; Purani, K.
  • Rule-based price fairness and its effect on willingness to purchase
    Maxwell, S.
  • The identification of social norms of price discrimination on the internet
    Maxwell, S.; Garbarino, E.
  • The wrath of the fairness-primed negotiator when the reciprocity norm is violated
    Maxwell, S.; Nye, P.; Maxwell, N.
  • The relationship between retail price promotions and regular price purchases
    Mulhern, F.J.; Padgett, D.T.
  • Voluntary market payments: underlying motives, success drivers and success potentials
    Natter, M.; Kaufmann, K.
  • Common method biases in behavioral research: a critical review of the literature and recommended remedies
    Podsakoff, P.M.; MacKenzie, S.B.; Lee, J.Y.; Podsakoff, N.P.
  • Why consumers pay voluntarily: evidence from online music
    Regner, T.
  • Trust and breach of the psychological contract
    Robinson, S.L.
  • Not so different after all: a cross discipline view of trust
    Rousseau, D.; Sitkin, S.; Burt, R.; Camerer, C.
  • Exploring the interactions among external reference price, social visibility and purchase motivation in pay-what-you-want pricing
    Roy, R.; Rabbanee, F.K.; Sharma, P.
  • Pay what you want as a marketing strategy in monopolistic and competitive markets
    Schmidt, K.M.; Spann, M.; Zeithammer, R.
  • Anchoring effects on consumers’ willingness-to-pay and willingness-to-accept
    Simonson, I.; Drolet, A.
  • Agency and trust mechanisms in consumer satisfaction and loyalty judgments
    Singh, J.; Sirdeshmukh, D.
  • Anchors and norms in anonymous pay-what-you-want pricing contexts
    Soule, C.A.A.; Madrigal, R.
  • A rules-based approach to competitive interaction
    Thomas, G.P.; Soldow, G.F.
  • Judgment under uncertainty: heuristics and biases
    Tversky, A.; Kahneman, D.
  • Determinants of consumers’ response to pay-what-you-want pricing strategy on the internet
    Weisstein, F.L.; Kukar-Kinney, M.; Monroe, K.B.
  • The price is unfair! A conceptual framework of price fairness perceptions
    Xia, L.; Monroe, K.B.; Cox, J.L.
  • Doing good or doing well? Image motivation and monetary incentives in behaving prosocially
    Ariely, D.; Bracha, A.; Meier, S.
  • Norms, moods, and free lunch: longitudinal evidence on payments from a pay-what-you-want restaurant
    Riener, G.; Traxler, C.