소비자는 선택에 있어 가격, 품질 등 내재적 단서 뿐 아니라 비본질적인 외재적 단서에도 많은 영향을 받는 것으로 알려졌다. 즉 소비자는 제품평가 시 유인효과나 절충효과 등 상황맥락이 주는 외재적 단서에 민감하게 반응하기도 하고, 구전효과 등 정보처리과정 상의 외재적 단서에도 많은 영향을 받게 된다. 본 연구는 소비자가 처한 상황이나 소비자의 성향에 따라 외재적 단서가 주는 효과가 크게 달라질 수 있음을 제안하였다. 즉 외부정보에 대하여 경계심이 많거나, 자신이 비본질적인 외부영향력을 지나치게 받았다고 생각하는 소비자라면, 이러한 외재적 단서가 주는 영향력이 상당히 감소할 것이라는 예상이 가능하다. 더 나아가 과도한 조정효과에서 말하듯이, 소비자는 최종 판단에서 초기의 즉흥적인 판단 시 받았던 외부영향력을 과도하게 조정하려고 노력한 나머지, 초기 판단과는 오히려 정반대의 판단까지 내릴 가능성도 있다. 예를 들어 경계심이 높은 소비자는 긍정적 구전에 대하여 특유의 경계심을 발동시킨 나머지 오히려 부정적으로 반응할 수도 있다. 본 연구에서는 조절적 초점 이론의 방어초점 소비자가 향상초점 소비자에 비하여 외재적 단서에 대한 경계심 수준이 더 높을 것이라고 가정하고 세 번의 실험연구를 진행하였다. 연구 결과, 실험 1에서 친분 없는 구전에 대하여 방어초점 소비자는 향상초점 소비자처럼 외부영향력에 그대로 순응하는 태도를 보여주지 않았다. 즉 방어초점 소비자는 초기판단에 대하여 과도한 조정을 거쳐서, 구전과 반대의 의사결정을 하는 신기한 태도를 보여주었다. 실험 2에서는 이렇게 방어초점 소비자가 외부영향력에 과도한 조정과정을 거치는 이유가 외부정보에 대한 경계심 수준이 향상초점 소비자보다 더 높기 때문이라는 것을 보여주었다. 그런데, 실험 3에서 방어초점 소비자에게 인지적 자원을 소모시켰더니 향상초점 소비자와 마찬가지로 외부영향력에 그대로 즉흥적으로 순응하는 경향을 보여주었다. 결론적으로 본 연구는 세 번의 실험연구를 통하여 광범위한 마케팅 효과로 알려져 있는 구전효과가 경계심 높은 방어초점 소비자에게는 그다지 효과가 없을뿐더러, 오히려 역효과까지 초래할 수 있다는 가능성을 보여주었다. 또한 인지적 자원 여부로 방어초점 소비자와 향상초점 소비자의 의사결정이 달라지는 결과를 통해, 적어도 본 연구의 실험 맥락 내에서는 향상초점 소비자와 방어 초점 소비자 모두 의사결정의 첫 단계에서는 즉흥적인 휴리스틱 판단과정부터 시작하지만, 인지적 자원 여부에 따라 방어초점 소비자가 두 번째 단계에서 심사숙고하는 체계적 판단과정을 시작하게 되는 차이를 보인다는 점을 제안하였는데, 이는 조절적 초점 이론에서 주목할 만한 의미가 있다고 여겨진다.
Both consumers take an product attitude based on intrinsic cues such as product quality or price, and they also are tendency to be influenced by extrinsic cues. For example, launching of a decoy brand may cause uprising of its similar competitor and thus falling off its distant competitor - what we call "attraction effect," - consumers have a pseudo-justification for decoy-dominating brand because of extrinsic cue that one brand is superior than another at least. In this way, consumers are likely to be taken alive not only by real fact but by illusional context. BDT(Behavioral Decision Theory), in point of fact, says consumers are "walking bias" - dazzled so easily by extrinsic cues in respect of context effect. If, for example, a troubled young lady is in agony between John(=extremely handsome but extremely poor) and Bob(=extremely rich but awfully ugly-looking), entry of Kim(=compromised appearance and moderate wealth) may be the savior of her. As well as consumers prefer A to B for its superior quality, they prefer A to B for mere feeling of fluency or familiarity. Many researchers have testified to a fact that consumers are easily and profoundly impacted by extrinsic cues - attraction, compromise, framing, anchoring, or reference effect etc. On equal terms, one brand assisted by context can go ahead another because consumers are "cognitive miser." That is, consumers are disposed to think of products with ad-lib or with ease - what we call "heuristic processing." Some stereotype or some feeling(fluency, familarity, or positive mood etc.) may overwork consumer behavior as extrinsic cue. For example, Kim who`s height is 170cm would be advantageous with 160cm-friend not with 180cm-friend when his marriage meeting. For all that, all consumer do accommodate with extrinsic cue? Not at all ! Some consumer may conform with context effect, in a matter of course, the other may not. In that case, which variable divide into two consumer group in respect of being influenced by extrinsic cue? Maybe "vigilance level" against to extrinsic information is possible. They would like to resist to extrinsic cues or context effects - "vigilant consumers" who are vigilant to extrinsic or nonessential information, or who are vigilant to being influenced itself by all external cue. So, who are vigilant consumers? Based on regulatory focus theory, prevention-focused consumers rather than promotion-focused are more vigilant. In according to this well-known theory, prevention focus is prone to concentrate on loss aversion (vs. gain achievement), duty (vs. activity), and avoidance to negativity (vs. pursuit to positivity.) Prevention-focused consumers, therefore, are more vigilant against to uncertain information or extrinsic cues. More interestingly, vigilant consumers would like to have a motivation to correct their initialattitude - this initial attitude made not through systematic processing but through heuristic. In respect of HSM(Heuristic and Systematic Model), consumers prefer heuristic to systematic processing, but under some "high" condition(=high involvement, high motivation, or high need for cognition etc.) they begin to plunge into more elaborate and systematic processing, and then their initial attitude based on heuristic is faced on correction or "overcorrection" potentially. Many researchers show us that systematic processing is likely to overcorrect their first heuristic judgment. In priming effect, for example, consumers who became aware of external influence would like to motivate to overcorrect their initial thought - "contrast effect." This research suggests that vigilant consumers like prevention-focused would like to overcorrect their initial attitude influenced by extrinsic cues such as word of mouth effect. If so, prevention-focused consumers may not conform with word of mouth, rather counter-think of that information when they become vigilant to word of mouth as unreliable extrinsic cue. We took development of three experimental studies for inspecting these prevention-focused consumers` overcorrection issues. Experiment 1 carried into effect for the purpose of the proof of hypothesis that prevention-focused consumers may overcorrect their first attitude influenced by word of mouth with no-friendship. We predict that prevention-focused consumers will respond negatively for positive word of mouth, and respond positively for negative word of mouth. Promotion-focused consumers, on the other hand, will conform with the valence of WOM(word of mouth). The 2×2 between-subject design is carried out for this purpose. The first independent variable is regulatory focus(promotion vs. prevention) manipulated by mindset formation through relevant writing. The second variable is the valence of WOM(positive vs. negative word of mouth) manipulated by scenario contents. In results through 2×2 ANOVA, the interaction effect with regulatory focus and valence of WOM on product attitude revealed(F(1, 116)=92.341, p<.001). That is, promotion-focused consumers took positive attitude(=5.72) for positive WOM, negative attitude(=2.67) for negative WOM. But prevention-focused consumers showed reverse pattern - negative attitude(=4.32) for positive WOM, and positive attitude(=5.02) for negative WOM. As well as product attitude, the other major dependent measures(=purchase intention and predicted satisfaction) go after in same pattern. These results confirm with our hypothesis that vigilant consumers resist against to extrinsic cue like unreliable WOM. Exp. 2 inquire into the mechanism why prevention-focused consumers resist to extrinsic cue such as WOM, but does not promotional consumers. We hypothesized prevention focus is more vigilant to extrinsic cues than be promotion focus. In results of mediation test of vigilance through Baron and Kenny (1986) methodology, prevention-focused consumers are more vigilant(=3.52) than promotion (=2.63), and then more vigilant more resist to WOM.Exp. 3 suggests a specific condition - prevention-focused consumers take same pattern with promotional consumers. Because systematic processing or overcorrection effect needs cognitive resource, depletion manipulation may cause breakdown of vigilance system of prevention-focused consumers. If so, depleted preventional consumers may conform with extrinsic cues like WOM. We manipulated depletion condition through learning by heart a 9-digit number. In results, under no depletion condition preventional consumers(=4.73) was more vigilance to negative WOM than promotional(=3.64), but under depletion condition the difference between prevention(=4.42) vs. promotion-focused(=4.85) consumers mitigated. Concludingly, this study displayed that not all extrinsic cue operates influential effect. Instead, vigilant consumers like prevention focus may response backfire effect against the extrinsic cue. Specifically, WOM effect can be moderated by regulatory focus. If marketers want to apply WOM effect, they must regard disposition of target consumers. Theoretically, this research may light up regulatory focus theory with HSM theory. Prior researches relevant to regulatory focus suggest promotion vs. prevention-focused consumers start to process differently in respect of cognitive quality. The results of this study, however, provide some insight that both prevention and promotion focus start to process at the same level - start point from heuristic, but under some specific condition(for example, high cognitive resource) prevention focus may plunge into systematic processing and then overcorrect their first attitude. But this suggestion is true only in context of our research paradigm. If our somewhat provocative suggestion is replicated in other studies, the idea of same cognitive processing start of both pro. vs. pre. focus may take a meaningful role of regulatory focus theory. Abraham Lincoln said "It is possible that dazzling a few person for a long time, and also possible that dazzling many people for a short time, but is impossible that doing many for long," But this research get a counterargument - if mixed application with regulatory focus theory and depletion effect, then it may be possible that dazzling many consumers for a long time more than did Lincoln think of.