More Than Meets the Eye: The Impact of Materialism on Information Selection During Luxury Choices

Abstract

Visual attention is an important condition for consumer decision-making. However, not much is known on individuals’ determinants of this visual attention. Using eye tracking, this study investigated how psychological values (i.e., materialism) modulate visual attention to specific sources of information (i.e., product, brand and additional information) in the context of luxury consumption. Participants were asked to perform a forced-choice experiment, where products were randomly assigned with luxury and non-luxury brands (Experiment 1) and product information (Experiment 2). Experiment 1 revealed that materialism was related to relatively higher attention to luxury as opposed to non-luxury and higher choice proportion of products displayed with a luxury brand. Experiment 2 showed that when providing additional product information (e.g., regarding the material) in addition to the brand, all participants chose luxury products more often. Interestingly, choices seemed to be driven by enhanced attention to brand for participants with high levels of materialism when choosing luxury products. In contrast, choices were driven by text for participants with low levels of materialism for non-luxury products. This suggests that individuals with high levels of materialism may prefer luxury products for different reasons than individuals with low levels of materialism: while the first focus on the symbolic dimension conveyed by the brand (Experiment 1), the latter pay attention to the actual product characteristics (Experiment 2). Taken together, our results suggest that materialism as a psychological value has an impact on visual attention and information selection during decision-making in the context of luxury consumption.