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Time to pay attention to attention: using attention-based process traces to better understand consumer decision-making

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Abstract

This paper examines consumers’ attention traces (e.g., sequences of eye fixations and saccades) during choice. Due to reduced equipment cost and increased ease of analysis, attention traces can reflect a more fine-grained representation of decision-making activities (e.g., formation of a consideration set, alternative evaluation, and decision strategies). Besides enabling a better understanding of actual consumer choice, attention traces support more complex models of choice, and point to the prospects of specific interventions at various stages of the choice process. We identify and discuss promising areas for future research.

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Notes

  1. These developments coincide nicely with increased awareness by researchers that visual attention and memory cannot be equated and that better measures of attention are needed (Milosavljevic and Cerf 2008; Chandon et al. 2009; Aribarg, Pieters, and Wedel 2010; Atalay et al. 2012).

  2. These models are built upon earlier models of perceptual decision-making, see Gold and Shadlen (2007) and Ratcliff and McKoon (2008). Due to space constraints, we focus only on accumulation models relevant to our discussion of attention.

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Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Southern Methodist University, Dallas, TX, USA

    Milica Mormann

  2. Princeton University, Princeton, NJ, USA

    Tom Griffiths

  3. University of Florida, Gainesville, FL, USA

    Chris Janiszewski

  4. Cornell University, Ithaca, NY, USA

    J. Edward Russo

  5. University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, MI, USA

    Anocha Aribarg

  6. Harrisburg University of Science and Technology, Harrisburg, PA, USA

    Nathaniel J. S. Ashby

  7. Virginia Tech University, Blacksburg, VA, USA

    Rajesh Bagchi

  8. University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, PA, USA

    Sudeep Bhatia

  9. University at Albany, SUNY, Albany, NY, USA

    Aleksandra Kovacheva

  10. Zeppelin University, Friedrichshafen, Germany

    Martin Meissner

  11. Columbia University, New York, NY, USA

    Kellen J. Mrkva

Authors
  1. Milica Mormann
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  2. Tom Griffiths
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  3. Chris Janiszewski
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  4. J. Edward Russo
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  5. Anocha Aribarg
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  6. Nathaniel J. S. Ashby
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  7. Rajesh Bagchi
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  8. Sudeep Bhatia
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  9. Aleksandra Kovacheva
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Correspondence to Milica Mormann.

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Mormann, M., Griffiths, T., Janiszewski, C. et al. Time to pay attention to attention: using attention-based process traces to better understand consumer decision-making. Mark Lett 31, 381–392 (2020). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11002-020-09520-0

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