Seminar (Dept. of Marketing)

Theme：Product Vulnerability Boosts Consumer Product Valuation

Speaker：Xiaobing Xu（Professor, Management School of Hainan University）

Time：2021-12-29 10:00

Address：Room 1007, Mingde Business Building

Language：Chinese/English

Abstract：

Product vulnerability, or the extent to which products can be damaged by external causes, is a crucial consideration in product design and manufacture. Rather than a lay belief that product vulnerability decrease valuations due to a low-quality perception, the current research reveals a vulnerability-premium effect: high- (vs. low-) vulnerability products make people perceive that the products are scarcer, which in turn leads to higher valuation of the products. Three lab experiments, a field experiment, and a secondary data study demonstrate the robustness of the effect across different products and with different samples. The article concludes by discussing the theoretical and practical implications of the findings.