브랜드 애착과 브랜드 태도 상황에서 성별 차이에 관한 연구

As for the period of development and exclusive customer behavior, there are some contrasting characteristics between the situation of brand attachment and brand attitude. Brand attitude can be developed in the process of alternative consumer evaluation, whereas brand attachment is primarily developed by long term emotional relations or commitments. If in these two situations male and female customers are exposed to negative inconsistent information, they response to them differently. The purpose of the paper is to search how negative inconsistent information affects brand switching intention and to check different effects developed by interaction with a gender and the situation of brand preference such as brand attitude and attachment. It is stimulating to investigate the reverse phenomenon of gender effect between the situation of brand attachment and brand attitude. We surmise that there is a particular gender type that reacts more sensitively to the particular type of brand preference situation. According to psychological thesis, as far as the reaction on the negative stimulus is concerned,there should be some differences between male and female. That is, female is more negative and more sensitive to stimulating information in the same situation than male. In this way,considering this female's anxiety tendency, it is very difficult to expect that preference toward brand could control the negativity effect in the side of female. On the other hand, in the situation of brand attachment, where emotional relationship is profoundly formed, there might be a reverse situation that negative effect could be more easily attenuated for female than male. This situation results from the fact that female is much more emotional and relation oriented. So female could fall into the feeling of attachment. In order to prove the hypothesis of this study, we conducted four experiments. Furthermore,this study also encompasses two sub studies. The results of the study are as follows. First,there are meaningful differences in brand switching intention depending on brand preference situation, such as brand attachment and brand attitude. Whichever gender they are, customers represent a lower level of brand switching intentions in situation of brand attachment than in that of brand attitude when they are exposed to negative inconsistent information. Second, according to the type of brand preference, we could find different situations in gender difference of brand switching intention. After the experiment using the scenarios to prove hypothesis 2, the conclusion represents the fact that in the situation of brand attitude, female consumers are willing to represent more brand switching intention than male customers when they are exposed to negative inconsistent information about the brand. In situation of brand attachment, female consumers show a lower level of brand switching intention than male consumers when they are in exposure to negative inconsistent information about the brand. This result is enthralling because it is the opposite of the result in hypothesis 2. The same results are drawn in additional extra experiments using low involved products such as banana milk and fashion sneakers. Therefore, we found that the female will possess greater emotional attachment upon a certain object more than the male. Third, we verified that there is an interaction effect between the type of negative inconsistent information and the situation of brand preference. Male and female consumers' reactions to the type of negative inconsistent information are different depending on the situation of brand preference. The existing studies show that after the brand preferences are formed, the negative impact of inconsistent information is undifferentiated and no significant differences could be found. But in this study, consumers are separated by gender factors and brand preference situation is separated by brand attachment and brand attitude and then differential effects can be observed due to the interaction of these factors.