Healthy Skepticism Library item: 13249

Warning: This library includes all items relevant to health product marketing that we are aware of regardless of quality. Often we do not agree with all or part of the contents.

Publication type: Journal Article

Alba JW, Hutchinson JW.
Dimensions of Consumer Expertise
Journal of Consumer Research 1987 Jan; 13:(4):411-454
http://www.journals.uchicago.edu/doi/abs/10.1086/209080

Abstract:

The purpose of this articleis to review basic empirical resultsfrom the psychological literature in a way that provides a useful foundation for research on consumer knowledge. A conceptual organization for this diverse literature is provided by two fundamental distinctions. First, consumer expertise is distinguished from productrelated experience. Second, five distinct aspects, or dimensions, of expertise are identified: cognitive effort, cognitive structure, analysis, elaboration, and memory. Improvements in the first two dimensions are shown to have general beneficial effects on the latter three. Analysis, elaboration, and memory are shown to have more specific interrelationships. The empirical findings related to each dimension are reviewed and, on the basis of those findings, specific research hypotheses about the effects of expertise on consumer behavior are suggested.