Product Design Perception and Brand Categorization

The authors propose a theoretical framework for the perceptual processing of information picked up from product design elements (such as product form) and its influence on consumers' conceptual knowledge and categorization of brands. The proposed theory of consumer knowledge and brand categorization draws from the ecological approach to visual perception, principles of object recognition by components in perceptual psychology, and the emerging perception-based theory of cognition as a perceptual symbol system. The authors describe four bases of brand categorization derived from product design information, provide examples of each, review empirical findings, and discuss implications for consumer research and new product design.

[1]  D. Aaker.  Building Strong Brands , 1995 .

[2]  tephen E. Palmer.  The effects of contextual scenes on the identification of objects , 1975, Memory & cognition.

[3]  Robert Kreuzbauer,et al.  Embodied Cognition and New Product Design: Changing Product Form to Influence Brand Categorization , 2005 .

[4]  G. Lakoff,et al.  Women, Fire, and Dangerous Things: What Categories Reveal about the Mind , 1988 .

[5]  J. Bettman.  An information processing theory of consumer choice , 1979 .

[6]  D. Mick,et al.  Consumer Research and Semiotics: Exploring the Morphology of Signs, Symbols, and Significance , 1986 .

[7]  Peter H. Bloch.  Seeking the Ideal Form: Product Design and Consumer Response: , 1995 .

[8]  M. Sujan,et al.  Product Categorization and Inference Making: Some Implications for Comparative Advertising , 1987 .

[9]  B. Tversky,et al.  Objects, parts, and categories. , 1984 .

[10]  Kevin Lane Keller.  Conceptualizing, Measuring, and Managing Customer-Based Brand Equity , 1993 .

[11]  Donald D. Hoffman,et al.  Parts of recognition , 1984, Cognition.

[12]  M. Sujan,et al.  Consumer Knowledge: Effects on Evaluation Strategies Mediating Consumer Judgments , 1985 .

[13]  J. Gibson.  The Ecological Approach to Visual Perception , 1979 .

[14]  D. Marr,et al.  Analysis of occluding contour , 1977, Proceedings of the Royal Society of London. Series B. Biological Sciences.

[15]  Jerry C. Olson,et al.  Inferential Belief Formation in the Cue Utilization Process , 1978 .

[16]  R. Lawson.  Consumer Knowledge Structures: Networks and Frames , 1998 .

[17]  B. Julesz.  A brief outline of the texton theory of human vision , 1984, Trends in Neurosciences.

[18]  S. Palmer.  Hierarchical structure in perceptual representation , 1977, Cognitive Psychology.

[19]  Linda B. Smith.  Action Alters Shape Categories , 2005, Cogn. Sci..

[20]  David Marr,et al.  VISION A Computational Investigation into the Human Representation and Processing of Visual Information , 2009 .

[21]  Arthur B. Markman,et al.  The implications of advances in research on motivation for cognitive models , 2005 .

[22]  A. A. Mitchell,et al.  The Assessment of Alternative Measures of Consumer Expertise , 1996 .

[23]  Stephen E. Palmer,et al.  Modern Theories of Gestalt Perception , 1990 .

[24]  S. Palmer.  Vision Science : Photons to Phenomenology , 1999 .

[25]  D. L. Gorlée.  Handbook of Semiotics , 1997, English and American Studies in German.

[26]  Marvin Berkowitz,et al.  Product shape as a design innovation strategy , 1987 .

[27]  I. Biederman.  Recognition-by-components: a theory of human image understanding. , 1987, Psychological review.

[28]  Alice M. Tybout,et al.  Schema Congruity as a Basis for Product Evaluation , 1989 .

[29]  K. Grunert.  Automatic and Strategic Processes in Advertising Effects , 1996 .

[30]  L. Barsalou.  Cognitive Psychology: An Overview for Cognitive Scientists , 1992 .

[31]  E. Brunswik.  Organismic achievement and environmental probability. , 1943 .

[32]  L. Barsalou,et al.  Ad hoc categories , 1983, Memory & cognition.

[33]  A. Treisman.  Strategies and models of selective attention. , 1969, Psychological review.

[34]  Jon Driver,et al.  Obligatory edge-assignment in vision: The role of figure and part segmentation in symmetry detection. , 1995 .

[35]  L. Barsalou,et al.  Whither structured representation? , 1999, Behavioral and Brain Sciences.