색이 메타인지적 과정을 통해 상품태도에 미치는 효과: 빨간색과 성적매력의 개념적 연계를 중심으로 (The Metacognitive Influence of Color on Product Attitude: The Case for Red and its Conceptual Relation to Sexual Attractiveness)

서지정보

· 발행기관 : 한국마케팅학회
· 수록지 정보 : 마케팅연구 / 27권 / 1호 / 135 ~ 160페이지
· 저자명 : 이윤재, 박기완

초록

본 연구에서는 색의 연상이 메타인지적 과정을 통해 상품태도에 미치는 영향을 확인하고자 하였으며, 다음과 같은 주요 과정을 예상하였다. 화장품 광고 맥락에서 빨간색은 성적매력과 관련한 의미를 점화시키며, 이에 활성화된 의미는 성적매력과 관련된 대상을 더 쉽게 처리 할 수 있게 할 것이다. 그리고 이러한 처리의 쉬움과 관련한 메타인지적 경험, 즉 처리 유창성은 상품태도에 호의적으로 반영될 것을 예상하였다. 이의 확인을 위해 실험 1에서는 브랜드 로고의 색(빨간색 vs. 초록색)과 상품 특성(성적매력과 높은 상품 vs. 성적매력과 낮은 상품)을 적용한 실험을 통해 상품에 대한 소비자 태도를 측정하였다. 실험 2에서는 실험 1에서 나타난 효과가 메타인지적인 과정에 의해 일어났음을 확인하기 위해, 광고의 색(빨간색 vs. 초록색)과 성적 연상의 연결 관계를 의식적으로 인지하게 하는 간섭, 즉 개입(있음 vs. 없음)에 따라 소비자 태도를 측정하였다. 이 때 개입은 실험참여자들에게 실험 자극의 특성이 참여자들이 의식하지 못하는 상황에서 상품에 대한 태도 평가에 영향을 미칠 수 있음을 미리 알려주어, 메타인지적 의사결정이 이루어지지 않게끔 하는 역할을 수행한다. 또한 실험 2에서는 개념적 유창성에 대한 척도를 도입해 개념적 유창성의 매개효과를 직접적으로 테스트하였다. 실험 3에서는 이러한 과정이 소비자가 지니고 있는 색에 대한 연상에 기반하고 있음을 보다 직접적으로 확인하기 위해 빨간색과 성적 매력 연상의 점화(연상 단서 제공 vs. 연상 방해) 조작을 통해 빨간색에 의한 성적매력 연상에 대한 접근성에 차이를 두어 상품 태도에 미치는 영향을 확인하였다.
실험 1의 결과 빨간색 로고를 접한 소비자들은 초록색 로고를 접한 소비자들 보다 성적매력과 관련이 높은 상품(마스카라)에 대해 더 높은 선호도를 나타내었으며, 성적매력과 관련이 낮은 상품(수분크림)에 대해서는 더 낮은 선호도를 나타내고 있었음을 확인했다. 실험 2의 결과로는 개입과 광고 색의 상호작용 효과를 확인하였는데, 개입이 없는 경우 실험 1에서와 같이 성적매력과 관련이 높은 상품에 대한 빨간색의 효과가 긍정적으로 나타났지만, 개입이 있는 경우 색의 효과는 사라짐을 확인하였다. 이후 개입이 없었던 집단에 대한 매개분석을 통해 개념적 유창성이 이 과정을 매개하고 있음을 확인하였다. 실험 3의 결과 빨간색의 성적매력 연상에 대한 접근성을 낮춘 집단에서는 성적매력과 관련이 높은 상품과 관련한 빨간색의 긍정적 효과가 사라지게 됨을 확인하였다.
본 연구는 세 개의 실험을 통해 색과 관련한 연상이 소비자의 상품태도 형성에 소비자들 스스로 의식하지 못하더라도 메타인지적 과정을 통해 영향을 주고 있기 때문에, 마케터의 입장에서는 상품 패키지에서부터, 광고의 색, 기업의 CI(Corporate Identity)에 이르기 까지 색과 관련한 연상의 이해를 통한 관리가 필요함을 제시하고 있다.

영어초록

Color is ubiquitous in consumers' everyday life. Color has its own aesthetic value and at the same time delivers a specific meaning, carrying specific information to consumers. Therefore, color is assumed to have a functional as well as an aesthetic value. In marketing, color is delivered to consumers in a variety of ways, including product design, product packaging, advertisements, and the store environment. Studies on the effects of color have focused on psychological and physiological impact of color, and have revealed that color can bring on specific autonomous biological reactions, can evoke specific emotional responses, and can influence consumers' decision making and behavior.
Early studies on color proposed that red is experienced as stimulation and unsympathetic and makes consumers focus on the outward environment, whereas blue and green are experienced as calming and sympathetic and turn consumers' focus inward. These studies posited that these effects are based on the wavelength of the color. However, recent studies on the effects of colors suggest that the underlying process involves colors' associations.
The red color, which the current research focuses on, is associated with happiness, warmth, prohibition, and sexual attractiveness. In this research, we propose that when color associations are primed, they may affect consumers' decision making through metacognitive processes, especially conceptual fluency. Consumers' decision making is accompanied by metacognitive experiences such as ease of accessibility, and ease of processing. These can affect consumer judgment as consumers take prior experiential information into account and arrive at favorable attitudes toward the target stimuli.
Research on metacognitive experiences suggests that processing fluency can be perceptual or conceptual in nature. Perceptual fluency describes the ease with which consumers can recognize a target stimulus on subsequent encounters, and involves the processing of physical features. Conceptual fluency pertains to the processing of meaning, and describes the ease with which the target stimulus comes into the consumer's mind. The conceptual ease of processing the target on favorable attitude is based on the effect of semantic priming. Therefore, conceptual fluency models have been explained by semantic priming that prior exposure to a target increases favorable attitude with target-related product by activation of related associations.
Drawing on conceptual fluency, in this research, we determine the metacognitive influence of color, red in particular, on product attitude. As red has been proven to be associated with sexual attractiveness, we predict that red (versus green) will increase consumers’ attitude toward a cosmetic product, for which sexual attractiveness is highly relevant. Red primes meanings related to sexual attractiveness and, as a result, heightens the ease of processing products related to sexual attractiveness. Specifically, we hypothesize;H1:Red versus green brand logo will increase consumers’attitude toward mascara, for which sexual attractiveness is relevant, but not the attitude toward moisture cream.
H2:The red effect, observed in H1, will be eliminated when the incidental nature of the color effect is salient.
H3:The red effect, observed in H1 will be mediated by conceptual fluency for sexual attractiveness.
H4:The red effect, observed in H1 will disappear when the red-sexual attractiveness link is made less salient by associating red with other associations.


In three experimental studies, we find that the conceptual fluency process underlies how red versus green increases product attitude, but only for mascara not for moisture cream, which appears to be because mascara is more closely related to sexual attractiveness than moisture cream. In study 1 we manipulated brand logo’s colors (red versus green) in product advertisements for two cosmetic products (mascara and moisture cream), which were ostensibly presented as a pre-test before actual launch in the market. We selected two product categories since there was a difference between the two in the relevance or importance of sexual attractiveness. An 2(color) X 2(product) mixed ANOVA, treating color as a between- and product as a within-subject factor, revealed a significant interaction effect. A red versus green logo increased attitude toward mascara, but decreased attitude toward moisture cream.
In study 2, we replicated the so-called ‘red effect’ observed in study 1 and also confirmed the underlying process by which color influenced product attitude. We found that the color effect only occurred without intervention to make the incidental nature of the red effect salient, implying that the brand logo’s color might induce a biased response to the advertised products, but was eliminated when the intervention was made. We also confirmed that conceptual fluency mediated the effect of color on product attitude. When the intervention was absent, the positive effect of red versus green on product attitude was eliminated when conceptual fluency was introduced as another predictor, thus confirming the mediating effect of processing fluency.
In study 3, we varied the accessibility of participants' red association with sexual attractiveness by providing either a cue related to red-sexual attractiveness association or another cue to interfere with the red-sexual attractiveness link. We found that the 'red effect' was eliminated when the link between red and sexual attractiveness was weakened by the intereference cue, strengthening the role of conceptual fluency as the underlying process.
Through the three studies, we showed that color can influence consumer decision making through the activation of related concepts and subsequent fluency experience in a rather unconscious manner. Theoretically, we contribute to the literature on color by providing the fluency-based explanation as a process that underlies the effect of color. This research also offers managerial implications for marketers who design color-embedded strategies for product package, corporate identity, and advertisement. Our study supports the assertion that awareness of color's importance is one important key to success for marketers.
In this research, we have examined only the effect of the red-sexual attractiveness association. To date, little research has been done on colors in the marketing literature, and so potential directions for future research are plentiful. Red-happiness, red-warmth, and red-prohibition linkages are an area that are potentially important for study. And the impact of different colors such as blue and white on product attitude in different marketing contexts has yet to be explored. Further, future research could also verify cultural differences in color associations and their consequences for marketing.

참고자료

· 없음