Consistency Effect of Directions between Product's Name Written on the Package and the Cast Shadow on Processing Fluency and Product Preference: Capturing Processing Fluency by Reaction Time and Identification Rate

Abstract

The authors focus on consumers' reading direction for capturing product's visual information. There has been a great deal of research done, but these have discussed separately from product's image information and character information such as product's name. This study investigates the processes of the visual stimulus when product's information and product's image are processed simultaneously and how that affects product preference. Three experiment studies examined that effect of the direction of a product's cast shadow on processing fluency and product preference. Those revealed two points that (1) the consistency of direction between the product name written on the product package and the product's cast-shadow could enhance consumers' processing fluency, (2) the effect of the consistency of two directions on processing fluency may enhance product evaluation. Additionally, it is worth noting that we recruited several measuring methods for capturing “processing fluency” to reinforce the robustness of our findings.