Techtopia - How Tech Bias Among Consumers Affects Product Evaluations

Sammanfattning: Several studies have found technology to be viewed as something inherently positive. Investors have shown an irrational bias for investments in tech companies and people using tech products are generally regarded as more innovative and successful. This possible tech bias has however not been thoroughly investigated from a consumer perspective, whereby this paper aspires to expand the understanding of how associations to technology affect consumer perceptions of products and services. The authors suggest, and seek to prove, the existence of a Techtopia effect - a general belief among consumers that a product or service with associations to new technology will be superior to a product or service lacking such associations. Three survey based experiments, with a total of 563 respondents, are conducted where respondents were asked to rate their interest in either a product or a service. The first experiment investigates how consumer preferences differ depending on whether a lamp has been produced by mold casting (control group) or 3D-printing (experiment group). The second experiment investigates how consumer preferences differ depending on if a shoe insole has been developed in Pittsburgh (control group) or Silicon Valley (experiment group). Lastly, the third experiment investigates how consumer preferences differ between a delivery service using bicycles (control group) or drones (experiment group). In the first experiment, respondents express a significantly greater interest in the 3D-printed lamp. In all three experiments, respondents express a significantly greater intent to spread Word of Mouth for the tech-augmented manipulation. Respondents also view users of the tech-augmented manipulation to be significantly more innovative in all three experiments. Lastly, a mediating effect of perceived innovativeness on Word of Mouth was found in all three experiments. The conclusion is thus that the hypothesized Techtopia effect does seem to exist, affecting consumer preferences and perceptions.