Consumer Response to Anthropomorphic Animal Images Based on Their Similarity to Humans

While humans have a long history of anthropomorphizing animals, the phenomenon has received little attention in consumer research. Findings of this research indicate that animals that are perceived to be moderately similar to humans are more frequently used as anthropomorphic mascots than animals that are either highly similar or relatively dissimilar to humans. However, results from an experimental study indicate that, while participants are indifferent between animal types when they are presented non-anthropomorphically, relatively dissimilar animals gain the most in terms of attitude favorability when presented anthropomorphically. I argue that these results are driven by a lower level of baseline similarity to humans in the nonanthropomorphic form. Thus, enhancing similarity to humans via anthropomorphism leads to positive violation of expectations and enhanced attraction toward relatively dissimilar animal images.

Citation:

Paul M Connell (2011) ,"Consumer Response to Anthropomorphic Animal Images Based on Their Similarity to Humans", in E - European Advances in Consumer Research Volume 9, eds. Alan Bradshaw, Chris Hackley, and Pauline Maclaran, Duluth, MN : Association for Consumer Research, Pages: 468.