How Do We Love This, Let Me Count the Ways: Attribute Ambiguity, and the Positivity Effect in Agent Evaluation

Individuals often evaluate agents as potential sources of future advice. Recent research has shown a positivity effect in agent evaluation, whereby agreements on previously loved alternatives are considered more diagnostic of agent suitability, than agreements on previously hated alternatives. In this article, we argue that the positivity effect in agent evaluation arises from the greater ambiguity, or uncertainty, about an agent’s attribute ratings of loved alternatives as compared to hated alternatives. Consistent with this attribute ambiguity mechanism, we show in three studies that the positivity effect is moderated by the number of attributes, the number of alternatives, and revelation of the agent’s attribute ratings.

Citation:

Ashesh Mukherjee, Andrew Gershoff, and Anirban Mukkhopadhyay (2006) ,"How Do We Love This, Let Me Count the Ways: Attribute Ambiguity, and the Positivity Effect in Agent Evaluation", in AP - Asia-Pacific Advances in Consumer Research Volume 7, eds. Margaret Craig Lees, Teresa Davis, and Gary Gregory, Sydney, Australia : Association for Consumer Research, Pages: 286-287.