Objective and Subjective Knowledge Relationships: A Quantitative Analysis of Consumer Research Findings

This article presents the results of a meta-analysis of empirical findings associated with the relationship between objective knowledge (OK; i.e., accurate stored information that consumers possess) and subjective knowledge (SK; i.e., consumers' perceptions of their own knowledge). Results of the meta-analysis reveal that OK-SK relationships from prior research were stronger for products versus nonproducts, for public versus private goods, and for SK measures containing an expert versus an "average" standard of comparison. These results and other findings offer a series of implications for future research regarding investigations of consumer knowledge.