DISTINGUISHING AMONG MODELS OF CONTEXTUALLY INDUCED PREFERENCE REVERSALS

Previous research has demonstrated that adding a 3rd (decoy) alternative that is dominated by only 1 of the other 2 alternatives in a choice set increases the preference for the dominating alternative (J. Huber, Payne, & Puto, 1982; Tyszka, 1983). By manipulating decoys within subjects, significant preference reversals have been obtained. The processes of 3 classes of models can account for these reversals: (a) The decoy affects the weights assigned to different dimensions, (b) the decoy produces range-frequency effects on the dimensional values of the alternatives, and (c) the perception of dominance directly increases the attractiveness of the targeted alternative. The results of 3 experiments designed to test these models favored a direct effect of dominance. When a dominated decoy was added to a choice set, asymmetrical dominance was demonstrated to be a necessary and sufficient condition for producing the predicted preference reversals.