The impact of consumer decision-making styles on consumer confusion in Mauritius: An empirical analysis

摘要

This article investigates the effects of consumer decision-making styles on consumer confusion and harm. While consumer confusion has been well documented in the literature, this investigation attempts to bridge our understanding on its relationship with consumer decision-making styles. Empirical data was collected from a field survey where 400 consumers selected at 20 supermarkets in Mauritius were asked to respond to a questionnaire measuring three variables under study: consumer confusion, consumer decision-making styles, and situational factors. Findings from the MANOVA parametric test showed that there is a significant difference between consumer decision-making styles and consumer confusion. Even when covariate situational factors were controlled through the parametric test MANCOVA, results still showed a significant difference between consumer decision-making styles and consumer confusion. More specifically, ANCOVA tests showed that the findings were specifically significant for three types of confusion: product confusion, packaging confusion, and product complexity. The study tends to confirm that a consumer's style of decision making does impact on consumer confusion.