Date & Time: May 31, 2018 10：00 a.m. -11：30 a.m.
Venue: SEM 218
Inviter：Haotian Zhou
Abstract：
Foods are often made or packaged into different shapes. For example, cookies, macarons, and donuts are circular whereas saltine crackers, tortilla chips, and cheese crackers are angular. A question naturally arises as to whether these shapes are randomly chosen or guided by some systematic principles. In this paper, drawing on previous literature on symbolism, we propose and demonstrate a systematic correspondence between shape and taste such that circular shapes are associated with sweetness while angular shapes with saltiness. Built on this foundational notion, subsequent studies explore several marketing implications, showing that (a) the shape of food influences participants' taste inferences, (b) the taste of food influences shape choice and preference, and (c) the (in)congruence between shape and taste affects consumer evaluations.
Speaker Biography：
Dengfeng Yan is a Visiting Associate Professor of Marketing at NYU Shanghai. He has been on the faculty at the University of Texas at San Antonio since 2012. He also taught at HKUST as a visiting assistant professor in the Spring of 2016. Dengfeng's research focuses on understanding how consumers respond to numerical information (such as prices and attribute specifications) and how consumer judgment and preferences vary as a function of psychological distance. His research has been published in top-tier journals including Journal of Consumer Research, Journal of Marketing Research, Journal of Consumer Psychology, and Journal of Personality and Social Psychology. He currently serves on the Editorial Review Boards of Journal of Consumer Research and Journal of Consumer Psychology.
