| dc.description.abstract | This dissertation work scrutinizes economic-decision making process when visceral feelings are present in the decision environment. I carefully model and study the role of attribute distortion, salience, self-control cost and attention in choosing high-quality and low-calorie food products. The first chapter of this dissertation shows that high price salience reduces the likelihood of purchasing high-quality, low-calorie food items at a price premium. I also find that income is an important factor that moderates this effect. The low-income group demonstrates similar purchasing behaviors regardless of the existence or the absence of price salience. However, in the absence of price salience (and distortion) in the decision environment, the high-income group is more likely to choose more expensive low-calorie foods. This effect vanishes when high-income consumers are exposed to environments with high price salience. In the second chapter of my dissertation, I document that the magnitude of the calorie distance between food items can explain the contradictory findings in previous literature regarding the impact of calorie labeling laws. The developed theoretical model suggests that the relative calorie difference between alternatives in food menus is a missing link important for understanding the impact of calorie labeling information on calorie intake and reconciling inconsistencies in previous findings. I implement laboratory and lab-in-the-field restaurant experiments where participants make incentivized food choices in binary menus. I exogenously manipulate the magnitude and saliency of the calorie distance between food alternatives. I find that providing accurate calorie information increases the likelihood of low-calorie choices by 3% and 10% in the lab and restaurant experiments, respectively. However, the menu-dependent calorie distance discounts the effect of information-provision. My findings suggest that a 100-calorie increase in the calorie distance between the food alternatives reduces the probability of choosing the low-calorie alternative by 3%. My dissertation also demonstrates the importance of visual attention in attribute distortion and food choices. Findings suggest that equal salience of the calorie information of food alternatives does not alter the effect of the menu-dependent self-control cost. However, over-attention to any calorie information neutralizes the effect of the calorie distance or the menu-dependent self-control cost. This is important evidence to show that when a decision-maker experiences a trade-off and compares the calorie content of food products by spending the same fixation time on both alternatives, s/he is vulnerable to the menu-dependent self-control cost. In the case of disproportional attention to any product information, the decision-maker does not face the trade-off, and the effect of the menu-dependent self-control cost vanishes. | en |
