用經濟學實驗研究標價如何影響願付價格─實際消費者與學生群體的比較

How Price Tags Affect Willingness-To-Pay---Evidence from the Field (and Lab)

翁子凡(Vivian Tzu-Fan Own)

指導教授 ： 王道一

國立臺灣大學/社會科學院/經濟學研究所/碩士(2010年)

https://doi.org/10.6342/NTU.2010.01053

摘要

本文的目的為研究商品的標價如何影響消費者的願付價格（Willingness-To-Pay）。並且，我們設計一個經濟學實驗，來達到此研究目的。實驗中，我們使用真實的消費性商品（潛水布材質的手提包、側背包、各種消費性電子產品保護套…等），並邀請有真實購買經驗的消費者來參與實驗。實驗中，我們讓所有受試者觀看這些商品，然後，分別在給他們看真實的商品標價前、後，問受試者對該商品的願付價格是多少。
同時，為了儘可能避免實驗誤差，我們使用以下的實驗設計來問出消費者的願付價格：誘因相容 （incentive compatible）的「Becker, DeGroot, Marschak (BDM) mechanism」、充分解釋在BDM機制下的最佳策略（誠實申報願付價格）、提供付真錢的練習回合（讓受試者練習當買方與賣方）。
這樣的實驗機制，過去文獻已經證實，其可以成功縮小願付價格與願意接受價格（Willingness-To-Accept）間的差距。即便如此，在使用這樣的機制下，我們仍然可以觀察到，願付價格在看到標價後，會統計上顯著的往標價移動，並且願付價格比標價高者，其下降幅度明顯的大於低於標價者的上升幅度。同樣的，我們在實驗室對大學生做類似的實驗，也得到相同的結論。
這個結果告訴我們，廠商在訂價時應該訂高價，但訂高價的原因為避免低價所帶來的負面效果，而非價格本身正的安慰劑效果（Price placebo effect）。

關鍵字

訂價策略 ； 價格安慰劑效果 ； 安慰劑效果 ； 田野實驗 ； 消費者行為 ； 田野實驗與實驗室的比較

並列摘要

We investigate how posted prices affect consumers' willingness-to-pay (WTP) for real-world products by eliciting the WTP from experienced consumers for water-resisting handbags and consumer electronics accessories before and after people see the price tag. To control for possible experimental artifacts, we elicit WTP with the following procedure: The incentive compatible Becker, DeGroot, Marschak (BDM) mechanism, explanations of the optimal strategy under BDM (truthfully revealing one's valuation), and paid practice rounds with subjects switching roles between buyers and sellers. Though this procedure has successfully minimized the willingness-to-pay and willingness-to accept gap in the literature (which we indeed replicate), we find a moderate but significant increase in WTP for the majority whose initial WTP were lower than the price tag, and a sharp decrease in WTP among the few whose initial WTP were higher than the price tag. This suggests a price effect driven by information regarding potential resale (and repurchase) opportunities. A similar laboratory experiment with college students replicates these findings. This suggests that when firms determine prices or discounts, they might have to care more about the negative “outside-opportunity” effect of low prices instead of the positive “price placebo” effect commonly observed in more controlled environments.

並列關鍵字

Price Placebo Effect ； Field Experiment ； Consumer Behavior ； Valuation ； Field and Lab Parallelism

參考文獻

Leslie, Philip and Alan Sorensen (2009), "The Welfare Effects of Ticket Resale", mimeo.

Bushong, King, Camerer and Rangel (2010), “Pavlovian Processes in Consumer Choice: The Physical Presence of a Good Increases Willingness-to-Pay,” American Economic Review, forthcoming.

Camerer, C. F. (2003), Behavioral Game Theory, Princeton University Press.

Falk and Heckman (2009), “Lab Experiments Are a Major Source of Knowledge in the Social Sciences,” Science 326 (5952), 535 – 538.

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