The Influence of State Mindfulness and Processing Fluency on Consumer Judgments
(A2023-112721)

AUTHORS

Svenja Winkler, Goethe University Frankfurt

ABSTRACT

Mainly consistent findings show that processing fluency influences evaluative judgments, like aesthetic pleasure or credibility. Yet, little research has investigated whether increased attention and awareness affect this relationship. In this light, this research examines whether increased state mindfulness elicited by a brief mindful meditation and manipulated fluency can affect judgments, and whether mindfulness impacts fluency perceptions differently. Within three experimental tasks, the effects involving various consumer judgment and decision-making contexts were tested. Processing fluency was manipulated by hard/easy-to-read font colors (task 1), (a)typical car designs (task 2), and (un)ease of pronunciation (task 3). Participants with higher state mindfulness levels perceived subjective fluency as stronger than the control group. The three experimental studies present mixed results on the effect of state mindfulness via processing fluency on judgments of truth, liking, and risk.