© 2003 Blackwell Publishing Ltd International Journal of Consumer Studies, 27, 3, June 2003, pp218–251 243

Abstracts

Use of persuasive techniques on Internet shopping sites

Anita Subramaniam

Montclair State University

Huge strides in technological development combined with mar-

keting strategies have led to dramatic changes in the way infor-

mation is transmitted and communicated to the consumers, and

subsequently used by the consumers. Information has become

a dominant factor in determining why, where, what, and how

consumers shop, process information, and make decisions.

While marketing information has always been an important factor

in consumer decision-making, its provision on demand and

added convenience via the Internet has created a need to

research the nature and amount of information that these tech-

nologies provide.

Advertisements use different forms of persuasion to gain con-

sumer attention, meet their economic and emotional shopping

needs, to create a positive image of the product, brand, and the

shopping medium, and influence consumers to purchase the

product. Persuasion may be classified as functional congruity

and self-congruity routes to persuasion (Johar & Sirgy, 1991).

Fifty websites were studied for utilitarian and value-expressive

forms of persuasion by product differentiation. The websites were

classified as those selling tangible products only and those sell-

ing intangible products only, and those selling both tangible and

intangible products. The paper will present results of the study

along with a discussion and conclusion with implications on con-

sumer well-being.27MiscellaneousAbstractsAbstracts

Adolescents as consumers of restricted media content: empowering adults as mediators

Sonya Thompson

University of Alberta, Canada

Children and youth are a dominant consumer force in the media

marketplace and restricted media content is part of the near

environment of many adolescents, both at home and in their

communities. Yet, little attention has been paid to adolescents as

consumers of film, video, DVD, Internet, video games, pay per

view, satellite and digital cable television content that has been

deemed ‘adult’ or restricted content by government and industry

regulators. Using a human ecology framework, this research

assess what types of restricted media content 13 and 14 years

olds are exposed to at home and in the community, how they

come to have access to different types of restricted material, how

they regulate their own consumption of sexually and violently

explicit media content, what they think is appropriate viewing for

themselves.

The media environment of adolescents is continually changing

with the proliferation of new technologies, and restricted content

is pervasively and aggressively marketed to adolescents. Market

forces, government regulation, parental guidance, and media in

its social context determine what children are exposed to. This

research investigates the interaction between these forces and

their outcomes for adolescents in the province of Alberta, Can-

ada. Adolescents in Alberta have the highest rates of film, video,

and DVD viewing in Canada, as well as the highest saturation of

Internet in homes. Alberta’s system of film classification (age