Hedonic and utilitarian attitudes towards technology and innovation : purchase Intentions of Audio Devices : the AirPods Case

• Autor(a) principal: Amorim, Marta Maria Rodrigues Pessoa de
• Data de Publicação: 2017
• Tipo de documento: Dissertação
• Idioma: eng
• Título da fonte: Repositório Científico de Acesso Aberto de Portugal (Repositórios Cientìficos)
• Texto Completo: http://hdl.handle.net/10400.14/22128
• topic: Consumer behaviour; Hedonic and utilitarian; Consumer electronics; Technology; Innovation; AirPods; Purchase intentions; Comportamento do consumidor; Hedónico e utilitário; Produtos de eletrónica; Tecnologia; Inovação; Intenções de compra; Domínio/Área Científica::Ciências Sociais::Economia e Gestão

The substantial technological growth that defines the era we are living in, involves not only improvement of current electronics features, but also launches of innovative products in the market, and both situations from the consumer electronics segment hold an uncertainty regarding the new product acceptance. As to minimize this uncertainty, brands must be aware of preferences and characteristics which drive consumers to their products, addressing properly the potential key target groups. This dissertation relies on identifying relevant dissimilarities across hedonic and utilitarian behaviour profiles concerning the smartphone consumption, the attributes most valued in electronics, and assess whether these profiles influence the consumers’ attitudes towards technology and innovation in general. On a further analysis, the research is applied to the practical case of AirPods, the new wireless earbuds from Apple, limited to the Portuguese market. From the outcomes of the study it was possible to properly differentiate two groups of smartphone users related to hedonic and utilitarian behaviours. The main findings suggest that these consumer profiles do not constitute the main driver in influencing attitudes towards technology and innovation, although they disclose a relative impact on purchase intentions of the innovative audio device from Apple. Nonetheless, demographic aspects, such as age and gender, are also highlighted due to the relatively influence they have in these attitudes. The collected analyzed data might also contribute for brand managers to better communicate to their target groups, enhancing in their products the ‘emotional side’ for the hedonics and the ‘feature side’ for the utilitarians.