2023 Fiscal Year Annual Research Report
Social Learning, Consumer Search and Firms' Dynamic Strategies: A Theoretical Approach
Project/Area Number |
21K13300
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Research Institution | Kyoto Sangyo University |
Principal Investigator |
潘 聡 京都産業大学, 経済学部, 准教授 (30807425)
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Project Period (FY) |
2021-04-01 – 2024-03-31
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Keywords | consumer search / fake review / personalized pricing |
Outline of Annual Research Achievements |
In 2023, I continued working on my last two projects related to consumer search and social learning. One project focuses on how firms' attempts to create fake reviews affect consumers' decision-making regarding whether to keep searching and how this adversely affects firms' pricing decisions. The other project is an extension because I considered how firms' rewarding policies for these fake reviews affect the competition outcomes. Besides, I considered the role of a platform that can guide consumers' search and cause distortions. I found that when a firm owns loyal consumers, it may spontaneously let its rival be displayed at the top of the search results, and the presence of fake reviews greatly affects this incentive.Furthermore, I completed two papers. One examines how consumers' heterogeneity in their preferences affects firms' pricing policies regarding whether to employ personalized pricing, group pricing, or uniform pricing. The other captures firms' multi-channel choices when facing consumers' online shopping and the presence of entrants. I published these two papers in Southern Economic Journal and Transportation Research: Part E, respectively. As planed, I have finished laying the basic fundation of consumer search with firms' dynamic strategies.
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