• Journal of Korea Trade
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• v.27 no.2
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• pp.115-129
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• 2023

Purpose - This study empirically analyzes the consumer value of risk management associated with illegal, unreported, and unregulated (IUU) fishing of fishery products imported to Korea. The global regulatory paradigm for IUU fishing has shifted from production-centered to market-centered. As a result, changes in the international fisheries trade environment emphasizing "transparency" and "legality" of the production process are accelerating. Therefore, changes in the management systems of fishery products entering the country are also needed. Accordingly, this study estimated the consumer value for risk management of IUU fishing, targeting major fish species imported to Korea, and derived the feasibility of introducing related policies. Design/methodology - This study used the choice experiment as an analysis model to estimate consumers' willingness to pay for the "possibility to check for IUU fishing." The choice experiment assumes that the value of a good or service is composed of separable attributes and that the sum of the part-worth of these individual attributes becomes the total value. In this study, respondents were presented with profiles comprising three attributes (country of origin, price, and possibility of checking IUU fishing) and the levels of frozen poulp squid, the subject of the analysis. The participants were asked to select their preferred profile. The marginal willingness to pay for each attribute was derived from the results of the respondents' choices using conditional logit model estimates. Findings - There is a marked difference in utility based on the preference of the country of origin of fishery products among consumers. In addition, the utility of fishery products that have undergone IUU fishing verification was observed to be higher, with the utility marked to be higher for lower prices. Originality/value - Estimating the policy value of the risk management in IUU fishing of imported fisheries products in this study is a novel attempt that has never been conducted before. Several studies have been conducted to assess the risk of IUU fishing associated with the import of fishery products internationally. However, such studies are yet to be conducted in Korea. Instead, policies and studies have focused on issues related to complying with trading partners' legal and transparent standards for exporting fishery products. This study should be the beginning of more in-depth empirical and theoretical explorations to establish order in the domestic seafood market and respond to changes in international regulations on IUU fishing.

• Journal of Distribution Research
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• v.17 no.2
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• pp.63-92
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• 2012

This study investigated consumer intention to use a location-based mobile shopping service (LBMSS) that integrates cognitive and affective responses. Information relevancy was integrated into pleasure-arousal-dominance (PAD) emotional state model in the present study as a conceptual framework. The results of an online survey of 335 mobile phone users in the U.S. indicated the positive effects of arousal and information relevancy on pleasure. In addition, there was a significant relationship between pleasure and intention to use a LBMSS. However, the relationship between dominance and pleasure was not statistically significant. The results of the present study provides insight to retailers and marketers as to what factors they need to consider to implement location-based mobile shopping services to improve their business performance. Extended Abstract : Location aware technology has expanded the marketer's reach by reducing space and time between a consumer's receipt of advertising and purchase, offering real-time information and coupons to consumers in purchasing situations (Dickenger and Kleijnen, 2008; Malhotra and Malhotra, 2009). LBMSS increases the relevancy of SMS marketing by linking advertisements to a user's location (Bamba and Barnes, 2007; Malhotra and Malhotra, 2009). This study investigated consumer intention to use a location-based mobile shopping service (LBMSS) that integrates cognitive and affective response. The purpose of the study was to examine the relationship among information relevancy and affective variables and their effects on intention to use LBMSS. Thus, information relevancy was integrated into pleasure-arousal-dominance (PAD) model and generated the following hypotheses. Hypothesis 1. There will be a positive influence of arousal concerning LBMSS on pleasure in regard to LBMSS. Hypothesis 2. There will be a positive influence of dominance in LBMSS on pleasure in regard to LBMSS. Hypothesis 3. There will be a positive influence of information relevancy on pleasure in regard to LBMSS. Hypothesis 4. There will be a positive influence of pleasure about LBMSS on intention to use LBMSS. E-mail invitations were sent out to a randomly selected sample of three thousand consumers who are older than 18 years old and mobile phone owners, acquired from an independent marketing research company. An online survey technique was employed utilizing Dillman's (2000) online survey method and follow-ups. A total of 335 valid responses were used for the data analysis in the present study. Before the respondents answer any of the questions, they were told to read a document describing LBMSS. The document included definitions and examples of LBMSS provided by various service providers. After that, they were exposed to a scenario describing the participant as taking a saturday shopping trip to a mall and then receiving a short message from the mall. The short message included new product information and coupons for same day use at participating stores. They then completed a questionnaire containing various questions. To assess arousal, dominance, and pleasure, we adapted and modified scales used in the previous studies in the context of location-based mobile shopping service, each of the five items from Mehrabian and Russell (1974). A total of 15 items were measured on a seven-point bipolar scale. To measure information relevancy, four items were borrowed from Mason et al. (1995). Intention to use LBMSS was captured using two items developed by Blackwell, and Miniard (1995) and one items developed by the authors. Data analyses were conducted using SPSS 19.0 and LISREL 8.72. A total of usable 335 data were obtained after deleting the incomplete responses, which results in a response rate of 11.20%. A little over half of the respondents were male (53.9%) and approximately 60% of respondents were married (57.4%). The mean age of the sample was 29.44 years with a range from 19 to 60 years. In terms of the ethnicity there were European Americans (54.5%), Hispanic American (5.3%), African-American (3.6%), and Asian American (2.9%), respectively. The respondents were highly educated; close to 62.5% of participants in the study reported holding a college degree or its equivalent and 14.5% of the participants had graduate degree. The sample represents all income categories: less than $24,999 (10.8%), $25,000-$49,999 (28.34%), $50,000-$74,999 (13.8%), and $75,000 or more (10.23%). The respondents of the study indicated that they were employed in many occupations. Responses came from all 42 states in the U.S. To identify the dimensions of research constructs, Exploratory Factor Analysis (EFA) using a varimax rotation was conducted. As indicated in table 1, these dimensions: arousal, dominance, relevancy, pleasure, and intention to use, suggested by the EFA, explained 82.29% of the total variance with factor loadings ranged from .74 to .89. As a next step, CFA was conducted to validate the dimensions that were identified from the exploratory factor analysis and to further refine the scale. Table 1 exhibits the results of measurement model analysis and revealed a chi-square of 202.13 with degree-of-freedom of 89 (p =.002), GFI of .93, AGFI = .89, CFI of .99, NFI of .98, which indicates of the evidence of a good model fit to the data (Bagozzi and Yi, 1998; Hair et al., 1998). As table 1 shows, reliability was estimated with Cronbach's alpha and composite reliability (CR) for all multi-item scales. All the values met evidence of satisfactory reliability in multi-item measure for alpha (>.91) and CR (>.80). In addition, we tested the convergent validity of the measure using average variance extracted (AVE) by following recommendations from Fornell and Larcker (1981). The AVE values for the model constructs ranged from .74 through .85, which are higher than the threshold suggested by Fornell and Larcker (1981). To examine discriminant validity of the measure, we again followed the recommendations from Fornell and Larcker (1981). The shared variances between constructs were smaller than the AVE of the research constructs and confirm discriminant validity of the measure. The causal model testing was conducted using LISREL 8.72 with a maximum-likelihood estimation method. Table 2 shows the results of the hypotheses testing. The results for the conceptual model revealed good overall fit for the proposed model. Chi-square was 342.00 (df = 92, p =.000), NFI was .97, NNFI was .97, GFI was .89, AGFI was .83, and RMSEA was .08. All paths in the proposed model received significant statistical support except H2. The paths from arousal to pleasure (H1: ${\ss}$=.70; t = 11.44), from information relevancy to intention to use (H3 ${\ss}$ =.12; t = 2.36), from information relevancy to pleasure (H4 ${\ss}$ =.15; t = 2.86), and pleasure to intention to use (H5: ${\ss}$=.54; t = 9.05) were significant. However, the path from dominance to pleasure was not supported. This study investigated consumer intention to use a location-based mobile shopping service (LBMSS) that integrates cognitive and affective responses. Information relevancy was integrated into pleasure-arousal-dominance (PAD) emotional state model as a conceptual framework. The results of the present study support previous studies indicating that emotional responses as well as cognitive responses have a strong impact on accepting new technology. The findings of this study suggest potential marketing strategies to mobile service developers and retailers who are considering the implementation of LBMSS. It would be rewarding to develop location-based mobile services that integrate information relevancy and which cause positive emotional responses.

• Cartoon and Animation Studies
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• s.33
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• pp.597-616
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• 2013

Character industry is not only knowledge-based industry chiefly with copyrights but also motive power for creative economy to take a role functionally over the fields of industries because it has industrial characteristic as complement product to promote sale value in manufacturing industry and service industry and increase profit on sales. Since 2003, the national policy related to character has aimed to maximize effect among connected industries, extend its business abroad, enforce copyrights through the improvement of marketing system, develop industrial infrastructure through raising quality of character products. With the result of this policy, the successful cases of connected contents have been crystallized and domestic character industry has stepped up methodically since 2007. It is needed to reset the scales of character industry and industrial stats because there are more know-how of self industry promotion and more related characters through strategy of market departmentalization starting with cartoon, animation, games, novels, movies and musicals. Especially, The Korea government set our target for 'Global Top Five Character Power' since 2009 and has started to carry out to find global star characters, support to establish network among connected industries, diversify promotion channels, and develop licensing business. Particularly, since 2013, There have been prospered the indoor character theme park with time management just like character experimental marketing or Kids cafes using characters, the demand market of digital character focusing on SNS emoticon, and the performance market for character musical consistently. Moreover, The domestic and foreign illegal black markets on off-line have been enlarged, so we need another policy alternative. To prepare for the era of exploding character demand market and diversifying platform, it is needed to set up a solid strategy that is required the elements of policy changes in character industry to vitalize character industry and support new character design and connected contents. the following shows that the elements of policy changes related to the existing policy, the current position of market. Nowadays, the elements of policy changes in domestic character industry are that variety of consumers in the digital character market according to platform diversification, Convergence contents of character goods for the Korean waves, legalization of the illegal black contents market, and controling the tendency of consumers in departmentalized market. This can help find the policy issue entirely deferent with the existing character powers like US, Japan or Europe. In its final analysis, the alternatives are the promotion of models with contract copyrights of domestic and foreign connected contents, the diversification of profit models of platform economy, the additive development of target market related to enlarging the Korean waves, and the strategy of character market for the age-specific tendency according to developing character demand market.

• 대한공업교육학회지
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• v.38 no.1
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• pp.1-27
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• 2013

The purpose of this study was to find out the areas and their constitute elements of new apprenticeship through the expert of vocational education to improve the growth potential in the field of industry. Through the three times Delphi research process final composing areas and elements(total 6 areas and 41 sub-elements) of new apprenticeship were extracted. Followings are specific study results of 41 sub-elements for the 6 areas. In area A(Technology Skill aspect) total nine sub-elements were deducted as follows. Technology skill's field appling ability, new technology skill's acquisition, quality assurance ability, research development ability, material management using ability, problem solving ability, core technology skill understanding ability, idea's imagery expressing ability, creative design ability. In area B(Institutional aspect) total five sub-elements were deducted as follows. Flexible human material support, precise division of works, objective result assessment, institutionalization of responsibilities and liabilities between teacher and student, institutionalization of duty invention reward. In area C(Affective aspect) total eight sub-elements were deducted as follows. Manners and cooperation between teacher & student and peer, values for job, basic attitude for technology, job ethic sense, respect of other organization, active action to organization change, attitude of technology successor, service mind. In area D(Self-improvement aspect) total nine sub-elements were deducted as follows. Self evaluation and reflection, cultivate of organization understanding, career planning and developing ability, sound philosophy of life, communication ability, decision making ability, prepare of individual competence enhance system, self-control ability improvement, reaction of unexpected situation. In area E(Knowledge aspect) total four sub-elements were deducted as follows. Basic knowledge of relevant area, knowledge of new technology & preceding technology, fusion and relocation of knowledge, practical knowledge. In area F(Environmental aspect) total six sub-elements were deducted as follows. Awareness of business environment, understanding of education and practice environment, understanding of apprenticeship's business demand, connectivity of region community, adapt ability of labor market's change, awareness of society environment change.

• Journal of Distribution Science
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• v.13 no.10
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• pp.115-122
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• 2015

Purpose - This study was conducted to develop a beekeeping farm management standard checklist. This is essential to increase the competitive power of beekeeping farmers. Checklists in relation to crops and livestock were established by the Rural Development Administration in the 2000s. To date, 60 checklists have been created by crop and livestock experts. However, other farmers outside the 60 checklists are increasing. Therefore, extra development is required for these farmers. This study was conducted to meet farmers' requirements. The special farming dealt with in this study is beekeeping. Such checklists were not developed due to the small number of beekeeping farmers. However, these days, a number of such farmers are emerging. Research design, data, and methodology - Many related experts participated in this study. This study was conducted in four stages. First, a basic outline of beekeeping was created by surveying many kinds of beekeeping experts. The draft of the beekeeping checklist was created by a secondary advisory council. This draft was then sent to 14 beekeeping experts to confirm whether or not it was suitable as a management checklist. For collecting the experts' opinions, a direct visit survey was done through an arranged questionnaire. Additionally, a basic management checklist blueprint was reviewed by many experts. In the third stage, a Delphi survey method was utilized with a special Delphi questionnaire. In this stage, experts who participated in the first and second stages were excluded. As there were uncertain answers among them, a second Delphi survey was done. As a result of this survey, all answers were agreed among them. Results - From the results of this survey, four subjects in the management accomplishment index were determined. These are farming scale, average product per beehive, the sale price of honey (1kg), and the number of bee plates in the beehive. In the case of the management checklist content, five items were determined. These are beekeeping farming facilities, the environment around the farm land and general management, the product management of the beekeeping harvest, the management of the disease and pest, and farming management. This checklist will be utilized for beekeeping farmers to implement in a management situation. Conclusions - These days, the number of beekeeping farmers is increasing. The management checklist for beekeeping farmers will be used to improve their farming situation and marketing. Beekeeping farmers can understand their management by reviewing their checklist. After checking, the situation of management can be analyzed. Farmers can supplement weaknesses with expert advice. This checklist will be used by agricultural technique extension workers for farming management consulting. This checklist has to be complemented by a change in the management of the environment. This checklist will be delivered to beekeeping farmers after a verification survey is done. The result of the checklist score will be utilized for a benchmarking service to be implemented for beekeeping farmers to utilize.

• The Journal of Information Systems
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• v.25 no.1
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• pp.1-23
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• 2016

Purpose Self-congruity deals with the effect of symbolic value-expressive attributes on consumer decision and behavior, which is the theoretical foundation of the "non-utilitarian destination positioning". Functional congruity refers to utilitarian evaluation of a product or service by consumers. In addition, recent years, social network services, especially mobile social network services have created many opportunities for e-WOM communication that enables consumers to share personal consumption related information anywhere at any time. Moreover, self-construal is a hot and popular topic that has been discussed in the field of modem psychology as well as in marketing area. This study aims to examine the moderating effect of self-construal on the relationship between self-congruity, functional congruity and tourists' positive electronic word of mouth (e-WOM). Design/methodology/approach In order to verify the hypotheses, we developed a questionnaire with 32 survey items. We measured all the items on a five-point Likert-type scale. We used Sojump.com to collect questionnaire and gathered 218 responses from whom have visited Korea before. After a pilot test, we analyzed the main survey data by using SPSS 20.0 and AMOS 18.0, and employed structural equation modeling to test the hypotheses. We first estimated the measurement model for its overall fit, reliability and validity through a confirmatory factor analysis and used common method bias test to make sure that whether measures are affected by common-method variance. Then we tested the hypotheses through the structural model and used regression analysis to measure moderating effect of self-construal. Findings The results reveal that the effect of self-congruity on tourists' positive e-WOM is stronger for tourists with an independent self-construal compared with those with interdependent self-construal. Moreover, it shows that the effect of functional congruity on tourists' positive e-WOM becomes salient when tourists' self-construal is primed to be interdependent rather than independent. We expect that the results of this study can provide important implications for academic and practical perspective.

• Asia-Pacific Journal of Business Venturing and Entrepreneurship
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• v.16 no.4
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• pp.153-165
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• 2021

With the disappearance of boundaries between online and offline, the O2O(online to offline) platform service is rapidly growing. Unlike general products, freshness is an important decision-making factor for agri-food, and there are many limiting factors for growth as an open market among O2O platforms due to the characteristics of difficult refunds and exchanges compared to other items and new transaction methods. In order to overcome these obstacles, consumer innovation must be considered. The purpose of this study was to investigate the influence of O2O(online to offline) platform characteristics perception on agri-food repurchase intentions. And an empirical survey of the hypothesis is made that innovation will show a moderating effect between agri-food O2O platform characteristics and repurchase intention. And an empirical survey of the hypothesis is made that innovation will show a moderating effect between agri-food O2O platform characteristics and repurchase intention. For this purpose, Using a convenience sampling technique, an online survey was conducted through Google survey from April 1 to April 15, 2021. A total of final analysis data were collected from a total of 270 purchase experienced of agri-food O2O(online to offline) platform. The SPSS program was used for analysis, and multiple regression analysis was used for hypothesis verification. The results showed that Economic, Interaction, and Playfulness had a significant positive effect on agri-food repurchase intend. Also, Interactivity × innovation, playfulness × innovation were found to have a significant positive (+) effect on repurchase intention. The results of this study show that innovation reduces the burden on consumers for new systems and mobile transactions. The results of this study suggest that convenient interface design is important for activating O2O transactions of agri-food. In addition, education and support are needed to strengthen the IT competency of farmers. The results of this study will be able to contribute to the establishment of infrastructure for agri-food open market shopping malls. In future studies, the influence of the O2O platform type on the purchase intention should be studied continuously.

• Asia pacific journal of information systems
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• v.19 no.1
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• pp.1-31
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• 2009

This paper empirically examines factors that potentially influence the success of a Web-based semantic search engine. A research model has been proposed that shows the impact of quality-related factors upon the effectiveness of a semantic search engine, based on DeLone and McLean's(2003) information systems success model. An empirical study has been conducted to test hypotheses formulated around the research model, and statistical methods were applied to analyze gathered data and draw conclusions. Implications for academics and practitioners are offered based on the findings of the study. The proposed model includes three quality dimensions of a Web-based semantic search engine-namely, information quality, system quality and service quality. These three dimensions each have measures designed to collectively assess the respective dimension. The model is intended to examine the relationship between measures of these quality dimensions and measures of two dependent constructs, including individuals' net benefit and user satisfaction. Individuals' net benefit was measured by the extent to which the user's information needs were adequately met, whereas user satisfaction was measured by a combination of the perceived satisfaction with search results and the perceived satisfaction with the overall system. A total of 23 hypotheses have been formulated around the model, and a questionnaire survey has been conducted using a functional semantic search website created by KT and Hakia, so as to collect data to validate the model. Copies of a questionnaire form were handed out in person to 160 research associates and employees working in the area of designing and developing semantic search engines. Those who received the form, 148 respondents returned valid responses. The survey form asked respondents to use the given website to answer questions concerning the system. The results of the empirical study have indicated that, of the three quality dimensions, information quality was found to have the strongest association with the effectiveness of a Web-based semantic search engine. This finding is consistent with the observation in the literature that the aspects of the information quality should serve as a basis for evaluating the search outcomes from a semantic search engine. Measures under the information quality dimension that have a positive effect on informational gratification and user satisfaction were found to be recall and currency. Under the system quality dimension, response time and interactivity, were positively related to informational gratification. On the other hand, only one measure under the service quality dimension, reliability was found to have a positive relationship with user satisfaction. The results were based on the seven hypotheses that have been accepted. One may wonder why 15 out of the 23 hypotheses have been rejected and question the theoretical soundness of the model. However, the correlations between independent variables and dependent variables came out to be fairly high. This suggests that the structural equation model yielded results inconsistent with those of coefficient analysis, because the structural equation model intends to examine the relationship among independent variables as well as the relationship between independent variables and dependent variables. The findings offer some useful implications for owners of a semantic search engine, as far as the design and maintenance of the website is concerned. First, the system should be designed to respond to the user's query as fast as possible. Also it should be designed to support the search process by recommending, revising, and choosing a search query, so as to maximize users' interactions with the system. Second, the system should present search results with maximum recall and currency to effectively meet the users' expectations. Third, it should be capable of providing online services in a reliable and trustworthy manner. Finally, effective increase in user satisfaction requires the improvement of quality factors associated with a semantic search engine, which would in turn help increase the informational gratification for users. The proposed model can serve as a useful framework for measuring the success of a Web-based semantic search engine. Applying the search engine success framework to the measurement of search engine effectiveness has the potential to provide an outline of what areas of a semantic search engine needs improvement, in order to better meet information needs of users. Further research will be needed to make this idea a reality.

• Journal of Intelligence and Information Systems
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• v.24 no.4
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• pp.171-196
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• 2018

With the development of the web, two-way communication and evaluation became possible and marketing paradigms shifted. In order to meet the needs of consumers, web design trends are continuously responding to consumer feedback. As the web becomes more and more important, both academics and businesses are studying consumer emotions and satisfaction on the web. However, some consumer characteristics are not well considered. Demographic characteristics such as age and sex have been studied extensively, but few studies consider psychological characteristics such as regulatory focus (i.e., emotional regulation). In this study, we analyze the effect of web style on consumer emotion. Many studies analyze the relationship between the web and regulatory focus, but most concentrate on the purpose of web use, particularly motivation and information search, rather than on web style and design. The web communicates with users through visual elements. Because the human brain is influenced by all five senses, both design factors and emotional responses are important in the web environment. Therefore, in this study, we examine the relationship between consumer emotion and satisfaction and web style and design. Previous studies have considered the effects of web layout, structure, and color on emotions. In this study, however, we excluded these web components, in contrast to earlier studies, and analyzed the relationship between consumer satisfaction and emotional indexes of web-style only. To perform this analysis, we collected consumer surveys presenting 40 web style themes to 204 consumers. Each consumer evaluated four themes. The emotional adjectives evaluated by consumers were composed of 18 contrast pairs, and the upper emotional indexes were extracted through factor analysis. The emotional indexes were 'softness,' 'modernity,' 'clearness,' and 'jam.' Hypotheses were established based on the assumption that emotional indexes have different effects on consumer satisfaction. After the analysis, hypotheses 1, 2, and 3 were accepted and hypothesis 4 was rejected. While hypothesis 4 was rejected, its effect on consumer satisfaction was negative, not positive. This means that emotional indexes such as 'softness,' 'modernity,' and 'clearness' have a positive effect on consumer satisfaction. In other words, consumers prefer emotions that are soft, emotional, natural, rounded, dynamic, modern, elaborate, unique, bright, pure, and clear. 'Jam' has a negative effect on consumer satisfaction. It means, consumer prefer the emotion which is empty, plain, and simple. Regulatory focus shows differences in motivation and propensity in various domains. It is important to consider organizational behavior and decision making according to the regulatory focus tendency, and it affects not only political, cultural, ethical judgments and behavior but also broad psychological problems. Regulatory focus also differs from emotional response. Promotion focus responds more strongly to positive emotional responses. On the other hand, prevention focus has a strong response to negative emotions. Web style is a type of service, and consumer satisfaction is affected not only by cognitive evaluation but also by emotion. This emotional response depends on whether the consumer will benefit or harm himself. Therefore, it is necessary to confirm the difference of the consumer's emotional response according to the regulatory focus which is one of the characteristics and viewpoint of the consumers about the web style. After MMR analysis result, hypothesis 5.3 was accepted, and hypothesis 5.4 was rejected. But hypothesis 5.4 supported in the opposite direction to the hypothesis. After validation, we confirmed the mechanism of emotional response according to the tendency of regulatory focus. Using the results, we developed the structure of web-style recommendation system and recommend methods through regulatory focus. We classified the regulatory focus group in to three categories that promotion, grey, prevention. Then, we suggest web-style recommend method along the group. If we further develop this study, we expect that the existing regulatory focus theory can be extended not only to the motivational part but also to the emotional behavioral response according to the regulatory focus tendency. Moreover, we believe that it is possible to recommend web-style according to regulatory focus and emotional desire which consumers most prefer.

• Journal of Global Scholars of Marketing Science
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• v.18 no.1
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• pp.33-58
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• 2008

Previous research has presupposed that the evaluation of consumer who received any recovery after experiencing product failure should be better than the evaluation of consumer who did not receive any recovery. The major purposes of this article are to examine impacts of product defect failures rather than service failures, and to explore effects of recovery on postrecovery product attitudes. First, this article deals with the occurrence of severe and unsevere failure and corresponding service recovery toward tangible products rather than intangible services. Contrary to intangible services, purchase and usage are separable for tangible products. This difference makes it clear that executing an recovery strategy toward tangible products is not plausible right after consumers find out product failures. The consumers may think about backgrounds and causes for the unpleasant events during the time gap between product failure and recovery. The deliberation may dilutes positive effects of recovery efforts. The recovery strategies which are provided to consumers experiencing product failures can be classified into three types. A recovery strategy can be implemented to provide consumers with a new product replacing the old defective product, a complimentary product for free, a discount at the time of the failure incident, or a coupon that can be used on the next visit. This strategy is defined as "a rewarding effort." Meanwhile a product failure may arise in exchange for its benefit. Then the product provider can suggest a detail explanation that the defect is hard to escape since it relates highly to the specific advantage to the product. The strategy may be called as "a strengthening effort." Another possible strategy is to recover negative attitude toward own brand by giving prominence to the disadvantages of a competing brand rather than the advantages of its own brand. The strategy is reflected as "a weakening effort." This paper emphasizes that, in order to confirm its effectiveness, a recovery strategy should be compared to being nothing done in response to the product failure. So the three types of recovery efforts is discussed in comparison to the situation involving no recovery effort. The strengthening strategy is to claim high relatedness of the product failure with another advantage, and expects the two-sidedness to ease consumers' complaints. The weakening strategy is to emphasize non-aversiveness of product failure, even if consumers choose another competitive brand. The two strategies can be effective in restoring to the original state, by providing plausible motives to accept the condition of product failure or by informing consumers of non-responsibility in the failure case. However the two may be less effective strategies than the rewarding strategy, since it tries to take care of the rehabilitation needs of consumers. Especially, the relative effect between the strengthening effort and the weakening effort may differ in terms of the severity of the product failure. A consumer who realizes a highly severe failure is likely to attach importance to the property which caused the failure. This implies that the strengthening effort would be less effective under the condition of high product severity. Meanwhile, the failing property is not diagnostic information in the condition of low failure severity. Consumers would not pay attention to non-diagnostic information, and with which they are not likely to change their attitudes. This implies that the strengthening effort would be more effective under the condition of low product severity. A 2 (product failure severity: high or low) X 4 (recovery strategies: rewarding, strengthening, weakening, or doing nothing) between-subjects design was employed. The particular levels of product failure severity and the types of recovery strategies were determined after a series of expert interviews. The dependent variable was product attitude after the recovery effort was provided. Subjects were 284 consumers who had an experience of cosmetics. Subjects were first given a product failure scenario and were asked to rate the comprehensibility of the failure scenario, the probability of raising complaints against the failure, and the subjective severity of the failure. After a recovery scenario was presented, its comprehensibility and overall evaluation were measured. The subjects assigned to the condition of no recovery effort were exposed to a short news article on the cosmetic industry. Next, subjects answered filler questions: 42 items of the need for cognitive closure and 16 items of need-to-evaluate. In the succeeding page a subject's product attitude was measured on an five-item, six-point scale, and a subject's repurchase intention on an three-item, six-point scale. After demographic variables of age and sex were asked, ten items of the subject's objective knowledge was checked. The results showed that the subjects formed more favorable evaluations after receiving rewarding efforts than after receiving either strengthening or weakening efforts. This is consistent with Hoffman, Kelley, and Rotalsky (1995) in that a tangible service recovery could be more effective that intangible efforts. Strengthening and weakening efforts also were effective compared to no recovery effort. So we found that generally any recovery increased products attitudes. The results hint us that a recovery strategy such as strengthening or weakening efforts, although it does not contain a specific reward, may have an effect on consumers experiencing severe unsatisfaction and strong complaint. Meanwhile, strengthening and weakening efforts were not expected to increase product attitudes under the condition of low severity of product failure. We can conclude that only a physical recovery effort may be recognized favorably as a firm's willingness to recover its fault by consumers experiencing low involvements. Results of the present experiment are explained in terms of the attribution theory. This article has a limitation that it utilized fictitious scenarios. Future research deserves to test a realistic effect of recovery for actual consumers. Recovery involves a direct, firsthand experience of ex-users. Recovery does not apply to non-users. The experience of receiving recovery efforts can be relatively more salient and accessible for the ex-users than for non-users. A recovery effort might be more likely to improve product attitude for the ex-users than for non-users. Also the present experiment did not include consumers who did not have an experience of the products and who did not perceive the occurrence of product failure. For the non-users and the ignorant consumers, the recovery efforts might lead to decreased product attitude and purchase intention. This is because the recovery trials may give an opportunity for them to notice the product failure.