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Consumer Perception of Mobile Phone Attributes

Conference Paper · July 2010

DOI: 10.1201/EBK1439835074-82

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 Consumer Perception of
Mobile Phone Attributes
Tao Zhang 1, Pei-Luen Patrick Rau 2, Jia Zhou 2
1
Department of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science
Vanderbilt University, TN 37211, USA
2
Department of Industrial Engineering,
Tsinghua University, Beijing, 100084, China

ABSTRACT
This paper reported results from a questionnaire survey of consumer perception of
product attributes of mobile phones and how they consider the importance of each
product attribute. The questionnaire contained 35 items covering brand, physical
attributes, functional attributes, and beneficial attributes. All the items were
measured with 7-point Likert scale anchored from “strongly disagree” to “strongly
agree”. The questionnaire was administrated online to a broad sample (N=215) in
China. An exploratory factor analysis was conducted to find out the latent
constructs of mobile phone product attributes, which also reflect consumers’
common idea of attribute category. Eight factors, accounting for 62.88% of the total
variation, were identified: common functions, appearance, multimedia functions,
connectivity, personal information management functions, body design, brand &
country, and product image. These attribute factors can be used as a basis for
understanding of product attributes and its influencing factors. Results from the
factor analysis also provide information about what consumers are concerned about
when they evaluate mobile phones or make purchase decisions.

Keywords: Product Attributes, Perception, Mobile Phones

INTRODUCTION
The perception of various product attributes gives the first impression for
consumers, particularly when they have limited time and bandwidth to do a
thorough research on a new product. This perception of attributes also has strong
relation with consumer judgment of whether the product will satisfy their needs.
Studying the structure of product attributions based on consumer perceptions will
help practitioners to understand consumers’ acceptance of products. This is
2

especially important for mobile phones as more and more technologies and
functional designs have been integrated into new mobile phones. Consumer
requirements of mobile phone are now not limited to the basic communication
functions, but also on functions for other mobile applications, efficiency, ease of use
and comfort. Unlike other interactive systems (e.g., desktop computing), consumer
criteria of judging benefits expected from mobile phones include factors like
function specification, aesthetics, brand image, self-feeling and user experience.
These factors altogether add influence on the overall consumer perception.
Therefore, the objective of this study was to provide a quantitative and structural
assessment of consumer perceptions of product attributes of mobile phones.

LITERATURE REVIEW

PRODUCT ATTRIBUTES

Earlier studies such as Lancaster (1966) held that attributes are the objective
physical aspects of a product. He said that people do not acquire products for the
sake of the products themselves, but for the utility that is produced by
characteristics of the products attributes. However, many of the product
characteristics that are important from the point of view of consumers as well as
designers are neither physical nor objective. Therefore, according to Grunet (1989),
product attribute is “any aspect of the product itself or its use that can be used to
compare product alternatives.” “Each alternative can (but need not) be characterized
by all attributes, that is, using one attribute does not preclude using another”
(Nelson, 1970). Attributes may concern concrete product properties, practical
consequences the product and its use and possession may cause, or consequences
related to consumers’ personal values.
Product Attributes are requirement factors placed on a product from a consumer.
Every product item is viewed as a combination of correlative product attributes by
the consumer. The designed functions of the product, together with the appearance,
price, brand, package and after-sale service, are all parts of product attributes.
“Attribute is said to be important if a change in the individual’s perception of that
product attribute leads to a change in the attitude toward the product.” (Jaccard,
Brinberg, & Ackerman, 1986). Attribute importance is characterized by the salience
and determinacy of an attribute. Salience refers to the accessibility of the attribute,
and determinacy to the correlation between an attribute and overall preference.
Lefkoff-Hagius and Mason (1990) created a synthesis from a number of earlier
studies and divided product attributes into the three categories: characteristics
attributes, beneficial attributes and image attributes. Characteristics attributes are
related to the physical properties of a product; beneficial attributes refer to benefits
or risks that the product may cause; and image attributes are properties of the
product that have an ability to define the product owner’s relation to other people or
self.
 Chapter title 3

INFLUENCE OF PRODUCT ATTRIBUTES

Consumer perception of product attributes can influence the formation and change
of attitude, thereby impose its influence on buying behavior. Kotler and Armstrong
(2005) said that consumers regard product as the combination of product attributes
which are capable to satisfy their interests or requirements. Consumers make
evaluation and choice according to certain rules regarding the performance of
product attributes, and the importance they put on every attribute. Payne (1976)
suggested that consumers attach different importance on product attributes. In
certain occasions, only one single product attribute can lead to the buying decision,
while in some other occasions there is a complex process when they are making any
decision based on product attributes. Bahn et al. (2007) studied how feel of material,
elasticity, tactile oneness, shape, and color of the passenger car crash pad influences
satisfaction. The results indicated that softness of material was the key affective
response factor of satisfaction. Product attributes also influence affect. Seva et al.
(2007) found strong relationship between attributes of mobile phone and pre-
purchase affect. For example, slimmer phones increase feeling of contentment and
encouragement, larger display increase feelings of amazement and encouragement.
Fishbein (1975) proposed the Multi-attribute Attitude Model, in which he stated
that the attitude towards certain products will be reflected by the evaluation of
important attributes, then attitude can be assessed by measuring the evaluation of
these attributes:
n
Ao   bi ei , where
i 1

Ao = Attitude towards the product

bi = The strength of belief on product attribute i
ei = The performance rating of product attribute i
n = Number of important product attributes

METHODOLOGY

ITEMS OF PRODUCT ATTRIBUTES GENERATION

Based on examination of prior work on similar products and analysis of the

characteristics of mobile phones, an initial pool of items was developed. Items about
function specification were based on the official websites of major mobile phone
manufacturers. More items were developed by the author to cover all the three
classifications of product attributes (characteristics attributes, beneficial attributes
and image attributes). All the items were measured with 7-point Likert scale
anchored at “strongly disagree” and “strongly agree”. Two criteria were used to
determine which product attribute information will be presented in the
4

questionnaire: the respondent should understand what the specified attribute is; and
the attribute should be relatively important to consumers during their assessment of
perceived usability.
Initial items of product attributes were firstly examined by the authors according
to the correlation between items, and then critiques of items were sought from a
focus group discussion. Three Ph.D. students and two master students majoring in
Human-Computer Interaction (HCI) took part in the focus group discussion. They
were all familiar with the research topic and questionnaire design. The aim of focus
group discussion was to check if there were ambiguities in the wording of items, if
there were important missing items regarding mobile phone products, and if there
were any inconsistencies in the arrangement of items and overall questionnaire
design. Several items were adjusted and wording modifications were made from the
critiques. Two master students majoring in Social Science and one master student
majoring in Economics were then asked to examine the adjusted questionnaire. The
focus of their work was to check if there was overlap between items, if there were
suggestive wordings in the item descriptions, and if there were questions that may
exceed respondents’ knowledge and proficiency. The author took their feedback and
incorporated it in the final revision of the questionnaire. There were 35 items in the
final version of the questionnaire. These items were categorized into: brand,
physical attributes, functional attributes, and beneficial attributes, which were
similar to categories in the study by Lefkoff-Hagius and Mason (1990).

DATA COLLECTION

The questionnaire was administrated online to a broad sample in China including

undergraduate and graduate students in several universities in Beijing, employees
working in telecommunication industry, manufacturing industry, consulting
company, and the government. A total of 215 responses were collected. As shown
in Table 1, although more than half of the respondents are college students, the
sample represents a wide range of mobile phone consumers with different age,
education level, and income. The majority of respondents are young people with
high level of education and middle level of income in China. The questionnaire
began with an introduction of the survey objectives, followed by a survey of
demographic information, mobile phone usage and experience. Then the list of 35
items was given. Respondents were asked to choose the extent to which they agree
with the descriptive items for the mobile phone product attributes. They were
encouraged to put down their email addresses to get a copy of the result analysis.
 Chapter title 5

Table 1 Demographic profile of questionnaire respondents

NUMBER OF
VARIABLE CATEGORY PERCENTAGE
RESPONSES

<20 years 5 2.3%

Age 20-25 years 172 80%
26-30 years 35 16.3%
>30 years 3 1.4%
Gender Female 82 38.1%
Male 133 61.9%
High school 3 1.4%
Associate degree 6 2.8%
Education Level
4 years undergraduate 90 41.9%
Master student 100 46.5%
Doctorial student 16 7.4%
Government official
7 3.3%
/Company manager
Technician/Engineer 42 19.5%
Occupation
Business/Service
10 4.7%
employee
Student 136 63.3%
Others 20 9.4%
<1000 RMB 140 65.1%
Monthly Income 1000-5000 RMB 52 24.2%
5000 - 1000 RMB 21 9.8%
>10000 RMB 2 0.9%

RESULTS
Exploratory factor analysis is a method for reducing the dimensionality of
multivariate data and understanding patterns of association among variables, with
the underlying common factor model. The model assumes that the observed
variance in each measure is attributable to a relatively small number of common
factors and a single specific factor. The objective of exploratory factor analysis is to
identify the common factors and explain their relationship to the observed data, and
the factor solution is derived from the patterns of association in the observations
(Lattin, Carroll, & Green, 2002).
An exploratory factor analysis was conducted in SAS to determine the “latent
traits” of the items of product attributes. Principal axis factoring approach and the
varimax rotation method was used. After deleting one item causing almost equal
loadings on two common factors, the result shows that the first eight common
factors account for 62.88% of the total variation in data. Items were then assigned to
the common factors, given the criteria that factor loadings of items should be higher
than 0.5. The result of exploratory factor analysis is shown in Table 2.
6

Table 2 Internal consistencies, means, standard deviations and factor loadings of

attribute items
FACTOR
FACTORS ITEMS MEAN SD
LOADINGS

I believe input method is an important

Common feature for me to judge whether the 5.87 1.263 0.78
functions mobile phone is easy to use.
(α = 0.89, I think the short message functions
Variance (storage and manipulation) are important 5.97 1.199 0.82
accounted for me.
for = 4.27) I think the phonebook functions (storage
5.95 1.274 0.85
and manipulation) are important to me.
I think the battery time is important. 6.04 1.087 0.77
I will be attracted by the appearance
design of certain mobile phone and then 5.01 1.448 0.75
want to own it.
Appearance If I like the appearance of certain mobile
4.92 1.450 0.72
(α = 0.79， phone, I will be very interested in it.
Variance I think the body color is important to me. 5.04 1.395 0.73
accounted I like the mobile phone appearance with
for = 3.46) 4.85 1.370 0.65
special material.
I think it is a great pleasure to show the
special appearance design of mobile 4.61 1.549 0.55
phone to others.
I think the GRRS connection is
3.93 1.722 0.55
Connectivity important.
(α = 0.70， I will consider the connectivity
Variance (USB/Infrared/Bluetooth/Wifi) when 4.98 1.607 0.75
accounted choosing mobile phone.
for = 2.44) I will consider the accessories available
5.08 1.450 0.57
when choosing mobile phone.
Body design I think one particular body design in
2.44 1.281 -0.97
(Variance more suitable for me.
accounted I think the body design should not be
5.56 1.281 0.97
for =2.15) considered to be important.
PIM I will ask about the capability to deal with
Functions events like temporary note/number 5.07 1.600 0.63
(α = 0.67， taking when buying a mobile phone.
Variance I think the date planning functions like
accounted notepad, to do list, memo are important 5.26 1.436 0.59
for =2.11) to me.
 Chapter title 7

I think the voice recording function is

4.08 1.488 0.70
important to me.
Brand & I will only use certain brands of mobile
5.13 1.657 0.65
Country phone.
(α = 0.69， I will choose mobile phones from certain
3.43 1.625 0.75
Variance countries.
accounted I will exclude mobile phones from certain
4.27 1.939 0.57
for =1.92) countries.
Product
image
I believe the mobile phone design partly
(Variance 4.89 1.457 0.71
represents my life style.
accounted
for =1.61)

CONCLUSIONS
There is no precise definition of product attributes for mobile phones, as consumers
generally perceive product attributes in a conceptual way. The notion of product
attributes is formed and existing during the perception process. Previous studies on
mobile phones mainly considered individual attributes, without a systematic view of
how all the attributes influence perception of mobile phones as a whole. This study
fills this gap. The exploratory factor analysis was appropriate to find out the latent
constructs of mobile phone product attributes, which also reflect consumers’
common idea of attribute categories. Eight factors were identified: common
functions, appearance, multimedia functions, connectivity, personal information
management functions, body design, brand & country, and product image, which
accounted for 62.88% of the total variation. Important factors such common
functions and appearance are identified. Since people use mobile phones for daily
communications, they stress the importance of phonebook and SMS functions. Ease
of use of input methods also influences their perception of common functions. The
quantitative approach used in the present study can be beneficial to similar studies
of consumer digital products. Results of this study can be smoothly implemented
into design and marketing practice as a perceptive model. Limited resources can be
efficiently allocated to important attributes.

REFERENCES
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relationship between affective responses and product design attributes for
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Fishbein, M., and Ajzen, I. (1975). Belief, Attitude, Intention, and Behavior: An
Introduction to Theory and Research. Reading. MA: Addison-Wesley.
 8

Grunet, K. G. (1989). “Attributes, Attribute Value and Their Characteristics: A

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