Effect of Motivation Type and Reward Uncertainty on Consumers’ Marketing Promotion Participation

Abstract

The current research proposes to fill a research gap by testing how reward uncertainty, different types of motivation, as well as individual risk-taking attitude affect consumers’ promotion participation. Being offered with an uncertain reward, relative to individuals with extrinsic motivation, individuals with intrinsic motivation will have greater intention to participate in marketing promotion. In contrast, being offered with a certain reward, relative to individuals with intrinsic motivation, individuals with extrinsic motivation will have greater intention to participate in marketing promotion. This effect arises only among consumers having a low level of risk-taking attitude. For consumers having a high level of risk-taking attitude, their participation intention shows no significant difference between the two motivation type groups, under both certain and uncertain reward conditions. With an understanding of how consumer’s response heterogeneously to promotions involving rewards, marketers can better understand not only how to use this promotional tactic more effectively, but also how to better allocate their budget for promotions.

Keywords

• reward uncertainty
• motivation type
• risk-taking attitude
• promotion