Previous research has shown that consumer preferences have both hedonic and utilitarian dimensions. The aesthetic aspect of a product is normally taken as a source of hedonic consumption. What we are mostly interested in is whether the product aesthetic attribute will dominate consumer choice rather than product functional attributes? And how a preference of product aesthetic attribute will evoke the critical justification effect on hedonic consumption? Based on the research on loss aversion that demonstrates an asymmetry in evaluations depending on the direction of the proposed trade, the authors predict that differential loss aversion for product attributes may be a function of attribute importance for consumer. Therefore, this article conducted some trade-off decision tasks under the condition of given same price for each pair of comparable aesthetic-functional attributes, in order to examine which of both opposite attributes consumer will forfeiture under the price and other attributes equals. The authors chose mp3 players as the experiment target, and design four pairs of hypothetical products, focusing on salient aesthetic versus salient functional attribute respectively, namely push button with planer vs. convex style, USB connector is hided vs. exposed, with speaker vs. non, and with touch screen vs. non. In addition, due to different aesthetic acumens among consumers, the authors clustered respondents into several groups based on the measurement of the centrality of visual product aesthetic (CVPA). The findings indicate that this aesthetic-functional trade-offs design can derive the asymmetry in preferences of relative loss aversion between product aesthetic and functional attributes, which has significant heterogeneities among consumers with different CVPA.
