Integrating Compositional and Decompositional Analyses to Represent the Intervening Role of Perceptions in Evaluative Judgments

In the study of preference formation, compositional methods (e.g., linear compensatory attitude models) and decompositional techniques (e.g., conjoint analysis) have developed along relatively separate paths. The author attempts to integrate these two approaches via a two-stage model of evaluative judgment whose testing incorporates aspects of both analytic procedures. Specifically, the overall effect of objective product features on affect is broken down into a compositional relationship of affect to perceptions (i.e., attitude structure) and a decompositional analysis of the dependence of perceptions on product features (i.e., psychophysical relations). The approach is illustrated by a study of aesthetic preferences among piano performances differing in four factorially arrayed musical features (tempo, rhythm, dynamics, and phrasing). An integration of decompositional and compositional methods generates a summary path-analytic diagram that clearly represents the process wherein objective product features shape perceptions which, in turn, determine affect. This integrative approach appears to be applicable in several marketing contexts.