Professor
Forehand's research interests are focused on three interrelated issues:
implicit cognition, consumer social identity, and
attitude inference. Implicit cognition is argued to occur when
prior exposure to a stimulus influences an individual's
attitudes without the individual being consciously aware of its
influence. He is currently investigating several forms of
implicit cognition including unconscious response to celebrity
voiceovers in advertising, the positive effects of implicit
self-referencing, and the influence of primes in advertising on
consumer self-concept. To facilitate the study of these topics,
his research has frequently incorporated implicit measurement of
consumer attitudes using the Implicit Association Test.
His
research on consumer social identity is also built from various
implicit cognition frameworks. Together with colleagues, he has found that consumer social identities can be activated by a
number of factors including the distinctiveness of the identity
in the consumer's social environment, the enduring strength of
identification the consumer has with that identity, and
contextual identity primes in advertising or other media
content. When activated, these identities often drive consumer
response to advertising and brands. Professor Forehand and his
colleagues are also studying the
structure of consumer's implicit self-concept, the potential
reinforcing effects of identity-based evaluation, and the
strategic implications of consumer identity for marketing
managers.
Professor
Forehand's final stream of research studies the effects of attribution and
inference on consumer attitude development. In his dissertation,
he found that consumer attributions of the intent behind
marketing promotions influenced how consumers responded to
previously promoted products. More recently, he has found that consumer beliefs about corporate motives
influence how the consumer responds to corporate social
responsibility programs. This research stream has also produced
a joint effort with University of Washington researchers in
Speech Communication and Political Science on the heuristic
effects of endorsements in initiative elections.
