Key Takeaways:
Around the world, cultural differences and data collection methods influence how adults and children use scales.
In Africa, Middle East and South Asian countries, our research shows that people avoid the low ends of survey scales. With a 9-point liking hedonic scale, these consumers rate products an average of 7.4 or higher, a pattern we interpret as acquiescence bias. In the data from Saudi Arabia, not a single person used any scale points between 1 and 6.
Other scales have similar results in these regions. In Saudi Arabia and Egypt, almost everyone said all attributes were “Just Right” using the Just About Right (JAR) diagnostic scale. In India, nearly half of consumers in the study rated 15 of 28 attributes as “Extremely/Very Important” on the 5-point importance scale. Such results can fail to provide the information brands need for strategic product decisions.
On top of a cultural tendency to avoid low ratings, interview formats also can affect ratings. Across most cultures, central location tests using in-person interviews tend to result in higher ratings than those using self-administered surveys. In countries like Saudi Arabia and South Africa, where in-person interviews are the preferred survey format, the acquiescence bias is therefore further amplified, inflating ratings even more.
Taken together, these results suggest that averaging product ratings across countries is not advisable and can distort the patterns of findings. With global data sets, brands must analyze each country’s ratings separately to get the best insights.
The good news? While rating scale behaviors vary across regions, consumer preferences remain largely consistent. Of course, tests can uncover regional preferences, providing valuable direction for brands (another reason it’s worthwhile to look at data per country). Still, in most cases, the rank order of product appeal remains the same across very distinct cultures. Even when countries use different parts of the scale, consumers agree on which products are the best—and the worst.
Go Deeper:
While global product scale ratings should not be averaged, P&K’s findings suggest that some global data harmonization is possible. Alternative scale-free methods or analyses focused on things like preference or ranking can offer a sound basis for collecting more discriminating results and summarizing global data.
When assessing product attributes, companies can explore replacing the JAR scale with a JAR Check-All-That-Apply (CATA) method. Follow-up questions about attributes not marked “just right” can help deliver more discriminating results.
Likewise, the KANO model is an alternative to the 5-point importance scale. With KANO, businesses can categorize and prioritize product features from least important to expected, most important, and delighter.
Final Insights:
While consumer rating scales can be useful tools, global brands must never overlook the significance of cultural differences and survey methods. By examining country results individually and leveraging alternative methods as needed, companies can acquire the data to create and refine products aligned with real consumer preferences.
To discuss your product research needs and best practices, contact P&K Research today.