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Emotional Factors in Currency Perception

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Abstract

People may fill currencies with moral and emotional meanings and become attached to currencies in a similar way that they are attached to a brand. Such meanings and affective attachments to a currency may result in people’s resistance to proposed currency changes as well as playing a significant role in everyday consumer behaviour. Following Tajfel’s accentuation theory, it is shown in two studies that (1) opinions that prices in a currency (labelled an “expensive currency”) are high result in perception of prices in this currency as higher than prices in another currency, and that (2) positive affect attached to a currency results in perception of prices in this currency being higher than prices expressed in a currency which is not emotionally laden.

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Acknowledgement

The authors would like to express their gratitude to the National Bank of Poland for financial support for the research presented in this article.

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Correspondence to Krzysztof Przybyszewski.

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Przybyszewski, K., Tyszka, T. Emotional Factors in Currency Perception. J Consum Policy 30, 355–365 (2007). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10603-007-9047-0

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10603-007-9047-0

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