Question 6.23

6.23 Font naturalness and perceived healthiness. Can the font used in a packaged product affect our perception of the product’s healthiness? It was hypothesized that use of a natural font, which looks more handwritten and tends to be more slanted and curved, would lead to a higher perception of product healthiness than an unnatural font. Two fonts, Impact and Sketchflow Print, were used. These fonts were shown in a previous study to differ in their perceived naturalness, but otherwise were rated similarly on factors such as readability and likeability. Images of two identical packages, differing only in the font used, were available to be presented to the subjects. Participants read statements such as, “This product is healthy,” “This product is wholesome,” This product is natural,” and “This product is organic.” They then rated how much they agreed with the statements on a seven-point scale with “1” indicating strong agreement and “7” indicating strong disagreement. Each subject’s responses were combined to create a perceived healthiness score. The researchers have 100 students available to serve as subjects.

  1. (a) Outline a completely randomized design to learn the effect of font naturalness on perceived healthiness.

  2. (b) Describe in detail the design of a matched pairs experiment, using the same 100 subjects, in which each subject serves as his or her own control.