'Replication of Study 2 of Huang, Wong, and Wan (2019) (Prolific)'
(AsPredicted #35,647)
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1) Have any data been collected for this study already?
No, no data have been collected for this study yet.

2) What's the main question being asked or hypothesis being tested in this study?
This study is a replication of Study 2 in Huang, Wong, and Wan (2019), “The Influence of Product Anthropomorphism on Comparative Choice,” published in the Journal of Consumer Research. This study examines the hypothesis that “anthropomorphism increases consumers’ use of an absolute judgment strategy (vs. a dimension-by-dimension strategy) in comparative judgment, leading to increased preference for the option with a more favorable overall evaluation over the option with a greater number of superior dimensions.” We had run a previous replication on MTurk (AsPredicted #33160); we are running this one on Prolific.

3) Describe the key dependent variable(s) specifying how they will be measured.
Participants will be shown two laptops called Belio 2.0 and Litek 2.0. Litek is the dimension-dominant laptop (i.e., it is superior on more dimensions) and Belio 2.0 is the absolute-dominant laptop (i.e., it has a higher star rating overall). Participants will be asked to rate, on 9-point scales, “Which laptop do you like more?” and “Which laptop would you like to own more?,” coded such that 1= Litek 2.0 and 9 = Belio 2.0. Responses to these two questions will be averaged.

4) How many and which conditions will participants be assigned to?
We will manipulate whether the laptops are humanized (anthromorphism condition) or not (control condition). In the anthropomorphism condition, the instructions will appear on the same page as the laptop descriptions and read:
“‘Hello! My name is Belio. You won't regret choosing me!’
‘Hey! I am Litek. You should choose me!’
Now please imagine that each of the two laptops had come to life as a distinctive person who wants to catch your eyes (one with the name "Belio", the other with the name "Litek"). Which one is more attractive?”
In the control condition, the instructions will appear on the page before the laptops are displayed, and will read:
“On the next page, you will find the descriptions of two laptop computers. A table lists the available information about the two laptops along three different dimensions. Please process the following information, and then make the decision.”

There are also counterbalancing manipulations embedded in the survey (i.e., order in which laptops are presented, order in which attributes are presented) that we will collapse across in all analyses.

5) Specify exactly which analyses you will conduct to examine the main question/hypothesis.
We will conduct a t-test to see whether the anthropomorphism vs. control condition differed on the primary DV.

6) Describe exactly how outliers will be defined and handled, and your precise rule(s) for excluding observations.
We will exclude from the main analyses any participant who answered “yes” to a question at the end of the study that asked, “Did you ever do a study very similar to this one? Your answer to this question will not influence your payment of this study.”

7) How many observations will be collected or what will determine sample size?
No need to justify decision, but be precise about exactly how the number will be determined.
We will collect data from 600 U.S. participants on Prolific.

8) Anything else you would like to pre-register?
(e.g., secondary analyses, variables collected for exploratory purposes, unusual analyses planned?)
This study also includes three items designed to serve as a manipulation check of anthropomorphism. We will average those three measures together and conduct a t-test to see if the two conditions differed on this scale.

Note that the experimental manipulation in this study is somewhat confounded. Not only are the laptops humanized in one condition vs. another, but they are described somewhat differently. For example, Belio says that “you won’t regret choosing me” in the anthropomorphism condition, and so people in that condition may see it as the better, less regretful choice. There is also the additional possibility that people just like the human name “Belio” more than the human name “Litek.”