After making a purchase and using a product, many consumers experience postpurchase dissonance, or anxiety and doubt about the purchase they$$ve made. Dissonance is most common in high involvement, extended decision making. Similarly, some consumers also use or consume a product and experience consumption guilt. Consumption guilt occurs when negative emotions or guilt feelings are aroused by the use of a product or a service.

The goal of this activity it to demonstrate your understanding of the various methods that consumers may undertake in order to avoid postpurchase dissonance or consumption guilt. This activity is important as marketers and advertisers must understand the ways in which consumers seek to reduce negative feelings associated with the use or consumption of a product in order to instead associate positive feelings and emotions with their brand.

In this two$-$part activity, you will be given a scenario to which you must decide if it represents either postpurchase dissonance or consumption guilt. Then you must determine which method should be used to reduce the dissonance or consumption guilt that is presented in the scenario.

Part $1$: Read each item to determine whether the scenario describes postpurchase dissonance or consumption guilt.

Sabrina saved up money from work over the summer and bought herself a new laptop for the new school year. However, in the first month of class Sabrina notices that her laptop doesn$$t have the functionalities that her friends$$ laptops do$.$ Sabrina reminds herself that hers is technically a more expensive and well$-$known brand so she$$s sure hers has capabilities that theirs do not.

A$.$ Consumption Guilt

B$.$ Postpurchase dissonance