Influence of different cues on the color-flavor incongruency effect during packaging searching

Consumers tend to match the color of food packaging with its flavor. Previous studies have demonstrated the effect of color guidance based on expectation on visual search. Other studies suggested that cues from different sensory patterns can also influence visual search. Here we explore how cues presented through different senses affect top-down search based on color expectations in a visual search task. This study investigated the difference of the color-flavor incongruency effect in the visual search task under four different types of flavor cues were presented (visual cue, auditory cue, visual-auditory cue, and self-directed speech cue). The behavioral results revealed that the search accuracy and response time for the color-flavor incongruent target were significantly lower and slower than those for the color-flavor congruent target in all four conditions. In addition, the response time under self-directed speech condition and auditory-cue condition were significantly shorter than under visual and auditory presented cue simultaneously. These results showed that cues appeared through a single channel as well as across channels influence product search based on expectations, and shed some light on how consumers can search for products more efficiently in shopping malls.