Periodic pricing and perceived contract benefits
Atlas and Bartels show that framing a cost as a stream of frequent payments (periodic pricing) changes how people tally the benefits. A charity request framed as a daily amount led people to think about the benefits of many small gifts, which they often found more appealing than one large gift. Across eight laboratory experiments and one field study, periodic pricing raised perceived benefits, especially for the first few units, which are valued more than later ones. Journal of Consumer Research, 2018; authors Stephen A. Atlas and Daniel M. Bartels.
Atlas and Bartels show that framing a cost as a stream of frequent payments (periodic pricing) changes how people tally the benefits. A charity request framed as a daily amount led people to think about the benefits of many small gifts, which they often found more appealing than one large gift. Across eight laboratory experiments and one field study, periodic pricing raised perceived benefits, especially for the first few units, which are valued more than later ones. Journal of Consumer Research, 2018; authors Stephen A. Atlas and Daniel M. Bartels.
Written from the abstract, OpenAlex, 2026-11-03; Crossref record checked for authors and year, volume and pages not given there; full text not read.
What our sources record
Recorded when this source was checked, figures included, with page references and quotation marks removed.
Journal of Consumer Research. doi:10.1093/jcr/ucx127 https://doi.org/10.1093/jcr/ucx127