ABSTRACT
People’s sensory input guides their daily experiences. That in itself is perhaps not too surprising, as our perception has to draw information from the dierent senses to understand and perceive the world around us. However, what is interesting is the way in which our dierent senses aect our perception. It is also noteworthy that dierent types of stimuli can be used to alter an individual’s perception of stimuli. The vast eld of visual perception has shown that visual input generally dominates human perception, as it allows people to rapidly recognize environmental obstacles, colours, shapes etc. (Heller & Clark, 2008; Schierstein, 2006). However, in the last couple of decades researchers have increasingly found that other senses can at times dominate our perception and subsequently make vision a secondary source of input (e.g., Jansson-Boyd, 2011, Spence & Gallace, 2011). From a consumer perspective, this is important as it opens up multiple new possibilities concerning how marketers, product designers and manufacturers can communicate with consumers as well as aect how stimuli are perceived. Increasingly, there is emerging evidence for how the dierent senses (vision, touch, smell, hearing and taste) all independently make valid contributions to consumer perception. It is also evident from the current research literature that our senses are very much connected and that one often aects the others in terms of evaluation of consumer products, environments and services (e.g., Spence & Gallace, 2011). Consequently, it is important to understand not only how the senses work in isolation but also what the role of multisensory perception in consumption is. In most consumer settings our perception will be exposed to multiple sensory stimuli, such as music (auditory) and fragrance (smell), often in addition to visual input. So if we truly wish to comprehend how consumers perceive products and consumer environments, it needs to be understood how the senses interact, as it is not possible to segregate one from another in real-life settings. However, before senses are looked at in unison, in order to produce ecologically valid ndings similar to those of a genuine consumer experience, it is important to appreciate how they aect perception individually.
