Testing scales for attitude towards beer: The case of two brands of beer of the same producer

There is an increasing amount of literature focused on beer purchase and consumption, both micro- and macro-economic studies. The aim of the paper is to tests scales for attitudes towards Tuborg and Carlsberg beers, and to compare Cronbach's alphas for the two brands when evaluated by the same respondents. Both brands are produced by the Carlsberg Group, and both are lagers. The Carlsberg Group markets Tuborg as a more premium brand, and it also aims at women. The research was conducted in Denmark using an on-line questionnaire. The attitudes were measured in three dimensions - affective, cognitive, and conative. Affective and cognitive dimensions were measured using already validated instruments, while the conative dimension (for which no validated instrument was found) is based on consumption of a particular brand of beer. With regards to finding, Cronbach's alpha for the affective dimension was .944 for Tuborg and .956 for Carlsberg; Cronbach's alpha for the cognitive dimension was .785 for Tuborg and .886 for Carlsberg; and Cronbach's alpha for the conative dimension was .843 for Tuborg and .906 for Carlsberg. Although all scales had their Cronbach's alphas over .7, it is surprising that the difference in Cronbach's alpha for the cognitive dimension for the two brands was approximately .1 in spite of the fact that the statements for the scales were evaluated at the same time by the same respondents.