Correspondence: Eugene Kaciak, Department of Finance, Operations & IS, Faculty of Business, Brock University, St. Catharines, Ontario, Canada L2S 3A1. E-mail: ekaciak@brocku.ca

¹is Associate Professor of Management at Brock University in St. Catharines, Ontario, Canada. He earned both his MSc in Economics (1973) in the field of Management Science and his PhD in the field of Econometrics (1977) at Warsaw School of Economics (Poland). He has published papers in a number of scientific journals, including Journal of Marketing Research, Journal of International Consumer Marketing, Journal of Targeting, Measurement and Analysis for Marketing, International Business & Economics Research Journal, Journal of Microcomputer Applications and Revue Internationale PME.

²is a three-time winner of the Faculty of Excellence award in the Faculty of Business at Brock University. Carman has an extensive background in consumer research and retailing, both as a practitioner and as a consultant. Dr Cullen has offered numerous seminars and conducted research throughout North America and Europe, with a most recent focus on wine marketing.

Received 31 March 2009; Revised 31 March 2009; Published online 18 May 2009.

Abstract

The attributes-consequences-values associations, embedded in means-end chain theory, are often seen as a representation of the basic drive that motivates consumer behaviour. Laddering is a technique used to elicit such associations (ladders) from the respondent's cognitive structure. Unfortunately, the procedure is time-consuming and requires a considerable physical and mental effort from the respondent. We propose a method of shortening a laddering survey, while controlling the amount of information lost. We show that a laddering questionnaire may be shortened by more than 50 per cent and still allow the generation of approximately 95 per cent of the ladders produced by the full set of questions.