【正文】 he product in terms of attribute level binations. More recently, scholars have advanced the idea that the product as well as the brand name is capable of contributing several types of benefits to the consumer. The theoretical and empirical literature on consumerperceived or desired brand benefits suggests classifying those benefits according to a number of basic dimensions. Multiple item scales for assessing individual perceptions and desired brand benefits have been developed with six distinct dimensions emerging, termed quality/performance, price/value for money, social, emotional, environmental and health benefits. Recent applications of these scales to branded consumer goods have demonstrated that the basic dimensions are suitable for assessing brand images,16 brand positioning, and for predicting consumer preferences18 and No study could be found, however, applying the model to predict consumer choice, a variable of stronger interest for marketing managers than antecedent but unobservable perceptions, intentions or attitudes. Figure 1 shows the model utilised in this study. SITUATIONAL DRIVERS According to Hornik, neither individual differences (consumer personality) nor situational factors are assumed to be of exclusive importance in predicting situational variation in consumer behaviour. Instead, it is the person within a situational interaction that is expected to contribute most of the variance. The notion that consumer states, particularly their situational disposition, influence consumer behaviour is widely accepted. Consumer situational dispositions are posited as significant mediators between situational stimuli and behavioural outes with personality traits and affective states being their antecedents. For various product categories, marketing researchers have demonstrated the effects of consumer dispositions such as individual inclination to take a risk, to seek variety and curiosity on acquisition behaviours including brand switching. For example, Mitchell and Greatorex have stressed the importance of risktaking and varietyseeking to consumer choice of wine brands. Dominating the current literature on consumer exploratory tendencies is Raju’s conceptualisation of three situational dispositions. Risktaking describes exploratory behaviour expressed through choices of innovative and unfamiliar alternatives that are perceived as risky. Varietyseeking is expressed through an individual’s switching within familiar alternatives, including brand switching, and an aversion to habitual behaviour. Curiositymotivated behaviour involves exploratory informationseeking, interpersonal munication and shopping. Consumerperceived risk in wine buying situations has been related to functional (quality) and social brand have also shown consumer informationseeking (curiositymotivated behaviour) to be related to what benefits consumers desire in wine. Examining several other branded consumer goods including soups, sodas, beer and mineral water, Van Trijp reported that in addition to individual differences in intrinsic desire for variety, expression of varietyseeking behaviour was also influenced by brandrelated factors. Highinvolvement decisions usually entail a considerable degree of perceived risk in making a suboptimal decision, a situation that hampers varietyseeking behaviour. On the other hand, for brand choices that are totally unimportant to the consumer, habitbased repetitive choice behaviour is by far the most efficient heuristic, and consequently varietyseeking is not likely to occur. Van Trijp et al. suggest that true varietyseeking is rooted in the need for change in an attempt to resolve the boredom associated with a brand. Different from that is varietyseeking triggered by external factors such as impressionmanagement concerns. Indeed, researchers have found that consumers incorporate more variety in their brand choices when their behaviour is subj