Salience

How the investors react to the received information plays a crucial role in determining the return of stock exchange market. Supply and demand based upon incorrect decisions lead to the price deviation of inherent values. This paper aims to study the impact of salience phenomenon on disproportionate pricing and investor overreaction in the corporates in Tehran stock exchange. Research methodology is correlative. Statistical sample involves 120 corporates accepted by Tehran stock exchange during 2012-2016. To test the hypotheses, a regression analysis method has been selected. Research findings have indicated that there exists a promising phenomenon in Tehran stock exchange causing the investors overreaction followed by the disproportionate pricing and also, the results have shown that the impact of salience is different on strong and weak information environments.

Objective: Capture of attention occurs when a goal-irrelevant salient stimulus appears in the field of attention. The COVID-19 pandemic seems to be salient enough to capture a great proportion of one’s attentional resources. The purpose of this study was to explore how novelty of outbreak news affects attention in everyday life. Methods: 162 participants were recruited using an online invitation and divided into two samples (early and late sections). The variables—salience of news, intrusive thoughts, endogenous attention, and knowledge of COVID-19—were compared between the two measurements using one-way MANOVA. Additionally, a correlational analysis was performed in order to reveal a model of relationships between variables. Results: It was found that despite the increase in infected cases, intrusive thoughts and attentional capture were decreased over time. To describe the relationship between salience of news and attentional capture a conceptual model was presented. Conclusion: In addition to the other physical properties of a stimulus, novelty also contributes to stimulus salience. In everyday life, novel situations can trigger intrusive thoughts and attentional capture. Nonetheless, it cannot be sustained after the novelty has worn off. The proposed model can be useful to understand further similar situations.