Previous research has demonstrated that rejecting product alternatives (i.e., choosing which alternatives to give up) may cause preference reversals compared to choosing alternatives. We provide an investigation into the psychological processes underlying this phenomenon. These preference...

This research examines how consumers’ food choices differ when healthy items are included in a choice set compared with when they are not available. Results demonstrate that individuals are, ironically, more likely to make indulgent food choices when a healthy item is available compared to...

This research examines the largely unexamined effect of incidental pride on consumer self-control. The results demonstrate that incidental pride influences long-term goal pursuit through dual processes that result in conflicting outcomes for consumer decisions: indulgent choices when promoting a...

This research demonstrates that the effect of product information on the evaluation of an experiential product depends on the order with which such information is presented. In a series of experiments, we find that when information is presented before consuming an experiential product, the...

Online social networks are used by hundreds of millions of people every day, but little is known about their effect on behavior. In five experiments, the authors demonstrate that social network use enhances self-esteem in users who are focused on close friends (i.e., strong ties) while browsing...

Five experiments demonstrate that brands cause priming effects (i.e., behavioral effects consistent with those implied by the brand), whereas slogans cause reverse priming effects (i.e., behavioral effects opposite to those implied by the slogan). For instance, exposure to the retailer brand...

Volitional behaviors can be construed as “work” (extrinsically motivated) or as “fun” (intrinsically motivated). When volitional behaviors are construed as an obligation to work, completing the behavior depletes a consumer, and subsequent self-control becomes more difficult. When...

This article investigates how temporal distance influences consumers' self-control. We demonstrate that self-control is dependent on the content of currently active information in decisions for the future. When indulgence information is currently active, decisions for the future tend to be...

The seller's threshold price in name-your-own-price auctions varies over time. However, consumers must bid without knowing when these variations occur because the threshold price is unobservable to them. This paper uses an analytical model and laboratory auctions to explore how the frequency of...

During the course of a day, consumers experience choices that involve goal conflict (e.g., eat tasty vs. healthy food, recreate vs. work, relax vs. act). In some cases, an initial behavior is followed by a similar behavior. In other cases, an initial behavior is followed by an opposing behavior....