Companies typically use clear fonts and bright pictures in their ads, Web sites, and product-package designs; place their products on easy-to-reach shelves; and emphasize ease-of-usage to make their products appear desirable to consumers. However, we suggest that customers focused on...

We propose that risk perceptions are systematically influenced by anthropomorphism. Anthropomorphism effects, however, are moderated by the individual’s feelings of social power. People with low power perceive higher risk in playing a slot machine (study 1) and in getting skin cancer (study 2)...

Automotive sales forecasts traditionally focus on predictors such as advertising, brand preference, life cycle position, retail price, and technological sophistication. The quality of the cars' design is, however, an often-neglected variable in such models. We show that incorporating objective...

Across six studies, we demonstrate that consumers have beliefs pertaining to the transience of emotion, which, along with their current feelings, determine the extent to which they regulate their immediate affect. If consumers believe that emotion is fleeting, those feeling happy (vs. unhappy)...

Across five studies, we show that firming one's muscles can help firm willpower and that firmed willpower mediates one's ability to withstand immediate pain, overcome food temptation, consume unpleasant medicines, and attend to immediately disturbing but essential information, provided that...

Two experiments suggest that when participants evaluate an ad, they prefer improving ad emotions, because attitudes are based on an assessment of whether the emotions deviate positively or negatively from previous levels of emotions. In contrast, when emotions are experienced, positive emotions...

We propose that a positive mood, by signaling that a situation is benign, might allow people to step back and take in the big picture. As a consequence, a positive mood might increase abstract construal and the adoption of abstract, future goals. In contrast, a negative mood, by signaling not...

Three experiments show that semantic primes can enhance perceptual fluency, resulting in higher liking of the perceived product. Specifically, semantic primes that cue the visual identifier of one of two products (e.g., a bottle of wine with a frog shown on the label) increase preference of the...

Do our bodies control our minds? That people approach positive outcomes is not surprising, but do people also infer an outcome is rewarding from their bodily sensation of approaching it, and does this positivity transfer indirectly to other outcomes linked in memory to the original negative...