Journal of Consumer Behaviour最新文献

The exponential growth of the online luxury resale market has spurred a notable shift toward a circular economy, reflecting the increasing consumer preference for pre-owned luxury items. Nevertheless, this growth presents challenges related to product authenticity and seller credibility. In response to these concerns, blockchain technology (BT) emerges as a promising solution, leveraging a decentralized ledger to enhance transparency and reduce information asymmetry. This allows for the traceability of pre-owned luxury goods, addressing issues of provenance and authenticity in the online resale space. By incorporating regulatory focus theory into the uncertainty reduction theory, this study examines how approach and avoidance motivations impact evaluations of BT-enabled platforms to effectively mitigate consumer uncertainties and influence trust. The collected data (N= 511) was analyzed through partial least squares structural equation modeling (PLS-SEM; study 1), and a complementary qualitative study (study 2) was additionally conducted. Results reveal that distinct motivations coexist, each following separate pathways to build consumer trust. Findings indicate that an approach orientation mindset highly values the reliability of BT-enabled information, while an avoidance orientation focuses on risk mitigation and expresses heightened uncertainty in online transactions. Consequently, BT is found to be instrumental in reducing consumer concerns about purchasing pre-owned luxury products. The study contributes to the existing literature by shedding light on the psychological dynamics influencing consumer trust in BT-enabled platforms, has implications for luxury retailers contemplating BT integration, and offers insights into consumer behavior that can inform strategies to enhance perceived trust in online luxury resale.

Over the past 30 years, gain/loss framing has received substantial scholarly attention from advertising researchers. Nevertheless, its effects are not yet fully understood, and further research is required to clarify mixed findings reported in previous studies. In response to this gap in the literature, this study examined the mechanisms through which risk perceptions affect gain/loss framing effects, using two experiments involving different levels of risks. Experiment 1, which involves low risk, showed that gain framing was more effective for consumers with stronger risk perceptions. However, this advantage disappeared when consumers' risk perceptions were weak. In Experiment 2, which involves high risk, loss framing was more effective for consumers with weaker risk perceptions; however, these effects disappeared when consumers' risk perceptions were very strong. The study also revealed that anticipated regret mediates the interaction effects of framing and risk perceptions on attitudes and intentions. The findings of this study suggest that risk perceptions may help explain the inconsistent results reported in previous research.

The study aims to synthesize four decades of research on emotions in marketing by delving into the specifics of who, where, how, what and when. Using quantitative and qualitative methods, 453 articles from top marketing journals were analysed. The study first presents a descriptive account of publication and citation metrics and theoretical underpinning, resolving contestation around emotion function as cause, effect, mediator and moderator. Secondly, using science mapping, along with performance and content analysis landscape of emotion research is unravelled by identifying eight clusters. These clusters placed on development timelines provide a bird's eye view and are presented on a three-level categorization: Theory, Characteristics and Context. Clusters 1 and 2 focus on theoretical underpinning of emotion interrelationship with cognition and construal. Clusters 3 and 4 emphasized unique characteristics of emotion as antecedents and outcomes to/of evaluations/behaviours. Clusters 5, 6, 7, and 8 emphasized distinct emotional settings—notably, cluster 5 accounts for emotion interaction across service encounters and elements of service interface. Cluster 6 emphasizes effectiveness, advantage and measurement of emotion in advertising. Cluster 7 highlights how emotions are profoundly shaped by and influence social interactions/behaviour, and Cluster 8 underscores emotion embedded in brands, products and life experiences. Finally, a diverse yet unified field of emotion research in marketing is advocated by reflecting on findings, identifying opportunities for cross-pollination, highlighting cluster-specific future research directions and developing an integrative framework. The framework, beyond decision-making, synthesizes distinct ways emotion arises and permeates marketplace and accounts for alternate lenses to emotion functioning, promoting newer research.

All facets of society may enter the virtual world more quickly due to the rapid development of digital technology, which would blur the boundary between the real and the digital realms and encourage the creation of a Metaverse. In the upcoming decades, metaverse technology—which allows immersive experiences in virtual and real environments—will be the next revolutionary force in society. The Fintech industry has been one of the first to adopt it, and it is one of those that uses technology to resolve problems. The study begins by conceptualizing the Metaverse as being defined explicitly by the convergence of its essential components and its influence on the fintech sector. It further discusses how Metaverse could create value in consumer behaviour in three vicinities: social perception, user identity and advertising & consumer psychology. Finally, the study presents the various implications and future scope of this research by doing the thematic analysis to enhance our understanding of the Metaverse economy and how it influences consumer behaviour. This study provides an overview of the shift occurring in the marketplace and contemplates the various changes that it may bring, all through the perspective of consumer behaviour which can be used to create predictive models that recognize emerging trends in customer behaviour, market activities, and other aspects of the business.

Given the increasing role of word of mouth (WOM), and primarily the impact of negative WOM on the decision-making of today's retail consumers, it is essential to understand the changing nature of consumer values (monetary, functional, emotional and social), emotion and attitude toward negative WOM. The current study's data were collected using two online surveys in 2015 and 2019, with 290 participants in Study 1 and 201 in Study 2. The intention behind using two different time points over a 4-year span was to capture the differences in consumers' views over the two periods. The study's findings suggested that social and emotional values remained unchanged; however, monetary and functional values changed over time. Interestingly, attitudes altered toward complaining, although the relationships between taking external action and negative WOM were unchanged in both studies. Consumers raising their voice and consumers' risk-taking attributes were found to be significant moderators in Study 1 but not in Study 2. The findings provide useful insights into the negative WOM literature and have implications for marketing practitioners, as highlighted in the paper's conclusion.

The secondhand luxury market has experienced significant growth in the past few years. Unlike the well-known knowledge on consumers' luxury consumption, the motivations for purchasing secondhand luxury items remain underexplored. To address this gap, the present study examines how and when Chinese consumers' perceived values affect their purchase intention of secondhand luxury products. We propose that the imbalanced luxury value perception is superior to the balanced one in boosting customer purchase. This hypothesis received convergent support from two studies adopting different methodologies. Specifically, Study 1 was a lab experiment that verified that the imbalance value perception, that is, either a salient financial or symbolic value of a secondhand luxury product, can increase consumers' purchase intention. However, when the two values are highlighted, purchase intention decreases instead. Furthermore, Study 2 adopted a questionnaire survey to test the moderating effects of product risks. Specifically, when the level of product quality (fit) risk is high, a financial-focused (symbolic-focused) imbalanced value perception is most effective in improving consumers' purchase intention. This study contributes to the literature on luxury value and risk perception and benefits the marketing practice of secondhand luxury.

Due to the growing concerns around problematic smartphone use and its negative impact, there is a rising interest in digital detox. While many digital detox apps have been developed in recent years, there is still limited understanding of the long-term effectiveness of digital detox applications and the attitude of people towards these apps. This study fills this gap by identifying the topics that people post in their reviews on the Google Play Store about digital detox apps and the emotion-based sentiment of those reviews. A total of 3500 reviews of 25 digital detox apps were collected from the Google Play Store using a scraping tool called “Parsehub.” Data was analyzed using R studio. Sentiment analysis results suggest that positive sentiments dominated the data frame. “Trust” and “anticipation” were the two most expressed emotions in the reviews. Regression analysis confirmed that sentiment scores could explain the ratings of the apps. Through LDA topic modeling four major topics of the reviews were identified and are discussed in detail in the later section of the research paper. The findings of this study may help app developers and marketers improve digital detox apps so that people can learn and practice mindful smartphone use with the help of these apps. This study fills a gap in digital detox research by adopting a new methodological approach and procedure since it combines text mining, sentiment analysis (NRC Lexicon using Syuzhet package), regression analysis, and LDA topic modeling. To the best of our knowledge, this is the first study which uses this research approach in the context of digital detox apps.

In the dynamic realm of online commerce, the phenomenon of Online Impulse Buying (OIB) has become a focal point of extensive research. Despite the multitude of studies exploring antecedents, mediators, and moderating factors, inconsistencies in findings have hindered generalization. To bridge this gap, we conducted a comprehensive meta-analysis, synthesizing data from 84 empirical results across 75 research articles up to December 2023. Encompassing a cumulative sample size of 139,545 participants and 341 effects, our analysis aimed to evaluate the strength and significance of associations with OIB. Results revealed substantial influences on OIB, with Situational stimuli (ESr = 0.477), Marketing stimuli (ESr = 0.433), Customer related factors (ESr = 0.388), and Platform related factors (ESr = 0.362) emerging as key contributors. The heightened impact of situational and marketing stimuli reflects the evolving landscape of OIB. Additionally, we explored six potential moderators—culture, sample type, sampling method, online commerce type, and data collection technique—uncovering statistically significant effects on some aggregated correlations. By shedding light on the changing dynamics of OIB, our findings provide valuable insights for both researchers and practitioners navigating the intricate landscape of online impulse buying. Finally, we outline future research directions to guide ongoing exploration in this rapidly evolving field.

Wearing a mask or face covering can serve not only as a health defense measure or a requirement for certain activities and rituals, but can also influence consumer purchasing behavior. This research examines whether, how, and when mask wearing fosters store engagement (e.g., higher intention to try on, longer staying time, and higher repeat patronage intention). Building on social observation and social monitoring theory, we conducted five studies and found that mask wearing leads consumers to perceive they are being observed/evaluated less and therefore to feel more relaxed; this feeling in turn leads to greater store engagement, especially for those who are high in self-monitoring. Studies 1–3 indicate that consumers who wear (vs. not wear) masks generate higher engagement across different shopping contexts, demonstrate the proposed mechanism through serial mediation while ruling out alternative explanations, and show that being observed/evaluated less has a unique effect beyond perceived invulnerability to viruses on feelings of relaxation. Study 4 demonstrates the moderating role of self-monitoring, such that this effect diminishes when consumers are low in self-monitoring. Finally, Study 5 generalizes the mask-wearing effect using a different facial covering situation. Both theoretical and practical implications are discussed.