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People usually try to avoid uncertainty. Recently, however, uncertainty has become an emerging marketing tool in the hedonic product industry. In the case of blind box consumption, for example, the consumers become addicted to the uncertainty created by businesses, leading to repeat purchases and even indulgences. Previous research has, yet, to focus on the impact of uncertainty on indulgence and the role of emotions.

This paper constructs and validates a chain mediation model of uncertainty triggering indulgent consumption based on the information gap theory, positive emotion theory and uncertainty resolution theory and examines the difference between resolved and unresolved uncertainty. This study also explores differences in the impact of whether uncertainty is resolved on emotions. The uncertainty-resolved group elicited a more positive emotional response than the uncertainty-unresolved group, leading to a more indulgent consumption.

The results of three studies show that uncertainty influences indulgent consumption through curiosity and positive emotion, and that curiosity and positive emotion play separate and chain mediating roles between uncertainty and indulgent consumption, respectively. We validate our central hypothesis with questionnaires among blind box consumer groups, examining the moderating role of perceived luck and risk preferences.

The findings shed new light on firms' use of uncertainty to promote consumer purchases.

This paper aims to examine the effect of proximal (versus distant) depiction of food products within an advertising or online context on consumer responses across food types (indulgent versus non-indulgent) and display formats that lead to a single exposure (e.g. billboard) versus multiple exposures (e.g. online menu).

Five experimental studies, using both implicit and explicit elicitation techniques, demonstrate the effect of proximal food depictions. The paper rules out alternative explanations (portion-size perception and participants’ bodily distance) and controls for several other factors (e.g. visual crowding, body-mass index, dietary restrictions, etc.)

The studies find that proximal food pictures are implicitly associated with tastiness more for indulgent (vs non-indulgent) foods; lead to higher purchase intention for indulgent food upon a single exposure driven by enhanced perceived tastiness; and evoke satiation upon multiple exposures.

This research identifies the effect of spatial proximity of food depiction on consumer responses using different stimuli. Future work could explore the effects in alternate consummatory contexts.

The findings provide clear instructions to marketers and policymakers on how to tailor consumer responses using spatial distance in depiction of food products, depending on the food type and display format. Understanding the effect of visual food cues will help policymakers devise strategies to counter over-consumption, which increases the risk of non-communicable diseases and reduces consumer well-being (SDG 3, United Nations).

Introducing a novel pictorial cue (i.e. the spatial distance of product depiction), this paper contributes insights to the literature on implicit associations, visual information processing, satiation, over-consumption and food marketing.

The purpose of this paper is to build upon reward-learning theory and examine the role of indulgent food consumption and habitual eating behaviors as a means of emotional coping.

Both qualitative and quantitative methods were enlisted to explore emotional eating and indulgent tendencies. In Phase 1 of this research, participants responded to open-ended questions regarding the drivers of emotional eating. In Phase 2, a theoretically driven model was developed from Phase 1 findings and quantitative data was collected to test it.

Phase 1 findings indicate that negative terms such as “stressed” and “distract” were more prevalent in the high emotional coping group as opposed to the low emotional coping group. Building from Phase 1, findings from Phase 2 demonstrate a link between emotional eating and indulgent food consumption, underscoring the impact of habitual behaviors. Specifically, emotional coping frequency fully explains the relationship between emotional eating habits and indulgent eating frequency, while intentions to eat indulgent foods partially mediates the relationship between attitude toward indulgent foods and indulgent food consumption frequency. In addition, intentions to eat indulgent foods partially mediates the relationship between emotional coping frequency and indulgent food consumption frequency.

Social marketing efforts can be enlisted to de-market fatty foods to individuals prone to engaging in emotional eating. Individuals might also be encouraged to use emotion regulation techniques to help manage negative emotions.

This research contributes to the existing marketing and consumer well-being literature by exploring the role of habit formation in the development of emotional eating and indulgent food consumption.

This paper aims to examine how exposure to sexual images activates the urge to yield to temptation in a subsequent unrelated context.

In Study 1, this paper uses empirical data based on an automobile expo to examine the correlational relationship between sexual imagery and indulgence. In Studies 2 and 3, this study examines the moderating effects of self-construal and gender differences on indulgent consumption, with different dependent measures. Study 4 distinguishes the sexual images into gratuitous sex and romantic love and tests the mediating role of sensation seeking.

For men, an independent self-construal increases indulgent consumption. In contrast, an interdependent self-construal facilitates women’s indulgent consumption. Having an interdependent self-construal has the opposite impact on indulgent consumption for the two genders: sexual images of romantic love attenuate the effect on men but boost the effect on women. Perceived sensation-seeking serves as the underlying mechanism.

This paper contributes to the literature on sex, reward-processing, context effects in marketing and indulgent consumption.

Advertisers, retailers, food courts and restaurants may use sexual imagery to promote more indulgent consumption with gender and self-construal as segmentation variables. Public policymakers and other concerned parties should also raise consumers’ awareness of the priming effect found in this research.

This research advances the literature on sex by demonstrating the priming effects of sexual imagery and further considers the simultaneous impacts of gender and self-construal on consumers’ subsequent indulgent consumption.

This study aims to investigate the effect of color temperature on consumption. Color is one of the most powerful elements of sensory marketing. However, how warm and cool colors drive consumer indulgence and interact with other visual cues is minimally understood.

This research conducts six experiments to investigate the effect of eight warm and cool colors and the effect of warm/cool color’s interaction with reflectance on indulgent consumption/use in various retail environments.

Studies 1a and 1b support the contrasting effects of warm vs cool colors on consumers’ indulgent consumption. Studies 2a and 2b establish the serial mediating role of arousal and self-reward focus in the color-indulgence relationship. Study 3a demonstrates the interactive effect of warm (vs cool) colors and glossy (vs matte) reflectance on consumer indulgence, and Study 3b confirms how glossy (vs matte) reflectance moderates the serial mediating effect of arousal and self-reward focus in the color-indulgence relationship.

This research contributes to the growing stream of research on the visual aspect of sensory marketing, especially color, and advances the theoretical knowledge of how color could be used effectively to influence consumer indulgence.

This research provides actionable managerial implications on the effective use of warm and cool colors and glossy and matte reflectance to influence consumer indulgence.

This research advances the theoretical and empirical knowledge of color’s interaction with other visual sensory cues and the underlying psychological processes shaping consumer indulgence.

The purpose of the present research is to investigate consumer-generated images (CGI), or images of products and experiences that are produced and controlled by consumers, particularly in the food domain, and the influence that producing such images has on the consumer creating the image.

The authors present three studies that manipulate the type of food (indulgent vs healthy) and whether participants create CGI prior to consumption. Data were analyzed using a combination of ANOVA and PROCESS.

It is shown that producing CGI causes a momentary active delay in consumption, which increases the savoring associated with consumption of pleasurable (i.e. indulgent) foods and, in effect, increases attitudes and taste evaluations of the experience when consumption actually takes place. When descriptive social norms regarding healthy eating are made salient, CGI can also lead to more favorable outcomes for less pleasurable (i.e. healthy) foods.

The findings provide insight into the effects of consumers taking pictures of their food before consumption, a growing trend on social media sites (i.e. Instagram). Marketing managers can develop strategies to encourage their consumers to take pictures of their food.

To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this research is the first to demonstrate the effects of consumer-generated images on a product consumption experience and identify the conditions and process under which these effects occur.

The purpose of this research is to explore how and why consumption behavior changes across time in reference to a temporal deadline, such as a meeting start time or scheduled appointment.

The authors present findings from two experiments that manipulate distance to/from a deadline and assess behavioral intentions and consumer choice, both before a deadline is reached (i.e. the individual is early) and after a deadline has passed (i.e. the individual is late).

Results demonstrate that, while individuals are more likely to refrain from consumption in favor of being on time as a deadline approaches, they are more likely to engage in consumption activities once they have already missed their deadline. Support is shown for an underlying process of affect regulation; when they are late (vs on time), consumers are likely to regulate affect via the selection of more indulgent options.

These studies provide insight into the both the beneficial and detrimental nature of deadlines. Further, they provide insight as to how deadlines impact consumer behavior by demonstrating differential patterns of consumption based on whether an individual is early vs late.

Documenting the effect of meeting and missing deadlines on consumption contributes to the literature on time usage and offers insights into individuals’ efforts to prioritize multiple activities that conflict due to time constraints.

Self-gifting is a performative process in which consumers purchase products for themselves. The literature to date remains silent on a determination and connection between the extents of post-purchase regret resulting from self-gifting behavior. The purpose of this paper is to examine identification and connection of self-gifting antecedents, self-gifting and the effect on post purchase regret.

This study claims the two antecedents of hedonistic shopping and indulgence drive self-gifting behaviors and the attendant regret. A total of 307 shoppers responded to a series of statements concerning the relationships between antecedents of self-gifting behavior and the effect on post-purchase regret. Self-gifting is a multi-dimensional construct, consisting of therapeutic, celebratory, reward and hedonistic imports. Confirmatory factor analysis and AMOS path modeling enabled examination of relationships between the consumer traits of hedonistic shopping and indulgence and the four self-gifting concepts.

Hedonic and indulgent shoppers engage in self-gifting for different reasons. A strong and positive relationship was identified between hedonic shoppers and reward, hedonic, therapeutic and celebratory self-gift motivations. hedonic shoppers aligned with indulgent shoppers who also engaged the four self-gifting concepts. The only regret concerning purchase of self-gifts was evident in the therapeutic and celebratory self-gift motivations.

A major limitation was the age range specification of 18 to 45 years which meant the omission of older generations of regular and experienced shoppers. This study emphasizes the importance of variations in self-gift behaviors and of post-purchase consumer regret.

This research is the first examination of an hedonic attitude to shopping and indulgent antecedents to self-gift purchasing, the concepts of self-gift motivations and their effect on post-purchase regret.

Pride is an emotional response to success or achievement with two facets, AP and HP. This study aims to address an unanswered question: how does each type of pride affect indulgence when consumers engage in relatively thoughtful processing (System II) versus when they engage in rapid and more superficial processing (System I).

Using four experiments, this research investigates the effects of pride and cognitive resources on indulgence. This study also tests the mediating roles of deservedness and self-esteem using an ANOVA, a bootstrap analysis and a binary logistic-regression analysis.

The results show that cognitive resources moderate the effects of AP and HP on indulgence. When consumers have ample cognitive resources, AP leads to more indulgence than HP. When consumers have restricted cognitive resources and engage a quick, affective-based processing system, HP leads to greater indulgence than AP.

This research enhances understanding of the impact of two kinds of pride on indulgence and advances the authors’ understanding in the broader area linking emotion and consumer decision-making.

Marketers and public policymakers need to understand the differences between AP and HP because they have potentially different impacts on consumer behavior. Depending on whether companies are trying to motivate consumers to indulge or to restrain from indulging, companies can successfully incorporate AP or HP into their marketing communications.

The key contribution of this research is that the authors show that both AP and HP can lead to indulgence, depending on the amount of cognitive attention that is allocated to the decision and, therefore, which system consumers deploy.

The cumulative pool of data piling through the empirical expedition around hospitals in Vietnam provides the clue on whether corporate social responsibility (CSR) influences upward influence behavior, which in turn catalyzes team processes and competitive intelligence scanning. The aim of this paper is to journey through the review of the constructs of CSR, upward influence behavior, and team processes.

Structural equation modeling (SEM) approach served as an analyst for 349 responses returned from self‐administered structured questionnaires despatched to 522 hospital members in the middle‐management position.

A model of team processes and competitive intelligence evolved along the process of hypothesis testing. Ethical CSR was found to cultivate organizationally beneficial upward influence behavior in the healthcare service organizations.

The research findings provide the insight into the CSR‐based model of team processes which underscores the role of ethical CSR initiatives and organizationally beneficial upward influence tactics in the activation of competitive intelligence scanning deeds in hospitals in Vietnam business setting.