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When consumers experience a self-threat that calls their self-concept into question, the ensuing psychological discomfort motivates them to restore their self-perceptions on the threatened attribute. Although consumers can restore a threatened self-perception by consuming products and brands that possess the desired symbolic associations, this study aims to propose that word of mouth can serve to resolve self-threat and restore a threatened self-perception when the brand at the center of a word-of-mouth communication is symbolically congruent with the domain of the threat.

Experimental online survey research was conducted, inducing self-threat, manipulating brand and word-of-mouth conditions and measuring self-perceptions. Data for three studies were analyzed using SPSS and Hayes’ (2013) PROCESS macro.

Three studies show that spreading word of mouth can restore consumers’ threatened self-perceptions when the brand is symbolically congruent with the threat domain. Word of mouth about a symbolically congruent brand alleviates psychological discomfort, resulting in higher self-perceptions on the threatened attribute. The restorative effect is amplified for lower self-esteem consumers.

Participants in the focal conditions were required to spread word of mouth, which may not be an organic response for all consumers; although not spreading word of mouth is ineffective, other compensatory consumer behavior options exist. The brand option was provided to participants, which allowed for control but may have reduced some of the realism.

Positioning brands to meet consumers’ psychological needs encourages the development of consumer–brand attachments. Brands that resonate with consumers reap the benefits of consumers’ active loyalty behaviors and enjoy stronger brand equity. The present research implies a new way consumers can form brand attachments: by spreading word of mouth to resolve self-threat. As many consumers post detailed, personal information online, this research suggests firms can align their brand messages with relevant identity-related discrepancies.

This research extends the symbolic self-completion compensatory consumption strategy to the word-of-mouth context, showing that consumers can achieve the same restorative effect as consumption by spreading word of mouth. This research also contributes to compensatory word-of-mouth literature by establishing the role of brand meaning.

This study aims to examine whether consumers’ lay theories of emotion play a moderating role between self-threat and their choice of threat-coping strategies (direct resolution and escapism) and product preference.

The present research uses the methods of experimental design and surveys to collect data and verify the hypotheses we assumed.

Study 1 indicates that in self-threatening situations, people who perceive emotions as fleeting (lasting) are more likely to use a threat-coping strategy of direct resolution (escapism). Study 2 demonstrates that people who believe emotions are fleeting are more likely to choose problem-solving products; people who believe emotions are lasting are more likely to choose emotion-enhancing products. Study 3 further demonstrates that the direct resolution (escapism) strategy plays a mediating role between the interaction effect and consumer preference for problem-solving products (emotion-enhancing products). Study 4 replicates the results of Study 2 by incorporating the manipulation of lay theories of emotion transience in a product evaluation context.

A limitation of the present research is that this paper puts focus on exploring the effects of self-view threat (e.g. intelligence and competence) on consumer product preferences. Another issue for future research is the extent to which emotion-transience theories hold for specific emotions. Given that distinct emotions of the same valence differ in their antecedent appraisals and that specific emotion could lead to different subsequent behaviors (Lerner and Keltner, 2000), future research may need to explore the roles of specific negative emotions triggered by self-threat in consumers’ product choosing behaviors. One potential direction for future research is to examine whether the perceived locus of control affects consumers’ choice of threat-coping strategies and product preferences.

Marketers could use product tactics for motivating consumers to restore their self-perceptions on the threatened attributes and address the self-threat, such as product attributes, advertising copy or promotional appeals that insert people who are more motivated to directly resolve the threat. Marketers can nudge consumers toward a direct resolution strategy by posting prompts such as, “I can do it!” For example, the slogan of Nike – “Just do it” and the 2012 award-winning campaign by Nike Spain have told consumers: “If something is burning you up, burn it up by running” (Allard and White, 2015), which suggests that consumers experiencing self-threat may resolve the negative self-discrepancy through the acquisition of the products in the advertisement. Another important implication suggested by the findings is that product consumption can be a way of helping consumers escape from self-threats. For example, the slogan of Coca-Cola – “Taste the feeling” resonates with consumers and stimulates their basic hedonic needs.

First, this research extends previous research by demonstrating that lay theories of emotion serve as a motivator of the selection of threat-coping strategies. Second, this research is conducive for literature to examine how differences in lay theories of emotion affect consumers’ product-choosing behaviors to cope with self-discrepancies. Third, the present research extends the broad marketing literature by differentiating problem-solving products from emotion-enhancing products.

The purpose of this paper is to study the influence of perceived control on product preferences of consumers under self-threat.

By conducting four experiments, this paper manipulated the participants’ self-threat and three sources of perceived control – namely, the controllability of the threat itself, the internal and external locus of control of the individual and priming the existing positive or negative experience of the individuals. After the manipulations, the participants’ product preferences for self-growth goods or hedonic goods were measured.

The findings of this research indicated that when consumers have a higher perceived control of the threats they are facing, they are more likely to adopt problem-focused coping strategies and show a preference for self-growth goods, which can help them resolve their threats. However, when consumers have a lower perceived control on the threats they are facing, they are more likely to adopt emotion-focused coping strategies and show a preference for hedonic goods, which can help them adjust their emotions.

This paper systematically confirms the interactive effect of perceived control and self-threat on consumers’ product preferences, as well as the meditation role of problem-focused coping and emotion-focused coping. It also provides insights for marketers to know what factors may affect consumers’ preferences for products in self-threat situations, thus contributing to marketing practices.

This study investigated the effect of adding a customer's name onto a standard product on the customer's product attitude from the perspective of the name-letter effect and psychological ownership theory.

A 2 × 2 experiment was conducted to test the name effect in customization services. The main effects, mediation effects and moderation effects were analyzed using SPSS 22.0 and PROCESS 2.16.3.

Adding customers' personal names onto a standard product positively affected their attitude toward the product, and these effects were mediated by psychological ownership. Furthermore, customers' responses were moderated by self-threat, whereby threatening customers' self-concept enhanced their attitude toward the product that had their name on it.

This study found a positive name effect that is applicable to customization services. It also identified mediating and moderating mechanisms underlying this effect. Therefore this study extends previous studies on customization services that have solely focusing on complex product personalization by focusing on a service that requires less effort and a more basic customization service. This study also extends previous findings about name-letter effects by focusing on the associations between an individual and an object that are induced by shared name letters and by studying how directly adding a personal name onto an object can influence these associations.

The deployment of artificial intelligence (AI) technologies in travel and tourism has received much attention in the wake of the pandemic. While societal adoption of AI has accelerated, it also raises some trust challenges. Literature on trust in AI is scant, especially regarding the vulnerabilities faced by different stakeholders to inform policy and practice. This work proposes a framework to understand the use of AI technologies from the perspectives of institutional and the self to understand the formation of trust in the mandated use of AI-based technologies in travelers.

An empirical investigation using partial least squares-structural equation modeling was employed on responses from 209 users. This paper considered factors related to the self (perceptions of self-threat, privacy empowerment, trust propensity) and institution (regulatory protection, corporate privacy responsibility) to understand the formation of trust in AI use for travelers.

Results showed that self-threat, trust propensity and regulatory protection influence trust in users on AI use. Privacy empowerment and corporate responsibility do not.

Insights from the past studies on AI in travel and tourism are limited. This study advances current literature on affordance and reactance theories to provide a better understanding of what makes travelers trust the mandated use of AI technologies. This work also demonstrates the paradoxical effects of self and institution on technologies and their relationship to trust. For practice, this study offers insights for enhancing adoption via developing trust.

The purpose of this paper is to examine the effect of self-worth on status consumption, focusing on the mediation of self-enhancement and self-compensation and the moderation of power distance belief (PDB) in the relationship of threats to self-worth and consumer choice.

Experiments are used to collect data. Three studies are designed to test the relationship between self-worth, self-enhancement and self-compensation, PDB and status consumption. In total, 180 MBA students participate Study 1, 186 and 244 undergraduate students participate Studies 2 and 3, respectively. ANOVA and bootstrapping method are adopted to analyze the data by using SPSS version 19.0. Study 1 tests the influence of self-worth on status consumption; Study 2 examines the mediation role of self-enhancement and self-compensation; and Study 3 tests the moderation role of PDB.

Results indicate that situational self-worth perception has dual path effects on status consumption. Both improvements in – and threats to – self-worth have a positive impact on status consumption. Improvements in self-worth affect status consumption through the mediation of self-enhancement motives. Threats to self-worth affect status and non-status consumption through the mediation of the self-compensation motive. In the context of a threat to self-worth, compared with consumers with a low PDB, high-PDB consumers have higher purchase intention for status goods but not non-status goods.

In this study, improvements in – and threats to – self-worth are momentarily manipulated. The authors present one product in each experiment, but what would happen if both status goods and non-status goods were shown to participants? Which one will the authors choose under different self-worth manipulations? And how long can the effects last? These questions should be answered in future research.

This research provides a venue for marketers to introduce and advertise status goods. Marketing practitioners should establish the link between self-worth and status consumption appeals. In the Asia-Pacific markets, Confucian value is important to consumers, and high power distance is important in Confucianism. Thus when developing markets in China, international companies should emphasize Confucian values in the design of advertisements or other promotional items. Further, marketing for status goods should attach importance to the expression of their symbolic meanings.

This study contributes to the literature on self-worth and status consumption. It also explores the dual path of the effect of self-worth on status consumption. The motives of self-enhancement and self-compensation are first proposed and tested to explain the mechanism, which differentiates the study from prior work and gives a more reasonable explanation for status and compensatory consumption. The moderation role of PDB delineates the boundary for the effect of a threat to self-worth on status consumption.

The purpose of this paper is to investigate the impact of two types of narcissism (rivalry and admiration) on consumer–brand forgiveness (CBF) following a brand transgression. This research also examines how narcissism interacts with transgression type to shape forgiveness intentions.

Data were collected through an online survey of 634 UK consumers, focussing on two different types of transgressions (public vs private). The formulated hypotheses were tested through moderated mediation analysis.

The results highlight that only narcissistic rivalry (and not admiration) moderates the relationship between transgression type and blame attributions. Although the type of transgression seems to affect CBF, forgiveness levels do not vary across the two transgression types. Finally, as expected, blame attributions shape forgiveness intentions.

The results of this research highlight that blame attributions are affected by the type of narcissism. Thus, identifying the type of narcissism will allow brands to allocate their resources more effectively in order to design recovery strategies that would promote CBF and restore brand trust.

The paper responds to calls for a better understanding of forgiveness through the use of personality traits and focusses on two dimensions of narcissism. This paper also uses a novel transgression typology, which is objective in nature. The results illustrate that narcissism has a differential role in shaping blame attributions and CBF.

This study established and examined a moderated mediation model connecting workplace ostracism with job performance. Drawing from the viewpoint of self-esteem threat, the model posits that the effect of workplace ostracism on job performance is mediated by levels of organization-based self-esteem, while the relationship between workplace ostracism and organization-based self-esteem is moderated by performance goal orientation.

Multisource data were collected from 160 employees and their immediate supervisors in Taiwan.

As predicted in the research model, workplace ostracism was found to decrease organization-based self-esteem and, therefore, hinder employees' job performance. Performance goal orientation was found to buffer the negative effect of workplace ostracism on job performance via organization-based self-esteem.

To eliminate the negative impact of workplace ostracism, supervisors can help ostracized employees to self-regulate by aligning their performance goal orientation to reduce the perception of self-esteem threat.

This study provides evidence of boundary conditions for the relationship between workplace ostracism and job performance and explores the impact of self-regulation on ostracized employees' organization-based self-esteem and subsequent job performance.

This research aims to explore how consumers' local brand choices differ between air-polluted days and clean days, and why the difference occurs.

Two studies were conducted. Study 1 used the longitudinal consumption data of various yogurt brands and daily air quality indexes in 2014 and 2015. Study 2 conducted three rounds of surveys on a clean day, a general air-polluted day and a seriously air-polluted day.

The findings indicate that consumers show less tendency of attribution and compensatory consumption during air-polluted days, which in turn decrease their willingness to choose local brands.

Implications are provided for future research and marketing practice, especially for local companies that rely heavily on local consumers, and retailers in heavy air-polluted areas.

This paper is the first to illustrate the influence of air pollution on consumers' local brand choices, and it extends current understanding on air pollution and consumer choices by discovering psychological process underneath to explain the effect.