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The purpose of this paper is to investigate the effect of a fashion store’s visual complexity on consumers’ behaviour. Considering environmental order and individuals’ sensation-seeking tendencies, the authors examine the effect of visually complex fashion stores on consumers in a more conclusive way to address the inconsistent effect found in the previous literature.

This study features a 3 (visual complexity level: low, medium, high) × 2 (environmental order condition: low, high) between subjects design, with individual sensation-seeking tendency included as a moderator. Using this design, an online survey was administered to 188 participants in South Korea.

The results indicate that there is a three-way interaction, where the interaction effect of visual complexity and environmental order is moderated by individuals’ sensation-seeking tendency. The effect of visual complexity on approach behaviours had an inverted U-shape in the low-order condition, while had a positive linear shape in the high-order condition, and the interaction effect was significant only for high-sensation seekers.

The findings assist practitioners in establishing strategies for visual merchandising and store design within fashion stores. It is suggested that retailers consider environmental order when organising a large amount of varied merchandise in a complex environment. Store managers must adjust the complexity and environmental order to meet the optimal stimulation level of their target consumers.

This study strengthens the literature on visual complexity by applying the concept to the retail environment. The results provide a significant contribution to the literature because they show how individual-level and store-level variables interact to influence consumer behaviour.

The purpose of this paper is to examine similarities and differences in motivational-type and sensation seeking tendencies in male and female firefighters and to determine how a growing focus on extrinsically focused reasons to volunteer relates to traditional, intrinsically focused rationales.

In total, 160 volunteer firefighters (29 women, 131 men) were compared to 210 undergraduate controls (171 women, 39 men) across a spectrum of motivation and sensation seeking types in a cross-sectional, questionnaire-based, approach.

Female volunteers showed a distinct pattern of motivations for volunteering and though similar to their male counterparts in Thrill and Adventure Seeking were lower in impulsive sensation seeking. Greater levels of career-focused motivation did not come at the cost of intrinsically focused motivation or to the number of years one projected volunteering.

The approach did not provide the means to check if reported intentions translate to behavioural outcomes and the small number of female firefighters sampled compromised power.

Findings of how female volunteers differ from male counterparts and university women might be considered when developing recruitment drives and formulating policy to modify what is rewarded in firefighting. Findings further suggest that the potential of gaining paid employment is unlikely to compromise traditional reasons for volunteering.

Evidence that female volunteers possess a distinct and desirable pattern of motivations and sensation seeking relative to their male counterparts seemingly provides a rationale to target women in recruitment drives that extends beyond bolstering numbers. However, that they were also distinct from university females raises questions about their representativeness and, in turn, about the size of the potential pool from which fire services may draw. Hypothesized concern about the negative impact that volunteering as a means to obtain paid work has on more traditional, intrinsically focused motivations appears to be unfounded.

Moves beyond anecdote to provide empirical evidence of the motivations and sensation seeking tendencies of volunteer firefighters, especially women, and contributes to a nascent area of inquiry about how intrinsic and extrinsic motivation can co-exist in this group.

This study aims to theorise and empirically test a model based on the hierarchy of effects behavioural learning approach (“do-think-feel”) to explain how travel during a crisis assists consumer well-being. The paper also examines whether the effect travel has on well-being is serially mediated by perceived risk and resilience and moderated by the personality trait of sensation-seeking.

This research uses a quasi-experimental design involving Australian consumers based on a sample of n = 307 who had travelled and n = 277 who had not during the COVID-19 pandemic (N = 584). A replication study (N = 290) is also undertaken to assess the robustness of the hierarchy of effects uncovered in the main study. Data were analysed using structural equation modelling (SEM) and Hayes PROCESS macro.

The results reveal travellers have significantly higher levels of both hedonic and eudaimonic well-being than non-travellers, suggesting the transformative potential of travel experiences during a crisis. The transformative potential of travel is driven by perceived risk and psychological resilience, which mediate the relationship between travel frequency and well-being. Further, spotlight moderation analysis demonstrates that the effect of travel on well-being is most profound for those with lower levels of sensation-seeking. These relationships are also confirmed in the replication study.

This research is among the first in transformative service research (TSR) to test the mediators of perceived risk and resilience together in a singular study, showing how experiences such as travel are potentially transformative. It also evaluates personality traits such as sensation-seeking as a moderating factor, which is uncommon in TSR. Further, this study empirically validates a do–think–feel behavioural learning approach, as opposed to other hierarchy of effects sequences that are dominant in TSR and the wider services marketing literature.

This study assessed the roles of atmospheric harmony, human crowding and sensation seeking towards hedonic value to determine re-patronage intention amongst mall consumers. Additionally, this study aims to investigate the moderating roles of past experience amidst mall consumers within the context of Pakistan.

The study data were collected from 334 mall consumers of Rawalpindi/Islamabad, Lahore and Karachi by using the judgemental sampling technique. Data analysis was performed using SmartPLS 3 via partial least squares structural equation modelling.

This study revealed that atmospheric harmony and human crowding displayed positive and adverse impacts, respectively, on hedonic value. The sensation seeking tendencies exerted by the consumers displayed no significant impact on hedonic value in light of mall habitat. The hedonic value exhibited a mediating role for the relationships of re-patronage intention with atmospheric harmony and human crowding. Besides, a significant interaction was noted between hedonic value and past experience in light of re-patronage intention.

The proposed model embeds hedonic value as a second higher-order construct, apart from amalgamating environmental and psychological factors of the mall shoppers to determine their re-patronage intentions. The study outcomes posit that mall re-patronage intention is built on several factors that offer mall managers an opportunity to enrich the hedonic consumption experience among mall consumers, aside from ensuring their re-patronage intention.

Numerous studies have looked at why people attend events which engage in conspicuous consumerism, but they have neglected the fear of missing out on these event-based experiences. This study aims to look at the impact of sensation seeking on conspicuous consumption within the event-based activities. Moreover, the developed model examined the mediating role of the fear of missing out in this impact.

A questionnaire survey was conducted, and a conceptual framework was performed to test hypothesized links between the three variables.

The findings show that sensation seeking affects conspicuous consumption, and fear of missing out has a mediating effect on this relationship.

The results of the study give some theoretical and practical implications to practitioners and researchers about aspirational class as elite consumers and high-level attendees of one-off events.

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.

The purpose of this study was to examine consumers' dining behaviors and explore their decision-making process when dining out during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Based on the extended parallel process model (EPPM) and the related literature, a conceptual model was developed and tested. This study conducted an online survey with 351 responses. In addition, a series of statistical analyses, including descriptive analyses and path analyses, were conducted to analyze the associations among key constructs in the proposed model.

The findings of this study confirmed the pragmatic utility of applying EPPM in a hospitality management context. The findings of this study also outline the different nature between the participants' enactment of self-protective measures and dining out activities. Lastly, while consumers are hesitant about dining out, the results showed that consumers' dining behaviors are directly related to their personality trait of sensation-seeking.

This study was delimited to a cross-sectional design and self-reported data. Such information may provide insights into individuals' decision-making and behaviors related to dining in a COVID-19 context. In addition, this study only includes US samples, while future studies can extend this study by including samples from different countries and cultural backgrounds.

This study adopts an interdisciplinary approach, which derives from tourism and hospitality management and public health. As a result, the findings of this study not only identify the major influencers affecting consumers' dining behavior but also help contextualize a public health model and contribute to the tourism and hospitality management literature.

This study aims to examine the influence of a sports-related accident and its severity on sponsorship effects, including brand recognition, attitude toward the sponsoring brand and purchase intention.

The fear appeal theory and sensation-seeking are applied as a theoretical framework. The research is carried out via an experiment using auto racing video footage and print material that manipulates the severity of accidents at three levels – no accident, an accident with a minor injury and an accident resulting in a fatality.

The analyses demonstrate that the severity of the accident elicits varying sponsorship effects. Sponsorship effects are maximized in a minor injury condition, while smaller sponsorship effects are garnered in the absence of an accident or during fatal injury conditions, as expected via the fear appeal theory. These results suggest that sports fans are excited by auto racing crashes, but are averse to witnessing a fatal accident.

The participants of the experiment were all students. Consequently, the participants did not represent all sports fans. Only auto racing was examined as experiment stimuli. Different demographic characteristics (e.g. age, race, nationality) and sports could differently influence the relationships among the research variables.

Potential sponsors do not need to take a negative view of the dangers of sports accidents. Rather, it is recommended that such companies actively plan their sponsorship activities with the appropriate strategy.

The relationship between the severity of a sports-related accident and sponsorship effects has received little attention regarding its potential impact on brand recognition, attitude toward the sponsoring brand and purchase intention. The current study is the first known empirical research using the fear appeal theory in sports sponsorship. It investigates the severity of a sports-related accident and determines how that severity influences sponsorship effects in auto racing. This study provides a better understanding of the effects of an accident and its severity on sponsorship effects.