Shivering for Status: When Cold Temperatures Increase Product Evaluation

While anecdotal evidence suggests that consumers maintain an association between high‐status products and cold temperature, no research has empirically examined this linkage. We propose and demonstrate that physical cold can indeed increase consumers’ perceptions of a product's status signaling and luxuriousness. We demonstrate this consequence can stem from tactile or visually induced temperatures and ultimately increase consumers’ overall evaluations of products. Finally, we highlight boundary conditions for when the effect is likely to manifest. Our findings offer theoretical contributions along with several practical implications for retailing, product design, brand management, and marketing communications.     

Keeping It Real: How Perceived Brand Authenticity Affects Product Perceptions

This article examines the effects of firm motivation (an intrinsic or extrinsic interest in their product) on perceptions of brand authenticity and anticipated product quality. Specifically, studies 1 and 2 show that an intrinsic motivation increases authenticity perceptions which, in turn, increase perceived product quality, even for negatively regarded products. Studies 3a and 3b demonstrate that motivation affects perceived product quality (through perceived authenticity) by influencing deliberate attribute‐level inferences consumers make about the product, and Study 4 demonstrates that the positive effect of intrinsic motivation (through authenticity) disappears in the presence of objective product attribute information, when such inferences are no longer necessary. These findings suggest that authenticity perceptions are malleable, and they shed light on the mechanism through which brand authenticity leads consumers to anticipate that a brand's products will be higher in quality.     

La Bella Figura: The role of a cultural philosophy on Italian consumerism

The La Bella Figura concept extends to many Italian cultural dimensions including physical appearance, perception of self, and behaviours. La Bella Figura plays an essential role in shaping Italian consumer behaviour and consumerism. The current study sought to understand how women living in Italy conceptualize La Bella Figura and how it affects their day‐to‐day lives, attitudes, and consumption behaviours. This research extracted concepts from Consumer Culture Theory to construct a qualitative codebook and structure thematic data analyses. Semi‐structured interviews were conducted with 30 women aged 18–50 years living in Florence, Italy. Participants were recruited through study flyers, social media, and snowball sampling. Open and axial coding were facilitated by HyperRESEARCH 4.0.1 software to generate key themes. Data were collected and analyzed by trained researchers living in Florence, Italy, who utilized grounded theory techniques to identify emergent themes. Results indicated various components of La Bella Figura contributed to consumer behaviour, namely its influence on identity (i.e., appearance, confidence), lifestyle goals (i.e., health, consumerism), and social norms (i.e., perceptions of others, media). Findings offer practical recommendations for marketers and retailers to appeal to the Italian market through effective and informed mediums.     

Non-spatial context-driven search

Contexts that predict characteristics of search targets can guide attention by triggering attentional control settings for the characteristics. However, this context-driven search has most commonly been found in the spatial dimension. The present study explored the context-driven search when shape contexts predict the color of targets: non-spatial context-driven search. It has been demonstrated that context-driven search requires cognitive resources, and evidence of non-spatial context-driven search is found when there is an increase in cognitive resources for the shape/color associations. Thus, the scarcity of evidence for non-spatial context-driven search is potentially because the context-driven search requires more cognitive resources for shape/color associations than for spatial/spatial associations. In the current study, we violated a previously 100% consistent shape/color association with two mismatch trials to encourage allocation of cognitive resources to the shape/color association. Three experiments showed that the shape-predicted color cues captured attention more than the non-predicted color cues, indicating that shape contexts triggered attentional control settings for a color predicted by the contexts. Furthermore, the shape contexts guided attention to the predicted color only after the two mismatch trials, suggesting that expression of the non-spatial context-driven search may require cognitive resources more than the spatial context-driven search.

     

Enhancing social diffusion theory as a basis for prevention intervention: A conceptual and strategic framework

Social diffusion theory has recently been recognized as a promising approach for large-scale disease prevention and health promotion efforts. This paper describes how principles and tactics from social cognitive theory, operant psychology, social psychology, social marketing, and the overarching stages of change model can be used to further develop the conceptual and strategic (technological) bases of social diffusion theory. Within an integrative framework, we discuss in detail more effective ways to train peer mediators of behavior change as one example of how social diffusion theory can benefit from this conceptual and strategic reformulation. We then further illustrate the use of peer mediators of change in human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) and cancer prevention intervention studies with both interventions training peer mediators to diffuse information, norms, and risk reduction strategies. Although the results of these studies showed reductions in high-risk behaviors across population segments, more closely following the framework discussed in this article should further increase the behavior change potential of future interventions based on social diffusion theory.     

The adrenergic receptor α-2A gene (ADRA2A) and neuropsychological executive functions as putative endophenotypes for childhood ADHD

There is resurgent interest in the psychiatric literature in endophenotypes, variables thought to more strongly reflect the effects of candidate genes than do manifest disorders. In a sample of 176 children with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) and 52 of their siblings, we examined the validity of several putative endophenotypes for ADHD that represent commonly used clinical measures of multiple cognitive/neuropsychological domains of executive functions (EFs). We review their distributional normality, their relations to ADHD symptoms in probands and unaffected siblings relative to nonADHD controls, and their correlation in siblings. We also tested the EF measures’ associations with the ADRA2A gene and whether they mediated or moderated the associations between ADHD and ADRA2A. Several EF measures showed association with ADRA2A, as well as moderation, but not mediation, of its association with ADHD. Implications of the results for evaluating the validity and utility of putative endophenotype measures and for finding candidate gene effects on ADHD are discussed.     

Comparison of treatment seeking compulsive buyers in Germany and the United States

OBJECTIVE: The aim of this pilot study was to compare a German (Bavaria) and an American (North Dakota) sample of women suffering from compulsive buying. METHOD: Thirty-eight German and 39 American female compulsive buyers were screened with the Compulsive Buying Scale (CBS), and the Yale-Brown Obsessive Compulsive Scale-Shopping Version (Y-BOCS-SV) prior to entering a group treatment study. Psychiatric co-morbidity was assessed with the Structured Clinical Interview for DSM-IV Axis I disorders (SCID). RESULTS: There were no statistically significant differences between the German sample and the American sample with regard to age (mean 43.7 and 45 years, respectively), and with regard to the scores on the CBS and the Y-BOCS-SV. A high lifetime co-morbidity rate with Axis I disorders, especially mood disorders, anxiety disorders, substance use disorders, OCD, and binge eating disorder was detected in both samples. Almost all participants met criteria for at least one lifetime Axis I disorder. However, German compulsive buyers showed significantly higher current prevalence rates of any affective disorder, and higher current and lifetime prevalence rates of any anxiety disorder and somatoform disorder. In addition, German compulsive buyers were significantly more likely to have more than one Axis I disorder. CONCLUSION: The groups did not differ with regard to age and with regard to the severity of compulsive buying and showed a high co-morbidity with Axis I disorders. However, the German compulsive buying sample presented with significantly more psychiatric co-morbidity compared to the American sample. Further research is needed to provide a better understanding of this disorder in general and cross-culturally.     

Concurrent working memory load can facilitate selective attention: evidence for specialized load

Load theory predicts that concurrent working memory load impairs selective attention and increases distractor interference (N. Lavie, A. Hirst, J. W. de Fockert, & E. Viding). Here, the authors present new evidence that the type of concurrent working memory load determines whether load impairs selective attention or not. Working memory load was paired with a same/different matching task that required focusing on targets while ignoring distractors. When working memory items shared the same limited-capacity processing mechanisms with targets in the matching task, distractor interference increased. However, when working memory items shared processing with distractors in the matching task, distractor interference decreased, facilitating target selection. A specialized load account is proposed to describe the dissociable effects of working memory load on selective processing depending on whether the load overlaps with targets or with distractors.     

Attributional patterns and perceptions of math and science among fifth-grade through seventh-grade girls and boys

A culturally and economically diverse group of fifth to seventh graders (n = 361) from Boston-area public schools rated their perceptions for liking and difficulty of core academic subjects, including math and science, and their attributions for explaining performance on a math test. Inconsistent with earlier work, girls and boys reported similar perceptions of core subjects, with all students reporting a relatively high liking of math and science. Girls' and boys' attributional patterns for success in math were somewhat consistent with earlier findings, but not their attributions for lack of success. Observations of the math and science classrooms in the study indicated that most teachers, aware of gender equity issues, attempted to teach their students in a gender-fair manner. This factor may account for differences between current findings and those from past studies.Special thanks to Dr. Adele Wolfson for her advice and support. Thanks also to Dr. Lee Cuba and Lillian Sun for their assistance with statistical analyses; to Dr. Beth Hennessey for help with the measure; to Drs. Ken Hawes, Barbara Beatty, and Susan Reverby for connections into schools; to Dr. Martha Pott for suggestions on the original document; to the teachers and principals who granted permission to conduct the research; and to the student participants. Appreciation is also extended to an anonymous reviewer for insightful comments.     

Assessing decision strategies using HyperCard

The use of “process-tracing” techniques for examining individuals’ decision strategies has been criticized widely for yielding results that are uninformative and often confounded. The present paper describes a new technique based on a “structural” approach that allows efficient assessment of finely discriminated decision strategies via a HyperCard program called DECOUT. The program presents individuals with an information matrix (e.g., describing five alternative pesticides on three attributes). Individuals are asked to choose the best or the worst alternative in the matrix for 12 problems. Information in the matrix is constructed so that choice of an alternative by an individual is uniquely associated with use of one particular decision strategy. The strategies include information integration, maximin, maximax, pessimism-optimism, and minimax-regret processes. An experiment using the program is described, and possible directions for future research and development are discussed.