Jennifer L. Stoner

Content marketers often employ mixed emotional appeals to engage viewers. Prior research suggests mixed emotions would appeal to collectivists, but not individualists. In contrast, the current research proposes that both individualists and collectivists choose content (e.g., in movies and comics) intended to signal mixed emotions, if the mixed emotions align with their cultural values. Building on established theoretical links between collectivism and self‐transcendence values, and individualism and self‐enhancement values, the authors find that collectivists (individualists) process affection‐sadness (pride‐anger) more fluently, and that this relative fluency is consistent with their choices. Data from 8 years of box office revenue (2015‐2022) and six experiments (including three in the Web Appendix), along with an internal meta‐analysis, are consistent with the hypotheses. Practically, the findings suggest that content platforms can increase recommendation effectiveness by personalizing emotional tags and images to match viewers' cultural orientations. The authors discuss implications for content personalization, consumer experience, and recommendation effectiveness.

Aligning with social causes has become a prevalent marketing strategy, yet there remains a lack of clarity about how brand‐cause fit—the perceived congruence between a brand and its associated cause—shapes the effectiveness of such initiatives. This research demonstrates that the positive effect of brand‐cause fit on brand credibility is contingent on spatial association: when brand logos and cause messages appear close together, the credibility advantage of high fit diminishes. Furthermore, we identify persuasion knowledge activation as the underlying psychological mechanism that explains how brand‐cause fit influences brand credibility. Study 1A shows that higher fit enhances credibility, while Study 1B replicates the effect using negative message framing. Study 2 identifies spatial proximity as a boundary condition, and Study 3 validates persuasion knowledge as the explanatory mechanism while reaffirming the moderating role of spatial association. These findings contribute to research on spatial association, persuasion knowledge, and brand credibility, while offering actionable insights into the efficacy of cause‐based marketing initiatives.

Past research suggests that cost‐saving behaviors such as couponing can trigger negative trait perceptions (e.g. that the consumer is being miserly), and consumers purchasing gifts may avoid use of coupons so as not to appear ungenerous. In contrast, we contend that cost‐saving can also send a positive signal. In five studies we show that cost‐saving enhances perceptions of consumer competence and financial management skills, which, in turn, can lead to more favorable brand perceptions. Using costly signaling theory, we further identify two boundary conditions for these signals to be perceived as genuine: (a) absence of ulterior motives (e.g., sponsored social media posts that diminish the authenticity of the signal) and (b) the presence of the quality being signaled (as higher‐class consumers are typically seen as competent). Our findings extend the scope of signaling theory to consumer behavior contexts, showing that costly signals must honestly convey positive qualities.

Experimental research methods have a long history across a number of different disciplines—including consumer research. Although experiments are just one of many alternative research methods, experiments are notable because they are the best way to establish causation. This makes experiments a powerful tool when researchers need to show cause and effect relationships. In this article, we provide best practices for implementing experimental research methods in consumer studies. Specifically, we discuss several important topics researchers need to consider when designing experiments, including developing hypotheses, operationalizing the variables (manipulated or measured), deciding on the research design (between‐subjects, within‐subjects, or mixed), selecting the research setting (laboratory, field, or online), understanding the main effect (via moderation, mediation, or moderated mediation), including manipulation and attention checks, determining the sample size, and choosing participants. We provide recommendations that researchers can use to conduct high‐quality experiments in a consumer context.

Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to propose cultural equity as a construct to better understand the characteristics that define a culturally symbolic brand and the downstream consequences for consumer behavior and nation branding in the era of globalization.Design/methodology/approach: This paper is an empirical investigation of the knowledge and outcome aspects of cultural equity with a total of 1,771 consumers located in three different countries/continents, 77 different brands as stimuli, and using a variety of measures, surveys, lab experiments, procedures and consumer contexts.Findings: Cultural equity is the facet of brand equity attributed to the brand's cultural symbolism or the favorable responses by consumers to the cultural symbolism of a brand. A brand has cultural equity if it has a distinctive cultural symbolism in consumers' minds (brand knowledge aspect of cultural equity: association with the central concept that defines the culture, embodiment of culturally relevant values and embeddedness in a cultural knowledge network), and such symbolism elicits a favorable consumer response to the marketing of the brand (outcome aspect of cultural equity: favorable evaluations and strong self-brand connections).Practical implications: This paper offers a framework that allows marketers to develop cultural positioning strategies in hyper-competitive and globalized markets and identify ways for building and protecting their brands' cultural equity.Originality/value: This paper advances our understanding of brands as cultural symbols by introducing cultural equity and integrates prior research on brand equity, cross-cultural differences in consumer behavior, country-of-origin effects and nation branding.

Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to comment on the conceptual framework highlighting the reinforcing nature of global consumer culture. Design/methodology/approach: The approach is conceptual with illustrative examples. Findings: The authors integrate the conceptual framework that highlights the reinforcing nature of global consumer culture with recent findings about the psychology of globalization. Specifically, the authors bring attention to the perceptual, cognitive and motivational consequences of globalization, as well as its effects on consumer identification. The authors illustrate how this integration provides insights for better predicting consumer behavior in a globalized world. Research limitations/implications: One key aspect of globalization is the creation of multicultural spaces in contemporary societies. Taking a psychological approach, the authors discuss how consumers respond to the process of culture mixing at the heart of globalization. This has consequences for marketers’ global endeavors and provides a nuanced understanding of consumer behavior in a globalized world. Originality/value: The paper integrates a novel framework with recent findings about the psychology of globalization, opening avenues for future research on global consumer cultures.

What happens when females use counterfeit luxury products in a social context? The authors show that counterfeit users view social interactions they have with other people as a possible signal that their counterfeit product has been judged to be an authentic luxury product (high authenticity signal) or a counterfeit product (low authenticity signal). Low authenticity signals trigger higher levels of social anxiety than do high authenticity signals. And, higher levels of social anxiety result in decreases in moral disengagement regarding counterfeit purchases. The end result is that low authenticity signals lead to lower purchase intentions and actual spending on counterfeit luxury goods compared to high authenticity signals. In a final study, the authors use these findings to develop a new anticounterfeit advertising strategy, and show it to be effective in reducing females’ interest in purchasing counterfeit luxury products in the future.

Naming products is quite prevalent in American culture; however, we are not aware of any consumer research that explores the effects of this phenomenon. Across three studies, we demonstrate that when consumers name products, their evaluations of those products increase (e.g., attitudes, purchase intentions, and willingness to accept). We find that name fit and creativity as well as subsequent psychological ownership drive this effect. We also demonstrate that the naming effect is quite robust—replicating across multiple products, presentation formats, and populations as well as persisting over time. These results contribute to consumer research by opening up a new substantive line of inquiry into the effects of naming products.