Knowledge that Transforms

AbstractFrom ancient time, Homo sapiens moved around in search of a better life. Although the development of agriculture and industrialization no longer necessitates frequently moving to find new food sources, people today still change their residences for a variety of reasons. This article highlights key findings from residential mobility, focusing on its implications for the self, social relationships, societies, and well‐being. Generally, residential mobility shifts individual attention away from collective attributes toward personal attributes. It also changes people's relationship styles and preferences, leading individuals to favor wider social networks, more open communication, low‐commitment groups, and egalitarian helpers. In addition, it increases tolerance for norm violations and moral deviations. Lastly, residential mobility can explain some cross‐national and within‐nation variations. This article reviews recent psychological research on residential mobility and then discusses limitations, paradoxical findings, and future directions.

This review of mental imagery research has the core objective of fostering more research on the topic of sensory imagery. The review is organized around a conceptual framework highlighting (a) how mental imagery is formed, (b) the elicitation and elaboration of mental imagery, (c) the multi‐modal nature of sensory imagery, and (d) the consumer behavior consequences of mental imagery. This conceptual framework provides many new lenses through which researchers can view prior findings, and thereby motivates innovative new research ideas. Future research directions are provided in each section of the review, with additional unexplored opportunities presented in a final section.

Since the introduction of the persuasion knowledge model more than 25 years ago, many research studies have investigated how consumers’ persuasion knowledge affects their reactions to persuasion attempts. While most results have shown that persuasion knowledge increases coping responses and leads to less favorable evaluations of marketer actions, the findings vary considerably, leaving researchers with a limited understanding of the substance and structure of persuasion knowledge effects and the conditions that explain their variability. To develop a better understanding of persuasion knowledge effects in the marketplace, this study builds on the concept of persuasion to predict responses to marketers’ attempts to persuade consumers with different levels of persuasion knowledge. The study presents a meta‐analysis of the findings in 148 papers and 171 distinct data sets. Persuasion knowledge effects can be viewed as substantial compared with persuasion attempts, but persuasion knowledge cannot suppress or eliminate persuasion effects in the marketplace, as it only reaches around 50% of the explanatory power of persuasion. Persuasion knowledge effects on evaluations and coping depend on the characteristics of the persuasion process. All persuasion elements that help consumers identify and better understand benefits not just for themselves, but also for marketers and how marketers realize their benefits—such as the use of personal communication, communication about unfamiliar products or products with experience attributes, and receiver experience—lead to less favorable effects for marketers. This paper’s insights provide a new framework for persuasion knowledge effects in the marketplace, ideas for future research, and implications for researchers, consumers, policymakers, and marketers.

AbstractIn response to high‐profile calls, and the apparent demand from consumers, brands in a wide variety of categories have sought to define, articulate, communicate, and act according to their “brand purpose.” But what is brand purpose? Human purpose is seen as a long‐term commitment to act consistently with one's values, leading to productive engagement with the world that transcends the self. However, the use of the term purpose as applied to brands raises a number of questions. In what ways is brand purpose similar to, and different from, human purpose? How do consumers react to brand purpose? How might a brand's purpose impact consumers? In this review, we explore the concept of brand purpose and its potential impact on consumer behavior, drawing upon the literature on human purpose. Additionally, we propose that engagement and connections with authentically purposeful brands may contribute to consumers' own purposeful lives, ultimately helping consumers achieve their own eudaimonic well‐being. We develop a framework highlighting the relationship between brand purpose and consumer eudaimonic well‐being to guide future research in this domain.

Interracial interactions abound in the marketplace and are at the core of many consumer experiences across commercial, health, and social settings. The creation of harmonious interracial interactions is a focal target of private, nonprofit, and governmental efforts to transform consumer markets worldwide. Yet both research and practice highlight the challenge of achieving such interactions. Despite their centrality to consumer experience and social significance, interracial interactions have received limited attention in the consumer psychology literature. Understanding the particular role of interracial interactions in how consumers choose, buy, and consume products, services, and experiences is essential to address racial inequity in the marketplace. In this research, we identify extant interdisciplinary research to conceptualize the consumer psychology underlying interracial marketplace interactions. We analyze this literature to summarize the state of the knowledge, identify important research gaps, and develop an organizing framework for prior and future research. Our analysis highlights priorities for future research supportive of harmonious interracial interactions that promote consumer equity and contribute to societal well‐being.

Research demonstrates that people utilize both reasoning and feeling in decision making and that both strategies can be advantageous. However, little is known about how people perceive their decision‐making relative to others. Despite research findings and popular appeals supporting the use of affective decision processes, across a series of studies, we find that individuals believe they rely more on reasoning, and less on feelings, than others. These effects are driven by the motivation to self‐enhance where, in most contexts, individuals believe the use of reasoning is superior, and self‐enhancing, compared to the use of feelings. Consistent with this mechanism, beliefs that one’s decisions are more rational than others’ are as follows: (a) stronger for those who exhibit greater beliefs in the superiority of reasoning (vs. feeling), (b) attenuated when the decision context precludes motivational thinking about the self or the self is affirmed, and (c) reversed when the use of feelings is perceived as more self‐enhancing. We demonstrate downstream consequences (e.g., decision delegation), rule out alternative explanations, and discuss practical implications of these lay beliefs.