Eduardo B. Andrade

Behavioral Consequences of Affect: Combining Evaluative and Regulatory Mechanisms

The proposed model integrates two streams of research on affect by specifying how evaluative and regulatory mechanisms interact to guide behavior. Two experiments demonstrate that when no mood-changes are expected, the affective evaluation mechanism guides behavior, leading to a monotonic increase in behavioral intentions as affect conditions shift from negative to positive. When participants expect the behavioral activity to change their current affective states, a combination of affect regulation and affective evaluation produces a U shape pattern when a mood-lifting cue is present (experiment 1) and an inverted U shape pattern when a mood-threatening cue is present (experiment 2).

The Curious Case of Behavioral Backlash: Why Brands Produce Priming Effects and Slogans Produce Reverse Priming Effects

Five experiments demonstrate that brands cause priming effects (i.e., behavioral effects consistent with those implied by the brand), whereas slogans cause reverse priming effects (i.e., behavioral effects opposite to those implied by the slogan). For instance, exposure to the retailer brand name “Walmart,” typically associated with saving money, reduces subsequent spending, whereas exposure to the Walmart slogan, “Save money. Live better,” increases it. Slogans cause reverse priming effects and brands cause priming effects because people perceive slogans, but not brands, as persuasion tactics. The reverse priming effect is driven by a nonconscious goal to correct for bias and can occur without any conscious mediation (i.e., following subliminal exposure to the word “slogan”). These findings provide evidence that consumer resistance to persuasion can be driven by processes that operate entirely outside conscious awareness.

Affective Intuition and Task-Contingent Affect Regulation

Mood influences cognitive activity and behavior in systematic ways. Since such affective contingencies are repeatedly and broadly experienced, they should be available for learning and possibly conscious introspection. We examine the role of such intuitive theories in guiding affect regulation in a series of four studies and show that even suboptimal hedonic adjustments (i.e., preferences for the negative pole of the affective spectrum such as negative mood maintenance) were deliberately chosen in an attempt to match cognitive requirements of forthcoming tasks. We contrast affect discrepancy and strength of signal hypotheses to explain how affect regulation goals are activated.

Gaming Emotions in Social Interactions

There is limited literature on social interaction in consumer research, let alone on the moderating role of emotion expression (see Buchan, Croson, and Johnson [2004] for a discussion). This is surprising because social interaction often takes place before, during, and/or after the purchase of a product or service in many consumer contexts. Moreover, it seems plausible that emotional display might play a role when people interact with each other. For example, a waiter smiles when handing over a check to a customer in hope for a good tip. Similarly, a car buyer may inflate her anger when negotiating with a car dealer in order to obtain a lower price. Finally, a professional poker player hides his emotions—positive or negative—during a game so as not to reveal his hands. These examples suggest (a) that emotion expression and social interaction may be inherently linked and (b) that the former may be strategically used to influence the outcome of the later. In this article, we posit that consumers are willing to game emotions—to strategically modify the expression of a current emotional state—in an attempt to influence a third party. In a series of three experiments, we investigate the extent to *Eduardo B. Andrade is assistant professor of marketing (eandrade@ haas.berkeley.edu) and Teck-Hua Ho is the William Halford Jr. Family

Fear, Social Projection, and Financial Decision Making

The number of individual investors who trade stocks online has significantly increased in recent years. Surprisingly, consumer researchers have paid little attention to how emotions influence individual investors’ stock-trading decisions. In a series of three experiments, the authors investigate the impact of incidental fear on the decision to sell in a stock market simulation. The results show that fearful (vs. control) participants sell their stock earlier (Experiments 1–3). This effect, however, is contingent on particular features of the market. Fear leads to early sell-off when parti-pant believe the value of the stock is peer generated but not when they believe the value of the stock is computer generated (Experiment 2). Early sell-off as a result of incidental fear also occurs when participants believe their risk attitude is common in the market but not when they believe their risk attitude is unique (Experiment 3). Social projection—that is, peoples tendency to rely on their current state of mind to estimate other peoples actions—explains the phenomenon.

Planned versus Actual Betting in Sequential Gambles

Anecdotal evidence indicates that in a gambling environment, consumers may end up betting more than they had initially planned. The authors assess this phenomenon in a series of three experiments, in which people are exposed to sequential and fair gambles in a two-stage process (planned and actual bets). The results show that in the planning phase, people behave conservatively, betting on average less after an anticipated loss and the same amount after an anticipated gain. However, after experiencing an actual loss in the first gamble, people bet in a subsequent gamble significantly more than they had initially planned, whereas on average, there were no observable differences from the plan after an actual gain. The reason for such asymmetry is due in part to peoples tendency to underestimate, at the planning phase of the gamble, the impact of negative emotions in betting decisions during the actual phase of the gamble.

Interpersonal Relationships and Preferences for Mood-Congruency in Aesthetic Experiences

Prior research examining how negative feelings influence aesthetic preferences (e.g., liking of different kinds of music, movies, or stories) has reported inconsistent findings. This article proposes a theoretical argument to explain when people are more likely to prefer mood-congruent to mood-incongruent aesthetic stimuli. It is suggested that mood-congruent aesthetic experiences, for example, listening to sad songs when feeling sad, (a) serve as a surrogate for the mood-sharing often observed in empathic relationships and hence (b) are preferred when emotional distress comes from failing interpersonal relationships (vs. noninterpersonal events). Consistent with this proposition, peoples preferences for mood-congruent music strongly correlate with their preferences for an empathic friend (experiment 1). Further, mood-congruent preferences significantly increase when people experience interpersonal (vs. noninterpersonal) distress, independent of emotional intensity, emotion type (sadness and frustration/anger), and normative issues (experiments 1-3). Further theoretical developments and future research are discussed.

How Is the Boss's Mood Today? I Want a Raise

Other peoples incidental feelings can influence ones decision in a strategic manner. In a sequential game in which proposers moved first by dividing a given pot of cash (keeping 50% or 75% of the pot) and receivers responded by choosing the size of the pot (from

Feelings Not Forgone Underestimating Affective Reactions to What Does Not Happen

0 to

The Offer Framing Effect: Choosing Single versus Bundled Offerings Affects Variety Seeking

1), proposers were more likely to make an unfair offer (i.e., to keep 75% of the pot) if they were told that receivers had watched a funny sitcom, rather than a movie clip portraying anger, in an unrelated study prior to the game playing. However, when proposers were told that receivers knew proposers had this affective information, the effect dissipated. In other words, a proposer expects a happy receiver to be more accommodating or cooperative than an angry receiver as long as the happy receiver does not realize that the proposer may be trying to benefit from the receivers current incidental feelings.