Scott W. Davis

Control Over What? Individual Differences in General Versus Eating and Spending Self-Control

Public policy research is often directed at inducing welfare-enhancing behavioral change using interventions that provide consumers with helpful information and tools. The authors suggest that the effectiveness of such public policy interventions for relevant outcomes depend on individual differences in consumer self-control. The present research examines how healthy eating and responsible spending outcomes are influenced by low (vs. high) self-control at general and domain-specific levels. Important questions pertain to the theoretical basis of self-control individual differences and the relative efficacy of general and domain-specific measures in predicting eating and spending outcomes. The authors propose a new measurement approach to increase measurement standardization and the comparability of results in self-control studies and empirically demonstrate its value. Recommendations for public policy researchers and practitioners reflect the role of general and domain-specific individual differences in self-control and their implications for designing and testing effective interventions to improve consumer health and financial well-being.

From Use to Abuse: When Everyday Consumption Behaviours Morph Into Addictive Consumptive Behaviours

Addiction does not begin with the harmful effects of being dependent on a particular consumption behaviour such as smoking, alcohol, or illegal drugs. Instead it starts with everyday seemingly benign behaviours that, through psychological, biophysical, and/or environmental triggers, can become harmful and morph into an addiction. We develop a framework based on harm and dependence that can help researchers better understand how consumers could become addicted to various types of everyday benign consumption behaviours (e.g., texting, shopping, plastic surgery, and other types of normally acceptable behaviours). Furthermore, the conceptual framework is based on expanding the concept of addiction to include the pre-addiction process with a focus on this continuum of benign to harmful behavioural consumption. This framework describes how consumers progress from a normal state of consumption into a state of addictive abuse and dependence. The framework discusses key issues and future research that can aid public policy researchers, practitioners, and marketers to better understand the entire pre-addiction process.

Don’t Sweat the Big Stuff: Emphasizing Importance Hinders Goal Pursuit for Consumers Low in Dispositional Self-Control Resources

Our research examines goal striving and the effect of importance on self-control outcomes. Extant research has shown that consumers allocate greater self-control resources when faced with more important goals, but we predict and show that emphasizing goal importance leads to worse self-control decisions for individuals lower in dispositional self-control. Specifically, for these consumers, increasing the perceived importance of managing personal finances or maintaining good health leads to a higher likelihood of making a goal-incongruent decision. Additionally, we advance self-control theory by keying in on the role of goal difficulty to explain our proposed backfire effect. Ironically then, our theory and results show that those consumers who naturally have limited self-control resources are worse off when reminded that their self-control goals are, in fact, important.

Inside Out Personal Branding (IOPB): Using Gallup Clifton StrengthsFinder 2.0 and 360Reach

A personal brand is an individual’s reputation and unique image, which can be a crucial differentiator in today’s hypercompetitive job market. This article’s two main objectives are: to present an evidence-based approach to developing the self-awareness component of a personal brand, and to analyze the impact of the assignment on student learning outcomes. The Gallup Clifton StrengthsFinder 2.0, which provides an inside (or internal) assessment, is used in conjunction with 360Reach, which provides an outside (or external) assessment, to guide marketing students through an inside-out approach to developing their personal brand (IOPB). Students report that the assignment helps them understand their talents, improve self-awareness, and prepare them for their job search and career planning.