The Detrimental Effects of External Objectives in Consumer Behavior

Consumers often engage in behaviors that are meaningful or self-relevant. These behaviors are typically guided by internal processes and motivations; as a result, extrinsic objectives can be disruptive. In my dissertation, I explore two distinct areas in which an external goal or incentive can be detrimental for consumers. In my first essay, I examine the utility people derive from their experiences as a function of their photo-taking goals. Virtually all people strive to maximize the happiness they obtain from their experiences, both living them in the moment and reliving them in the future. In a world where photo-taking is becoming increasingly common in almost every experience, it is important to understand how consumers’ photo-taking objectives influence how much they enjoy their experiences. In two field and four laboratory studies, we find that relative to taking photos to preserve memories for oneself, taking photos to share with others decreases consumers’ enjoyment of an experience. This effect occurs because taking photos to share increases anxiety from self-presentational concern. In other words, taking photos with the goal of sharing them with others, that is, with an extrinsic social motivation, can make rewarding activities less enjoyable. In my second essay, I investigate individuals’ effectiveness in persuading others to donate to a cause as a function of whether they were incentivized. Many individuals are intrinsically motivated to perform prosocial acts; that is, they are internally driven to help others. For activities like this that provide their own inherent reward, the introduction of an external motivator, such as a monetary incentive, can reduce effort or persistence on simple quantifiable tasks. But no work has examined the effect of incentives on prosocial tasks that require special skills or abilities, such as communicating and convincing others to do good deeds. In three fundraising experiments, we find that monetary incentives make individuals less effective in persuading others to donate to a cause by undermining their perceived sincerity. In other words, extrinsic material rewards can “crowd out” individuals’ genuineness of expression and thus their ability to gain support for a cause

When Happiness Shared Is Happiness Halved: How Taking Photos to Share With Others Affects Experiences and Memories

Though millions of photos are shared every day, no prior work examines how the goal of sharing influences experiences and memories. Three lab and field studies show that taking pictures to share with others, relative to taking pictures for oneself, can reduce enjoyment of experiences, photos themselves, and relived memories

Selfish Or Selfless? on the Signal Value of Emotion in Altruistic Behavior

We examine when consumers gain credit for good deeds. Contrary to theories that decry emotions as selfish, people view emotions as authentic, and therefore deserving of charitable credit. Further, feeling good as a result of giving is viewed positively, unless someone explicitly claims to have been motivated by emotional benefits. [to cite]

Impediments to effective altruism: the role of subjective preferences in charitable giving

Charity could do the most good if every dollar donated went to causes that produced the greatest welfare gains. In line with this proposition, the “Effective Altruism” movement seeks to provide individuals with information regarding the effectiveness of charities in hopes that they will donate to organizations that maximize the social return of their donation. This paper investigates the extent to which presenting effectiveness information leads people to choose more effective charities. We find that even when effectiveness information is made easily comparable across options, it has a limited impact on choice. Specifically, people frequently choose less effective charity options when those options represent more subjectively preferred causes. In contrast to making a personal donation decision, outcome metrics are used to a much greater extent when choosing financial investments and when allocating aid resources as an agent of an organization. Implications for Effective Altruism are discussed

Prosocial Behavior in Intergroup Relations: How Donor Self-Construal and Recipient Group-Membership Shape Generosity

This research examines the interplay of self-construal orientation and victim group-membership on prosocial behavior. Whereas consumers primed with an independent self-construal demonstrate similar propensities to help needy in-group and out-group others, an interdependent orientation fosters stronger commitments to aid in-group than out-group members. This interaction holds in both individualistic (i.e., the United States) and collectivistic (i.e., China) nations and seems driven by a belief system. For interdependents, the prospect of helping needy in-group (relative to out-group) members heightens the belief that helping others contributes to their own personal happiness, which in turn increases their propensity to act benevolently. Such in-group/out-group distinctions do not seem to operate among independents. The article concludes by discussing the theoretical implications of our findings for the cross-cultural, intergroup-relations, and prosocial literatures before deriving insights for practice

The Unexpected Social Consequences of Diverting Attention to our Phones

Phone use is everywhere. Previous work has shown that phone use during social experiences has detrimental effects on cognitive processing, well-being, and relationships. In this work, we first replicate this by showing the negative effects of phone use on relationships during both controlled and naturalistic social experiences. In Study 1, participants that were randomly assigned to complete a task with a confederate who used their phone part of the time reported lower feelings of social connection than participants paired with a partner who did not use their phone at all. In Study 2, dyads in a park completed a survey about their experience of the day. Participants reported that increased phone use resulted in lower feelings of social connection, enjoyment, and engagement in the experience. People were keenly aware that phone use in social situations can be harmful. If the negative effects of phone use are so obvious, why do people continue to phub their friends? Studies 3 and 4 demonstrate that people accurately intuit the effects of others’ phone use on experiences, but fail to recognize the effects of their own phone use. Study 4 explains this phubbing blindspot by demonstrating asymmetric positive attributions – people attribute their own phone use to positive social motives, and overestimate their ability to multitask compared to others. These findings suggest that people may fail to recognize the negative consequences of their own phone use by attributing positive motives for phone use to themselves