Global Identity and Preference for Environmentally Friendly Products: The Role of Personal Responsibility

This research tests the idea that a salient global identity positively affects people’s willingness to pay for environmentally friendly products. Results from a large-scale multi-nation survey (N = 75,934) as well as two studies (N = 322) conducted in Singapore supported this prediction. We found that participants with a more (vs. less) dominant global identity indicated greater support for environmentally friendly products and exhibited increased pro-environmental behavior. We further show that the effect is driven by a stronger feeling of personal responsibility toward the environment among individuals who possess a dominant global identity. Findings from this research suggest that the formation of stronger global identity, a psychological consequence of increasing globalization, can have an important impact on people’s pro-environmental behavior

Support for Resettling Refugees: The Role of Fixed-Growth Mindsets

In six studies (N = 2,340), we identified one source of people’s differential support for resettling refugees in their country—their beliefs about whether the kind of person someone is can be changed (i.e., a growth mind-set) or is fixed (i.e., a fixed mind-set). U.S. and UK citizens who believed that the kind of person someone is can be changed were more likely to support resettling refugees in their country (Studies 1 and 2). Study 3 identified a causal relationship between the type of mind-set people hold and their support for resettling refugees. Importantly, people with a growth mind-set were more likely to believe that refugees can assimilate in the host society but not that they should assimilate, and the belief that refugees can assimilate mediated the relationship between people’s mind-sets and their support for resettling refugees (Studies 4–6). The findings identify an important antecedent of people’s support for resettling refugees and provide novel insights into the science of mind-sets

100amonthor100 a month or 1,200 a year : regulatory focus and the evaluation of temporally framed product attributes

Five studies test the idea that consumers’ regulatory goals affect their evaluation of temporally framed product attributes. A salient promotion focus leads to more extreme evaluation of attributes framed in aggregate (Lose 10 pounds over 10 weeks; Pay $1200 over a year) as compared to disaggregate (Lose 1 pound per week over 10 weeks; Pay$100 per month) terms. However, no such difference in evaluation exists for prevention focused individuals. This effect held in both financial (Studies 1,2, and 4) and non-financial (Studies 3 and 5) domains, as well as for both benefits (Studies 1 through 4) and costs (Study 5). Furthermore, using different measures of magnitude perception, Studies 4 and 5 found that the effect was driven by biased magnitude judgments – promotion focused, but not prevention focused, individuals used the largeness of the numeric expression as a heuristic for quantity evaluation. These findings suggest marketers' strategy of aggregating benefits over a longer time period and disaggregating costs over a shorter time period may be effective only when the consumer is promotion focused.Doctor of Philosophy (NBS

Pursuit of Beauty: the Cultural Divide

Across three studies, we investigate the beauty obsession that is touching unprecedented heights in Asia. We show that Easterners/interdependents are more prone to using appearance-enhancing products to adhere to societal norms. Replicated across contexts, this effect is sequentially mediated by conformity and self-discrepancy, i.e. gap between ideal standards and self-image