Counteractive Construal in Consumer Goal Pursuit
The present research explores a self-control operation, namely counteractive construal, that helps consumers resolve the conflicts between an important goal and a short-term temptation by altering the construal of the temptation. We propose that when experiencing a self-control conflict, consumers intentionally construe temptation as more damaging to the attainment of a long-term goal, and use these distorted construals to help resolve the conflict in favor of the goals. Three studies provided converging evidence for the counteractive construal hypothesis. We found that people who were experiencing self-control conflict expected tempting food items to contain more calories, and were consequently less interested in consuming these temptations.
Citation:
Ying Zhang, Szu-Chi Huang, and Susan Broniarczyk (2011) ,"Counteractive Construal in Consumer Goal Pursuit", in E - European Advances in Consumer Research Volume 9, eds. Alan Bradshaw, Chris Hackley, and Pauline Maclaran, Duluth, MN : Association for Consumer Research, Pages: 77.
Authors
Ying Zhang, University of Texas at Austin, USA
Szu-Chi Huang, University of Texas at Austin, USA
Susan Broniarczyk, University of Texas at Austin, USA
Volume
E - European Advances in Consumer Research Volume 9 | 2011
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