Empowered Consumers = Benevolent Consumers? the Effects of Priming Power on the Appeal of Socially Responsible Products

It is well documented that consumers frequently encounter and buy products that have a corporate social responsibility (CSR) associations. Past research has looked at many factors that affect consumers’ willingness to purchase a product with a CSR-association. However, the role of power in consumer evaluations of CSR-associated products has largely gone unexamined. Potentially, power can prime two opposing goals - a self oriented goal, or a social responsibility goal. In this work we find evidence for the latter. Specifically, we find that priming power leads to both increased favorable evaluation for socially responsible products and an enhanced purchase intention for such products.

Citation:

Swati Bhargava and Amitav Chakravarti (2009) ,"Empowered Consumers = Benevolent Consumers? the Effects of Priming Power on the Appeal of Socially Responsible Products", in NA - Advances in Consumer Research Volume 36, eds. Ann L. McGill and Sharon Shavitt, Duluth, MN : Association for Consumer Research, Pages: 831-832.