Abstract
What influences consumers’ preferences for strong versus weak sensory stimuli? In this article, we find converging evidence that when the experience of a romantic crush is salient, consumers have an enhanced preference for options that elicit strong sensory stimulation (e.g., loud music, strongly flavored food). We demonstrate this effect across seven studies using a broad array of products and services as stimuli. We further show that these consumers have a heightened motivation to achieve greater sensations from the desired person, but cannot act in a way that directly satisfies this motivation, leading them to be more likely to turn to products and services for the desired sensations. Moreover, we find that the effect is specific to the experience of a romantic crush and cannot be generalized to other interpersonal experiences (e.g., passionate love, stable romantic relationship, unmet sexual desire).
| Original language | English (US) |
|---|---|
| Pages (from-to) | 53-68 |
| Number of pages | 16 |
| Journal | Journal of Consumer Research |
| Volume | 46 |
| Issue number | 1 |
| DOIs | |
| State | Published - Jun 1 2019 |
Funding
Xun (Irene) Huang ([email protected]) is an assistant professor of marketing at Nanyang Business School, Nanyang Technological University, 50 Nanyang Avenue, 639798 Singapore. Ping Dong (ping. [email protected]) is an assistant professor of marketing at Kellogg School of Management, Northwestern University, 2211 Campus Drive, Evanston IL, 60208, USA. Meng Zhang ([email protected]. edu.hk) is a professor of marketing at the CUHK Business School, the Chinese University of Hong Kong, Shatin, Hong Kong. Please address correspondence to Xun (Irene) Huang. The authors thank the editor, associate editor, and three anonymous reviewers for their very helpful and insightful comments. They would also like to thank Bob Wyer for his helpful comments on earlier drafts of this article. The preparation of this article was supported by NTU Start-Up Grant (M4081651.010) and MOE Tier 1 Grant (2017-T1-002-077) awarded to the first author; internal grants from the Kellogg School of Management, Northwestern University, to the second author; and Direct Grants from the CUHK Business School (BS16731/BS15762) to the third author. Supplementary materials are included in the web appendix accompanying the online version of this article.
Keywords
- Interpersonal relationship
- Romantic crush
- Sensations
- Sensory intensity
ASJC Scopus subject areas
- Business and International Management
- Anthropology
- Arts and Humanities (miscellaneous)
- Economics and Econometrics
- Marketing