IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/oup/jconrs/v37y2010i1p129-142.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Counteractive Construal in Consumer Goal Pursuit

Author

Listed:
  • Ying Zhang
  • Szu-chi Huang
  • Susan M. Broniarczyk

Abstract

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. Four studies in two self-regulatory domains (a dieting goal and an academic goal) 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 or expected parties to take more time away from studying and were consequently less interested in consuming these temptations. (c) 2009 by JOURNAL OF CONSUMER RESEARCH, Inc..

Suggested Citation

  • Ying Zhang & Szu-chi Huang & Susan M. Broniarczyk, 2010. "Counteractive Construal in Consumer Goal Pursuit," Journal of Consumer Research, Journal of Consumer Research Inc., vol. 37(1), pages 129-142, June.
    • Handle: RePEc:oup:jconrs:v:37:y:2010:i:1:p:129-142
    DOI: 10.1086/649912
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://dx.doi.org/10.1086/649912
    File Function: link to full text
    Download Restriction: Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1086/649912?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Berg, Nathan & Kim, Jeong-Yoo, 2010. "Demand for Self Control: A model of Consumer Response to Programs and Products that Moderate Consumption," MPRA Paper 26593, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    2. Tsvetanov, Tsvetan & Miceli, Thomas J. & Segerson, Kathleen, 2021. "Products liability with temptation bias," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 186(C), pages 76-93.
    3. Tsvetanov, Tsvetan & Segerson, Kathleen, 2013. "Re-evaluating the role of energy efficiency standards: A behavioral economics approach," Journal of Environmental Economics and Management, Elsevier, vol. 66(2), pages 347-363.
    4. Ayadi, Nawel & Giraud, Magali & Gonzalez, Christine, 2013. "An investigation of consumers' self-control mechanisms when confronted with repeated purchase temptations: Evidence from online private sales," Journal of Retailing and Consumer Services, Elsevier, vol. 20(3), pages 272-281.
    5. Scott W. Davis & Kelly L. Haws, 2017. "Don’t Sweat the Big Stuff: Emphasizing Importance Hinders Goal Pursuit for Consumers Low in Dispositional Self-Control Resources," Journal of the Association for Consumer Research, University of Chicago Press, vol. 2(1), pages 93-104.
    6. Yang, Shaoguang & Xu, Qian & Jin, Liyin, 2021. "Sweet or sweat, which should come first: How consumption sequences of vices and virtues influence enjoyment," International Journal of Research in Marketing, Elsevier, vol. 38(4), pages 1073-1087.
    7. Kathleen Segerson & Tsvetan Tsvetanov, 2013. "Regulation versus liability: a behavioural economics perspective," Chapters, in: Thomas J. Miceli & Matthew J. Baker (ed.), Research Handbook on Economic Models of Law, chapter 4, pages 69-86, Edward Elgar Publishing.
    8. Tsvetanov, Tsvetan & Segerson, Kathleen, 2011. "Re-Evaluating the Role of Energy Efficiency Standards: A Time-Consistent Behavioral Economics Approach," Working Paper series 148295, University of Connecticut, Charles J. Zwick Center for Food and Resource Policy.
    9. Dewitte, Siegfried, 2013. "From willpower breakdown to the breakdown of the willpower model – The symmetry of self-control and impulsive behavior," Journal of Economic Psychology, Elsevier, vol. 38(C), pages 16-25.
    10. Bayuk, Julia Belyavsky & Patrick, Vanessa M., 2021. "Is the uphill road the one more taken? How task complexity prompts action on non-pressing tasks," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 128(C), pages 436-449.
    11. van de Ven, Niels & Blanken, Irene & Zeelenberg, Marcel, 2018. "Temptation-based reasoning : When tempted, everything becomes a (better) reason to indulge," Other publications TiSEM 2d4ef71e-a23b-47ee-828d-9, Tilburg University, School of Economics and Management.
    12. (Grace) Chae, Boyoun & Yoon, Sangsuk & Baskin, Ernest & (Juliet) Zhu, Rui, 2023. "The lasting smell of temptation: Counteractive effects of indulgent food scents," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 155(PA).

    More about this item

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:oup:jconrs:v:37:y:2010:i:1:p:129-142. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    We have no bibliographic references for this item. You can help adding them by using this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: the person in charge (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://academic.oup.com/jcr .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.