The effect of consumer`s powerlessness on power-symbol product consumption focusing on the moderating effect of materialism

Although people want to control their own circumstances, losing the control can cause undesirable situations which in turn sometimes lead people to experience a feeling of powerlessness. For example, uncontrollable situations such as reproaches by a superior at work and lack of money to buy products they want may lead people to experience powerlessness. Since experiencing powerlessness is likely to cause negative emotions such as frustration, sadness, and anger, and also increase desires to regain power, people try to come up with coping strategies to reduce the feeling of powerlessness (Rucker and Galinsky 2008; Dubois, Rucker and Galinsky 2012). One of the coping strategies that people use is compensatory consumptions for power products suchas luxurious shoes and bags as a means of recovering and showing their power (Han, Nunes, and Drese 2010). It is generally believed that the compensatory consumptions for power products can appear more often for people who highly value materialism. Reflecting the phenomenon, main objectives of the current study are to examine how consumers show compensatory consumption behaviors when they experience powerlessness and how materialism moderates the relationship between powerlessness and compensatory consumption. In order to achieve the main objectives, two studies were conducted. In study 1, we employed an exploratory method to find out the sources that cause powerlessness, emotions that consumers feel when they experience powerlessness, and compensatory behaviors that consumers show to cope with the emotions. In study 2, we empirically investigated the relationship between powerlessness and desire to purchase power-products and how materialism moderates the relationship based on results of study 1. The result of study 1 showed that there are seven sources of powerlessness: economic resource, position of authority, failure, control, expertise, relationship with people and respect from others. In addition, powerlessness caused negative emotions for consumers such as frustration, sadness, lethargy, anger, and gloom. The results also showed that in order to cope with the negative emotions, consumers showed compensatory behaviors such as going to movies, sleeping, and going shopping. Especially, when consumers go shopping as compensatory behaviors, they mostly purchased shoes, bags, and clothes. Main hypotheses tested in study 2 are as follows. H1: consumers`` willingness to pay (WTP)for power products is higher when consumers experience powerlessness than when they experience power. H2: the more consumers value materialism, consumers’ WTP is higher for power products when consumers experience powerlessness than when they experience power. To test the hypotheses, we conducted t-test and ANOVA. The results showed that the main hypotheses were supported. As a result of H1 test, consumers showed higher WTP for power products when they experience powerlessness than when they experience power. As a result of H2 test, consumers who value materialism showed higher WTP for power products when they experience powerlessness. There are significant academic contributions made by the current study. First, this study employed both exploratory and empirical research method to examine the effect of powerlessness on consumer behavior by focusing on powerlessness in consumer domain. Second, this study not only revealed the sources of powerlessness and the negative emotions caused by the powerlessness, but also showed how consumers perform compensatory consumption for power products as a means of coping with the negative emotions. Finally, this study showed the importance of materialism in consumer study by finding that the more consumers value materialism, the higher WTP is for power products when consumers experience powerlessness.