Dampening the warm glow of a visible brand logo: how positive affect influences the perceived value of status goods

ABSTRACT

High status is conducive to many pleasant outcomes in life, and people often desire status goods for the attention and respect that are given to those who have them. This research shows that positive affect decreases the extent to which people pursue the extrinsic consumption benefits that hinge on others’ approval, and attenuates the magnitude of value people normally place on the social signaling attributes. When target products feature socially visible status attributes (e.g., brand logo), positive affect dampens people’s normative valuation of the goods. When the status attributes are invisible to others, the dampening effect becomes insignificant. When the products are noted for intrinsic quality attributes, positive affect enhances the evaluation. Thus, positive affect has more nuanced and distinct, rather than general, effects on product evaluation. These results suggest that positive affect can naturally attenuate people’s desire for status goods that are normally pursued for their social signaling efficacy.

KEYWORDS:

• Positive affect
• normative cognition and behavior
• preferences and choice
• status signal
• conspicuous goods
• social approval and validation
• intrinsic and extrinsic
• consumer judgments and decision making
• information processing
• cognitive flexibility

Acknowledgement

The author thanks Kristina M. Rennekamp, Surendra N. Singh, Daniel J. Benjamin, and the participants of the Behavioral Economics brown bag seminar at Cornell University for their helpful feedback on earlier drafts of this paper.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.