Presentation given at the 3rd International Consumer Brand Relationships Conference, www.consumer-brand-relationships.org Copyright by Marina Carnevale, Fordham Univeristy, USA Ozge Yucel-Aybat, Pennsylvania State University-Harrisburg, USA Lauren Block, Baruch College, City University of New York, USA

1. THE ADDED VALUE OF CONTEXTUAL MOTIVATIONS
ON THE CONSUMER-BRAND RELATIONSHIP
Marina Carnevale Ozge Yucel- Aybat
Fordham University Pennsylvania State University- Harrisburg
Lauren Block
Baruch College, CUNY

2. “Make up Your Way”
Estée Lauder
Heath et al, 2011

3. THEORETICAL BACKGROUND
● Giving gifts to one’s self : “self-gift giving” or “self-gifting”
● Self-communication through special indulgences
● clothing, jewellery, watches, food, entertainment products
● Premeditated: we plan on their acquisitions before buying them
(Mick and Demoss, 1990)
● What prompts self-gifts? (Mick and Demoss, 1990, Tice et al, 2001)
● Reward for accomplishing a goal
● Compensation for some bad feeling about the self (therapeutic)

4. ● Extant research has examined potential predictors of self-gift
giving
● Financial condition and age (Mick and Demoss, 1992)
● Materialism (McKeage et al, 1993)
● Deservingness and emotions (Faure and Mick, 1993)
● Current research examines the impact of these two contextual
motivations on consumer-brand relationships
● Would attitudes toward brands benefit from rewarding or
compensatory self-gifts?
● If so, would this added benefit hold equally for all consumers?
THEORETICAL BACKGROUND

5. HYPOTHESIS DEVELOPMENT
● Brands should reflect the associations with the self that
prompted the self-gifting behavior
● A self-rewarding motive should stimulate a positive effect on the
brand that represented such reward
● A self-compensating motive should also stimulate a positive
effect on the brand because of the positive associations to it
(e.g., mood-alleviation)
● Individuals with self-reward or self-compensatory motives
(vs. no motive) should display significantly higher attitudes
toward the brand

6. ● Consumers use brands to represent who they are or who
they want to be (Belk, 1988; Escalas and Bettman, 2009)
● Linkage between consumers’ self-concepts and brands is
called the “self-brand connection” (Escalas and Bettman, 2009)
● SBC tends to be consistent across time and consequently less
susceptible to contextual motives
● Thus, contextual motivations to purchase (self-reward and self-
compensation motives) should significantly affect the consumer-
brand relationship only when the connection between the self
and the brand is relatively low
HYPOTHESIS DEVELOPMENT

7. STUDY 1
Objective
Part I Part II
Prior SBC
Self-Brand
Connection
(SBC)
Method
Two sessions, 3 weeks apart
Motive
-”To reward myself for
this good grade”
-“To compensate for this
bad grade”
Contextual
motivation
Brand Evaluations
SBC
Midterm
grades
Attitude
(Gibson 2008)

8. MEASURES
Independent Variables
-Self-Brand Connection (e.g., “This brand reflects who I am,”
1= Strongly disagree, 7= strongly agree, α= .94; Escalas and Bettman 2003)
-
-Motive
“To reward myself for this good grade”
“To compensate for this bad grade”
(1= Strongly disagree, 7= strongly agree)
>0 → self-reward condition
<0 → self-compensate condition
=0 → “no motive”
Dependent Variables
Attitude toward the brand (bad-good, unfavorable-favorable, dislike-like, poor
quality-high quality, tastes bad-tastes good; α=.93, adapted from Gibson 2008 )

9. STUDY 1- RESULTS
-Positive, significant effect of SBC (β = .67, t = 4.63, P < .001)
● Relative to the no motive condition, positive and significant
effect on brand evaluations of:
-reward (β = 1.16, t = 2.82, P < .001) motives
-compensation (β = 1.84, t = 3.74, P < .001) motives
Those consuming the product to reward themselves for
the good grade or to compensate for the bad result had
significantly higher brand evaluations

10. STUDY 1- RESULTS
Simple interaction/slope tests
(Aiken and West 1991, Spiller et al 2013)
- Significant interaction:
-of reward and SBC (β = -.52, t = 2.27, P = .03)
-of compensation and SBC (β = -.44, t = -1.81, P = .07)
-For both the reward and compensation cases, contextual
motivations had a significant effect on brand evaluations only
for those with low levels of SBC
-Compared to a no motive condition, those who had lower levels
of SBC evaluated the brand more positively in the reward
condition (Mreward = 5.24, MNM= 4.07, β = 1.17, t = 2.82, P < .01) and the
compensation condition (Mcompensation = 5.82, MNM = 3.98, β = 1.84, t =
3.73, P < .01)

11. STUDY 2: OBJECTIVES
Prior SBC
● Enhance internal validity Manipulated Independent Variables
● Reinforce external validity Non-student sample
● Increase robustness High-involvement product category
● Strengthen managerial
relevance
Measures of satisfaction and
purchase intentions

12. STUDY 2: METHOD
● 143 participants (large online panel)
● 3 (Motivation: Self-reward vs. Self-compensation vs. Control) X 2 (Self-
Brand Connection: High vs. Low) between subject experiment
● Self-Brand Connection manipulation [High (vs. low)]
Design
Prior SBC
1
“Indicate the brand you feel the most (vs. least)
connected to…[ ] With which you can identify the most
(vs. least)”

13. STUDY 2 METHOD – CONT’D
● Motivation Manipulation
- Self-reward
“It is the end of winter. You just learned that you got the job promotion
you were hoping to have. This is truly exciting because you worked
really hard all year. To reward yourself for this promotion you decide to
go out and buy yourself a nice [brand] watch. Even though you don’t
need it, you decide to buy it anyway to reward yourself for getting the
promotion.”
-Self-compensation
“It is the end of winter. You just learned that you did not get the job
promotion you were hoping to have. This is truly devastating because
you worked really hard all year. To compensate for this loss of
promotion you decide to go out and buy yourself a nice [brand] watch.
Even though you don’t need it, you decide to buy it anyway to make up
for not getting the promotion.
2

14. STUDY 2 METHOD.. CONT’D
● Dependent Variables
● Attitude toward the brand (good, favorable, like, positive; α=
.96)
● “I am satisfied with my decision to buy a watch”
● “I would purchase it”
● Manipulation checks
● SBC → same measure used in study 1;
→ Brand considered was their favorite (1= least
favorite, 7= most favorite)
● Motive → “To reward myself”, “To comfort myself” (1=
strongly disagree, 7=strongly agree)

15. STUDY 2 RESULTS
Attitude toward
the brand
Satisfaction
Self-reward
Control
Self-reward
(F (1, 139) = 4.05; P
=.02).
(F (1, 139) = 6.11; P

16. CONCLUSION
● More positive brand evaluations when motives are
present (self-rewarding and self-compensating)
● Only for low SBC consumers
● Results are robust across:
● Both low and high involvement product categories
● Student and non-student samples
● Manipulated and measured independent variables
● Self-compensatory motives might be more beneficial
than self-rewarding motives

17. MANAGERIAL IMPLICATIONS
● Contextual motives
might help target low
SBC
● Mood alleviating ads,
which are the least used
by marketers (Heath et al
2011), might be the most
effective strategy to target
consumers with weaker
brand relationships

18. THANK YOU!

19. APPENDIX

20. STUDY1-2 MEASURES
SBC (Escalas and Bettman, 2003)
● This brand reflects who I am
● I can identify with this brand
● I feel a personal connection to this brand
● I use this brand to communicate who I am to other people
● I think this brand may help me become the type of person I
want to be
● I consider this brand to be “me” (it reflects who I consider
myself to be or the way that I want to present myself to others)
● This brand suits me well

21. STUDY 1 RESULTS- INTERACTION DETAILS
Low SBC (-1SD) High SBC (+1SD)
Reward vs. No motive (Mreward = 5.24, MNM= 4.07,
β = 1.17, t = 2.82, P < .01)
(Mreward = 5.63, MNM= 5.83;
P > .1)
Compensation vs. no motive (Mcompensation = 5.82, MNM =
3.98, β = 1.84, t = 3.73, P
< .01),
(Mcompensation = 6.41, MNM =
5.73; P > .1)