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Purpose This paper aims to investigate how the perception of physical coldness (vs warmth) influences consumers to make charitable donations. Design/methodology/approach Three experiments were conducted involving charitable donation scenarios. Findings Studies demonstrate that cold (vs warm) temperature cues result in greater intentions to donate to charities. Specifically, cold (vs warmth) cues activate the need for social connection which, in turn, motivate consumers to donate more money to charities. Furthermore, this effect holds even when the actual temperature instead of temperature cues is changed, and participants’ actual donation behavior instead of donation intentions is measured, thereby, strengthening the findings of this paper. Research limitations/implications Boundary conditions associated with the effect of temperature cues need empirical investigation. Future research needs to investigate if the effect holds with variability of coldness. Future research also needs to determine whether the documented effect occur across various pro-social contexts. Practical implications The results suggest that non-profit organizations incorporate “cold” cues into advertisements (people feeling cold or cold landscapes) to increase monetary donations and that these organizations should focus on targeting donors during wintertime (vs summer time) to get more donations. Originality/value This is the first research to demonstrate the effects of temperature cues on charitable donations. The added value of this paper is the use of physical temperature change to highlight the phenomenon, and the link between cold (vs warm) temperature cue and the need of social connection.

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Purpose This paper aims to investigate the influence of implicit self-theories and the change in CEO of a firm after product failure on consumers’ preference of the enhanced product. Design/methodology/approach Three experiments were conducted involving product failure and CEO change scenarios. Findings Studies demonstrate that incremental theorists prefer the enhanced product after the CEO change (vs no change), whereas entity theorists do not prefer the enhanced product after the CEO change. This effect is mediated by consumers’ perception of the likelihood of success of the firm after the CEO change. Furthermore, entity theorists prefer the enhanced product only when the CEO change is external (vs internal). Research limitations/implications Future research could investigate if the impact of CEO change on product perception depends on the severity of the situation, and identify boundary conditions under which the CEO change is not beneficial. Practical implications The results suggest that organizations can take advantage of the leadership change by introducing new products strategically around the period of leadership change. Marketers can induce incremental mindset in their advertisement material during the period of leadership change to ensure that all consumers have a positive perception of the enhanced products. Originality/value This is the first research to investigate how consumers respond to leadership changes made by organizations. The findings show that different signals (internal vs external CEO change) can generate different reactions across different receivers (incremental vs entity theorists).

Consumer‐brand relationships are important predictors of consumption, but the psychology surrounding the different roles brands occupy within these relationships is not fully understood. Three experiments and one field study investigate how preferences for two of these brand roles, partner and servant, depend on consumers' implicit theories of self‐change. Counter to what prior literature might suggest, findings show that consumers who believe that self‐traits are relatively malleable (incremental theorists) and fixed (entity theorists) prefer partner and servant brands, respectively. Results demonstrate that a partner brand signals an equal effort by both the consumer and the brand, whereas a servant brand signals less effort by the consumer and more effort by the brand. The relatively greater consumer effort signals by partner (vs. servant) brands align with the effort beliefs associated with consumers' implicit theories, thereby mediating preferences. Findings are demonstrated across different product categories and samples (Taiwan and US). The focus on dyadic effort signals of brand roles in consumer‐brand relationships, and the resulting interactive effect with implicit theories, provide novel contributions to theory and practice.