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The COVID-19 pandemic has significantly influenced our daily and social lives as well as our consumption patterns. This paper focuses on the relationship between the COVID-19 threat and variety-seeking. Based on several theories, including reactance theory and terror management theory, we predict that the perceived threat of COVID-19 will increase the tendency to choose more and different options in multiple choice settings. Firstly, two empirical studies demonstrate that variety-seeking in food and stationery choices is enhanced as people's perceived threat from the disease increases. Study 3 further suggests the boundary conditions of the above pattern in that the type of decision (i.e., multiple option selections across different brands vs. within the same brand) will moderate the impact of the perceived threat on varietyseeking. Specifically, when the decision involved choice across different brands, participants showed higher variety-seeking under high (vs. low) perceived threat. However, the opposite pattern was true when the decision involved choice within the same brand. This research offers a deeper understanding of how variety-seeking can be changed by the perceived threat of COVID-19.

When do consumers trust artificial intelligence (AI)? With the rapid adoption of AI technology in the field of marketing, it is crucial to understand how consumer adoption of the information generated by AI can be improved. This study explores a novel relationship between number presentation details associated with AI and consumers' behavioral and evaluative responses toward AI. We theorized that consumer trust would mediate the preciseness effect on consumer judgment and evaluation of the information provided by AI. The results of five studies demonstrated that the use of a precise (vs. imprecise) information format leads to higher evaluations and behavioral intentions. We also show mediational evidence indicating that the effect of number preciseness is mediated by consumer trust (Studies 2, 4, and 5). We further show that the preciseness effect is moderated by the accuracy of AI‐generated information (Study 3) and the objective product quality of the recommended products (Study 4). This study provides theoretical implications to the AI acceptance literature, the information processing literature, the consumer trust literature, and the decision‐making literature. Moreover, this study makes practical implications for marketers of AI businesses including those who strategically use AI‐generated information.