I Know What I Know, but I will Probably Fail Anyway: How Learned Helplessness Moderates the Knowledge Calibration–Dietary Choice Quality Relationship

Abstract

Prior research suggests that knowledge calibration (KC) supports consumers’ maintenance of a healthy diet. However, no previous studies have considered that learned helpless consumers may refrain from using their knowledge, even though they may be fully aware that they possess it. This research gap is considered in three studies. Study 1 investigates the moderating effect of learned helplessness (LH) by means of a cross‐sectional survey. Studies 2 and 3 are online choice studies. Besides from replicating Study 1, Studies 2 and 3 eliminate potential social desirability bias by objectively measuring respondents’ dietary choice quality. In addition, Study 3 takes into account the possibility that respondents’ responses may be biased by food preferences, medical conditions, and/or food allergies. Moreover, Studies 2 and 3 both investigate the consequences of the findings on consumers who live under a dieting regime. These studies demonstrate that consumers suffering from LH do not stand to gain from calibrating their dietary knowledge to the same degree as other consumers. It is also shown that dieting behavior has a tendency to weaken this negative moderating effect of LH on the relationship between KC and dietary choice quality. Finally, the implications of the findings for marketers and public policymakers are discussed.

How trust in financial supplier information impacts young adults' financial information involvement: The moderating roles of product savings risk and social norm

“…Indeed, the theoretical underpinnings regarding the interplay between the studied variables may also provide a research agenda for other industries, such as the food market, which also can be characterized by perceived market complexity and demand for trust (e.g. Hansen and Thomsen, ).…”

Two facets of stress and indirect effects on child diet through emotion-driven eating

“…Indeed, one review found insufficient evidence that subjective and objective measures of stress are associated (Hjortskov, Garde, Orbaek, & Hansen, 2004). Another possibility is that learned helplessness prevents adolescents from acting on knowledge of healthy foods to make corresponding consumption choices (Hansen & Thomsen, 2013), and potentially such dissonance prompts eating as a coping strategy. However, future research would need to be conducted to test these possibilities.…”

The moderating effects of financial broad‐scope trust on consumer knowledge, cognitive effort, and financial healthiness

“…While past research (e.g., Perry and Morris ) has examined self‐assessed (subjective) knowledge, no past research known to us has taken into account both consumers' subjective and objective financial knowledge in relation to cognitive effort and financial behavior. Specifically, the distinction between subjective and objective knowledge is inherent in the knowledge calibration paradigm, which refers to the correspondence between accuracy (objective knowledge) and confidence (subjective knowledge) in knowledge (Hansen and Thomsen ; Alba and Hutchinson ; Pillai and Goldsmith ). The knowledge calibration paradigm states that even low levels of objective knowledge can represent a valuable knowledge resource as long as consumers assess it correctly and thus take proper action.…”

“…For instance, the relationship marketing literature (e.g., Regó, Morgan, and Fornell ; Hunt, Arnett, and Madhavaram ) has focused especially on consumer trust in individual sellers with the purpose of understanding consumer commitment, loyalty, and satisfaction, among other factors. Another stream of research has focused on understanding consumer trust in their knowledge and in their ability to carry out reasonable decisions in the marketplace (e.g., Hansen and Thomsen ). However, with a few exceptions (e.g., Grayson, Johnson, and Chen ; Hansen ; Hansen ; Hansen ), consumer trust in the broader business context (i.e., BST) has received very little attention.…”