Setting the bar: The influence of women’s conspicuous display on men’s affiliative behavior

The psychology of luxury consumption

“…Luxury consumers are viewed as more wasteful, materialistic (Sun JJ, Bellezza S, Paharia N, unpublished), and even immoral by observers who oppose self-aggrandizement [44]. In a mating context, luxury consumption may harm a female consumer's chances of appealing to a potential male mate because it signals her higher financial expectations [45].…”

The role of intangible attributes of luxury brands for signalling status: A systematic literature review

“…Consumers may desire power to influence others in order to strengthen affective ties with the group or a specific individual (Lee et al, 2015). This influence may result in important outcomes, such as mating attraction (Hudders et al, 2014; Sundie et al, 2020) and rival deterrence (Wang & Griskevicius, 2014). Thus, luxury for women (Stokburger‐Sauer & Teichmann, 2013) may be different from men (Kiymalioglu et al, 2018).…”

“…Thus, signalling status through conspicuous consumption can be seen as a form of personal advertisement (Bird & Smith, 2005). The display of wealth from conspicuous consumption has significant implications for consumers' lives, for example, facilitating social adaptation (Goor et al, 2021;Veblen & Mills, 2017), attracting a mate or deterring rivals (Sundie et al, 2020;Wang & Griskevicius, 2014) or making friends (Garcia et al, 2019). The demand for luxury brands can be explained in terms of how these brands facilitate conspicuous exhibition in a publicly visible manner (Dubois et al, 2021;Shimul & Phau, 2022).…”