Vicarious Goal Fulfillment: When the Mere Presence of a Healthy Option Leads to an Ironically Indulgent Decision

Wilcox, Keith; Vallen, Beth; Block, Lauren; Fitzsimons, Gavan J.

doi:10.1086/599219

Cited by 252 publications

(237 citation statements)

References 24 publications

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“…Consistent with this analysis, previous work on licensing documented an increase in indulgence after making a virtuous, healthy choice (Khan and Dhar 2006;Wilcox et al 2009). These researchers attributed individuals' greater interest in indulgent items to their sense of entitlement after making a virtuous choice.…”

Section: The Impact Of External Controlssupporting

confidence: 81%

“…In study 1, we intentionally measured participants' experienced hunger rather than their consumption of unhealthy food (as in Khan and Dhar 2006;Wilcox et al 2009), since unhealthy food consumption might reflect other variables, such as one's sense of entitlement to eat, regardless of how hungry one is. However, when individuals perceive that healthy eating is imposed and therefore feel hungrier, they should subsequently seek means to satisfy their hunger by consuming foods available to them in their environment.…”

Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…In contrast, when people infer they have made progress, they experience partial goal fulfillment and relax their effort in pursuing that focal goal, attending to competing motives that were presumably neglected (Carver and Scheier 1998). As a result, pursuing one goal allows for pursuit of competing motives (Fishbach and Zhang 2008;Khan and Dhar 2006;Monin and Miller 2001;Wilcox et al 2009). …”

Section: The Impact Of External Controlsmentioning

confidence: 99%

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When Healthy Food Makes You Hungry

Fishbach¹

2008

PsycEXTRA Dataset

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Do subtle cues for imposed healthy eating make consumers hungry? Imposed healthy eating signals that the health goal was sufficiently met, and thus it increases the strength of the conflicting motive to fulfill one's appetite. Accordingly, consumers asked to sample an item framed as healthy later reported being hungrier and consumed more food than those who sampled the same item framed as tasty or those who did not eat at all. These effects of healthy eating depend on the consumer's perception that healthy eating is mandatory; therefore, only imposed healthy eating made consumers hungrier, whereas freely choosing to eat healthy did not increase hunger.E xternally imposed controls are common and help individuals adhere to their long-term interests. Thus, mandatory retirement savings, seat belt laws, compulsory physical education in college, and cafeterias that offer only healthy alternatives-all are common examples of how external controls help individuals resolve the internal conflict between options that offer larger but delayed benefits and those that offer lesser but immediate benefits. But, when external constraints lead individuals to adhere to their long-term interests, how does this influence the resultant strength of the compromised short-term interest?We explore this question in the domain of imposed healthy eating. We ask, for example, how having a healthy meal in a cafeteria that offers only healthy alternatives influences the motive to satisfy one's appetite. In particular, we examine how imposed healthy eating influences individuals' experienced hunger. We propose that because adherence to the health goal under externally imposed controls signals that progress has been made without also increasing the sense of personal commitment, it can ironically increase the strength of the competing motive to satisfy one's appetite afterward. Put simply, imposed healthy eating would make people feel hungrier than not eating at all or eating the same food without an emphasis on its healthiness. We further propose that this effect of imposed healthy eating is more pronounced among individuals who are less concerned with watching their diet, Stacey Finkelstein (sfinkels@chicagobooth.edu) is a doctoral candidate and Ayelet Fishbach (ayelet.fishbach@chicagobooth.edu) is professor of behavioral science and marketing at

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Section: The Impact Of External Controlssupporting

confidence: 81%

Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: The Impact Of External Controlsmentioning

confidence: 99%

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When Healthy Food Makes You Hungry

Fishbach¹

2008

PsycEXTRA Dataset

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“…Finkelstein & Fishbach, 2010). Similarly, this effect may explain why labeling snacks as 'low-fat' increases food intake by up to 50 percent (Wansink & Chandon, 2006), why individuals are more prone to make unhealthy food choices (such as a bacon cheeseburger) when a healthy food item is present in the choice set (Wilcox, Vallen, Block, & Fitzsimons, 2009), or why "people are more likely to underestimate the caloric content of main dishes and to choose higher-calorie side dishes, drinks, or desserts when fast-food restaurants claim to be healthy (e.g., Subway) compared to when they do not (e.g., McDonald's)" (Chandon & Wansink, 2007, p. 301).…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Touch forbidden, consumption allowed: Counter-intuitive effects of touch restrictions on customers’ purchase behavior

Otterbring

2016

Food Quality and Preference

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PostprintThis is the accepted version of a paper published in Food Quality and Preference. This paper has been peer-reviewed but does not include the final publisher proof-corrections or journal pagination.Citation for the original published paper (version of record):Otterbring, T. (2016) Touch forbidden, consumption allowed: Counter-intuitive effects of touch restrictions on customers' purchase behavior. Food Quality and Preference AbstractIn-store events are increasingly used to provide customers with unique shopping experiences.Although recent studies indicate that such events positively influence customers' purchase intentions and store choice decisions, little is known about how customers respond to various in-store events. This paper investigates one type of in-store event that is frequently used in several food and non-food contexts. Specifically, the study investigates how an in-store product demonstration influences customers' subsequent purchase behavior depending on whether they are restricted or encouraged to touch the products being demonstrated. An initial scenario-based experiment involving 35 undergraduates aimed to examine how people intuitively think that restricting (versus encouraging) touch during an in-store product demonstration would influence their subsequent purchase behavior. A two-way ANOVA with participant gender and experimental condition as the between-subjects factors consistently showed that people hold a lay theory that restricting touch should have a negative impact on the amount of money they spend and the number of products they purchase. A second field experiment involving 126 customers in a retail store aimed to investigate whether this lay belief is consistent with customers' actual purchase behavior. Counter-intuitively, a two-way ANOVA with customer gender and experimental condition (touch restriction, touch encouragement) as the between-subjects factors revealed that restricting touch during an instore product demonstration resulted in significantly more money being spent, a larger number of products being purchased, and more expensive products being purchased. These findings show that consumer lay theory can directly contradict customers' actual purchase behavior.

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“…Furthermore, the study of Wilcox, Vallen, Block, and Fitzsimons (2009) elucidates more on the compensating character of already served attributes considered for creating a choice set. Their study focused on clarifying the question why the addition of healthy alternatives to choice sets (eg.…”

Section: Literature Reviewmentioning

confidence: 99%

The Effect of Making a Derived Food Choice for a Relevant Other on the Pre-Fulfillment of One’s own Health Goal

Heinz

2015

MARBLE

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The aim of this study is to clarify the question of how making a derived food choice for ones' child influences a mothers own consumption behavior of sweet snacks. The focus of this study is set upon the difference of the consumption behavior of mothers as a consequence of their selection amongst a healthy and unhealthy food alternative aimed for their child. Finding a result in line with the expectations, the study reveals that mothers who perform a derived choice of a healthy food item for their children, feel free to eat more of unhealthy products as a consequence of their family benefitting behavior. Interestingly, the mothers' consumption behavior seems to be strongly and negatively moderated by their perceived happiness in the relationship with the father and the compatibility of both partners' educational techniques. A good mother remembers to serve fruit at breakfast, is always cheerful and never yells, manages not to project her own neuroses and inadequacies onto her children, [...] remembers to make play dates, her children's clothes fit, she does art projects with them and enjoys all their gamesAyelet Waldman, Novelist, Israel

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Vicarious Goal Fulfillment: When the Mere Presence of a Healthy Option Leads to an Ironically Indulgent Decision

Cited by 252 publications

References 24 publications

When Healthy Food Makes You Hungry

When Healthy Food Makes You Hungry

Touch forbidden, consumption allowed: Counter-intuitive effects of touch restrictions on customers’ purchase behavior

The Effect of Making a Derived Food Choice for a Relevant Other on the Pre-Fulfillment of One’s own Health Goal

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