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When hedonic products help regulate my mood

Marketing Letters volume 23, pages 701–717 (2012)Cite this article

Abstract

This paper analyzes how affect mechanisms work when consumers form their attitude toward and intention to purchase a hedonic product. The first of two studies shows that when products have the potential to improve moods, affect regulation dominates affective evaluation in forming purchase intentions. In other words, the need to repair one’s mood overrides mood-congruent reviews. However, the affect regulation mechanism is not very stable, and study two shows that introducing a competing source of information, such as product reviews, overwhelms the effect. Results show that when consumers are in a bad mood, product reviews significantly influence their attitude and purchase intention regarding a hedonic product. However, this effect is not significant for consumers in a positive mood because they generate both arguments and counterarguments that compensate for the information received from a third party.

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Acknowledgments

The authors thank the editor and the two reviewers for their helpful comments. This research was supported by the grant ECO2009-13170 from the Spanish Ministry of Science and Innovation and by the Fundación Séneca-Agencia de Ciencia y Tecnología de la Región de Murcia (Spain), under the II PCTRM 2007-2010. Authors also thank the support provided by Fundación Cajamurcia.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Marketing Department, Social Sciences Faculty, Miguel Hernández University, 03202, Campus de Elche, Elche (Alicante), Spain

    Inés López López

  2. Marketing Department, School of Business and Economics, Regional Campus of International Excellence “Campus Mare Nostrum”, University of Murcia, 30100, Campus de Espinardo, Murcia, Spain

    Salvador Ruiz de Maya

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  1. Inés López López
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  2. Salvador Ruiz de Maya
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Correspondence to Inés López López.

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López López, I., Ruiz de Maya, S. When hedonic products help regulate my mood. Mark Lett 23, 701–717 (2012). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11002-012-9172-7

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11002-012-9172-7

Keywords

  • Mood
  • Affect regulation
  • Information processing
  • Product reviews