Review Power and consumer behavior: How power shapes who and what consumers value Derek D. Rucker a, ⁎ , Adam D. Galinsky a,1 , David Dubois b,2 a Kellogg School of Management, Northwestern University, 2001 Sheridan Road, Evanston, IL 60208, USA b HEC Paris, 1, rue de la Libération, 78351 Jouy-en-Josas cedex, France Received 17 February 2011; received in revised form 4 June 2011; accepted 8 June 2011 Abstract The current paper reviews the concept of power and offers a new architecture for understanding how power guides and shapes consumer behavior. Specifically, we propose that having and lacking power respectively foster agentic and communal orientations that have a transformative impact on perception, cognition, and behavior. These orientations shape both who and what consumers value. New empirical evidence is presented that synthesizes these findings into a parsimonious account of how power alters consumer behavior as a function of both product attributes and recipients. Finally, we discuss future directions to motivate and guide the study of power by consumer psychologists. © 2011 Society for Consumer Psychology. Published by Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. Keywords: Power; Agentic orientation; Communal orientation; Value; Social hierarchy Contents On the nature of power ............................................................ 0 Power as a construct .......................................................... 0 Uniqueness of the power construct .................................................... 0 Antecedents of power ........................................................... 0 Structural factors.......................................................... 0 Cognitive factors ......................................................... 0 Physical factors .......................................................... 0 The interplay of structural, cognitive, and physical factors ................................... 0 Manipulated versus measured power ............................................... 0 Consequences of power: an agentic versus communal perspective of power ................................. 0 Agentic versus communal orientations .................................................. 0 Evidence for agentic versus communal orientations ........................................... 0 Power, action, and control ..................................................... 0 Power and perspective taking ................................................... 0 Power and abstract thinking .................................................... 0 Power and physiological consequences ............................................. 0 How power shapes who consumers value .................................................. 0 Power and spending on self and others .................................................. 0 ⁎ Corresponding author. Fax: +1 847 491 2498. E-mail addresses: [email protected] (D.D. Rucker), [email protected] (A.D. Galinsky), [email protected] (D. Dubois). 1 Fax: +1 847 491 8896. 2 Fax: +33 1 39 67 74 40. 1057-7408/$ - see front matter © 2011 Society for Consumer Psychology. Published by Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. doi:10.1016/j.jcps.2011.06.001 Please cite this article as: Rucker, D.D., et al., Power and consumer behavior: How power shapes who and what consumers value, Journal of Consumer Psychology (2011), doi:10.1016/j.jcps.2011.06.001 Journal of Consumer Psychology xx (2011) xxx – xxx JCPS-00239; No. of pages: 17; 4C: Journal of CONSUMER PSYCHOLOGY
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Power and consumer behavior: How power shapes who and what consumers valueJCPS-00239; No. of pages: 17; 4C:
Journal of CONSUMER
PSYCHOLOGY
Review
Power and consumer behavior: How power shapes who and what consumers value
Derek D. Rucker a,, Adam D. Galinsky a, 1, David Dubois b, 2
a Kellogg School of Management, Northwestern University, 2001 Sheridan Road, Evanston, IL 60208, USA b HEC Paris, 1, rue de la Libération, 78351 Jouy-en-Josas cedex, France
Received 17 February 2011; received in revised form 4 June 2011; accepted 8 June 2011
Abstract
The current paper reviews the concept of power and offers a new architecture for understanding how power guides and shapes consumer behavior. Specifically, we propose that having and lacking power respectively foster agentic and communal orientations that have a transformative impact on perception, cognition, and behavior. These orientations shape both who and what consumers value. New empirical evidence is presented that synthesizes these findings into a parsimonious account of how power alters consumer behavior as a function of both product attributes and recipients. Finally, we discuss future directions to motivate and guide the study of power by consumer psychologists. © 2011 Society for Consumer Psychology. Published by Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
Keywords: Power; Agentic orientation; Communal orientation; Value; Social hierarchy
Contents
On the nature of power . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0 Power as a construct . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0 Uniqueness of the power construct . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0 Antecedents of power. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0
Structural factors. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0 Cognitive factors . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0 Physical factors . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0 The interplay of structural, cognitive, and physical factors . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0 Manipulated versus measured power . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0
Consequences of power: an agentic versus communal perspective of power . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0 Agentic versus communal orientations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0 Evidence for agentic versus communal orientations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0
Power, action, and control . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0 Power and perspective taking . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0 Power and abstract thinking . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0 Power and physiological consequences . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0
How power shapes who consumers value . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0 Power and spending on self and others . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0
Corresponding author. Fax: +1 847 491 2498. E-mail addresses: [email protected] (D.D. Rucker), [email protected] (A.D. Galinsky), [email protected] (D. Dubois).
1 Fax: +1 847 491 8896. 2 Fax: +33 1 39 67 74 40.
1057-7408/$ - see front matter © 2011 Society for Consumer Psychology. Published by Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. doi:10.1016/j.jcps.2011.06.001
Please cite this article as: Rucker, D.D., et al., Power and consumer behavior: How power shapes who and what consumers value, Journal of Consumer Psychology (2011), doi:10.1016/j.jcps.2011.06.001
Synthesizing how power affects who and what consumers value . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0 Psychological propensities of power versus psychological needs of power . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0 Products lacking an association to status: dominance of psychological propensities . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0 Products possessing an association to status: dominance of psychological needs . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0 Experiment: power and who versus what consumers value . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0
Power and consumer behavior: new opportunities and future directions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0 Power and agentic and communal orientations: new directions in consumer behavior . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0 Agentic and communal orientations versus outcomes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0 New effects of power in new decision making contexts . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0 Manifestations of power in the consumer domain . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0 Psychological propensities associated with power versus psychological needs . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0
Coda . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0 Acknowledgments . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0 References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0
Power has long been argued to be a pervasive and fundamental component of social systems and hierarchies. Russell (1938) went as far as to state, “The fundamental concept in social science is Power, in the same sense that Energy is the fundamental concept in physics […] The laws of social dynamics are laws which can only be stated in terms of power.” The governing effects of power on human behavior have been relentlessly examined in the psychology, organiza- tional behavior, and sociology literatures (see Fiske, 1993; Magee & Galinsky, 2008). Across these literatures, the cumulative evidence suggests that power is an omnipresent force whose tentacles reach out and grasp nearly every situation to guide and ultimately shape human behavior.
Despite the long-recognized value and experimental study of power across the social sciences, the construct of power has been largely absent from efforts to understand consumer behavior. This is somewhat surprising given that different degrees of power exist and can arise in consumers' everyday activities. For example, consumers are often partitioned in the workplace into positions of high (e.g., bosses) and low (e.g., employees) power. Similarly, society's social stratification places consumers in various positions of power based on their economic resources or cultural capital (Bourdieu, 1984). Differences in power can also arise from asymmetric supply and demand, resulting in sellers or consumers engaging in a sales negotiation with differential levels of power. Furthermore, as will be demonstrated, even setting aside structural factors in society that can affect power, differences in power might be activated by architectural features of consumer markets such as advertisements or assortment options. Our basic premise is that all of these differences in power can spill over into how consumers plan their purchase, make decisions, and acquire products and services.
We first introduce the concept of power as a psychological state. Next, we put forth a framework for understanding the
Please cite this article as: Rucker, D.D., et al., Power and consumer behavior: Psychology (2011), doi:10.1016/j.jcps.2011.06.001
influence of power on behavior. Specifically, we delineate how the broad findings in the power literature can be parsimoniously accounted for by recognizing that high-power states prompt an agentic orientation and low-power states prompt a communal orientation. We use this framework to succinctly explain the role of power in shaping who and what consumers value. We then empirically synthesize seemingly contradictory findings into a parsimonious account by presenting a new experiment. Here we introduce a critical distinction between psychological propensities, inclinations or tendencies that are naturally triggered by the psychological experience of power and psychological needs, which represent power-induced motiva- tions or desires that guide one's preference and often produce compensatory behavior. We suggest that power shapes consumer preferences in a systematic fashion depending on a dynamic interplay between both product type and product recipient. The paper concludes by discussing new opportunities and directions for studying power in consumer behavior.
On the nature of power
Power as a construct
Power has traditionally been defined as asymmetric control over valued resources in social relations (Keltner, Gruenfeld, & Anderson, 2003; Thibaut & Kelley, 1959; see Magee & Galinsky, 2008 for a detailed discussion). Magee and Galinsky (2008) used the words asymmetric and social relations to capture the relative state of dependence between two parties: the low-power party is dependent upon the high-power party to obtain rewards and avoid punishments (Emerson, 1962). As a result, power is inherently a social construct that typically involves a comparison or interaction between two or more parties. Magee and Galinsky (2008) also used the term valued because the resource must be important or consequential to at
How power shapes who and what consumers value, Journal of Consumer
3D.D. Rucker et al. / Journal of Consumer Psychology xx (2011) xxx–xxx
least one of the parties. Of course, value is subjectively determined: control over a resource only matters to the extent that at least one party cares about and desires that resource. These resources may include actual monetary resources, ability to reward or legitimate authority, or even intellectual capital, depending on the context and parties involved (see French & Raven, 1959). Importantly, resources are often subjectively determined, in part resulting from individuals' perceptions of these resources and the situation. Thus, power refers to the perceived asymmetric control such that one individual has, or feels as if he or she has, more or less control relative to another.
Although this definition represents a broad, encompassing definition of power, others have differentiated power by the specific bases by which this asymmetric control can arise. In their classic treatise on power, French and Raven (1959) suggest that asymmetries in power can arise from five different bases underpinning a relationship: a relation based on coercion, reward, legitimacy, reference, or expertise. Coercive power refers to the ability to get someone to do something against his or her will. Reward power stems from the ability to give or withhold desired objects from others. Expert power is the possession of information that can be shared or withheld from others. Referent power is based on the ability to command the respect and affection of others, what most scholars today call status (Magee & Galinsky, 2008). Finally, legitimate power refers to the ability to administer to another certain feelings of obligation or the notion of responsibility, but many scholars now see legitimacy as a moderating variable — one achieves reward or coercive power or exercises that power either legitimately or not (Lammers, Galinsky, Gordijn, & Otten, 2008). Although this classic perspective provides a means to segment the power construct, the bases described can be viewed as subcomponents fueling the general possession of power as previously defined (i.e., asymmetric control over valued resources in social relations).
More recently, Lammers, Stoker, and Stapel (2009) have distinguished between power over others (i.e., social power) and freedom from others (i.e., personal power). In a series of experiments, the authors argue and provide evidence for the notion that these two types of power can, because of their opposite associations with independence and interdependence, have unique effects on behavior. Both of these terms reflect different facets of the power relationship, but are subsumed by our general definition as a power relationship can arise from either party having or lacking control. Consistent with this perspective, Lammers et al. (2009) reported that both social and personal power correlated with a more general sense of power.
In the present paper, we focus on power as asymmetric control over valued resources in social relations because a) this is both the broadest and most inclusive definition of power, and b) this is how the vast majority of research efforts have studied the construct. Furthermore, as we will discuss, the psycholog- ical experience of power does not have to stem from a particular basis, nor does it have to be activated with respect to the social or personal subcomponents. Rather, because of its pervasive- ness, individuals can feel a general sense of more or less power due to simple cognitive priming or physical embodiment.
Please cite this article as: Rucker, D.D., et al., Power and consumer behavior: Psychology (2011), doi:10.1016/j.jcps.2011.06.001
Uniqueness of the power construct
Power can be distinguished from a number of other psychological states that have been studied within consumer behavior and might be seen as overlapping or associated with power. In particular, power is conceptually distinct from consumer mood (Labroo & Rucker, 2010; Pham, 1998; Raghunathan & Pham, 1999), mortality salience (Arndt, Solomon, Kasser, & Sheldon, 2004; Mandel & Smeesters, 2008), personal freedom (Levav & Zhu, 2009), and general uncertainty (e.g., Briñol, Petty, & Tormala, 2004; Tormala, Rucker, & Seger, 2008). There are additional psychological states that can be contrasted against power; however, we selected these constructs as illustrative examples because of their relevance to the consumer literature.
With respect to mood,…
Journal of CONSUMER
PSYCHOLOGY
Review
Power and consumer behavior: How power shapes who and what consumers value
Derek D. Rucker a,, Adam D. Galinsky a, 1, David Dubois b, 2
a Kellogg School of Management, Northwestern University, 2001 Sheridan Road, Evanston, IL 60208, USA b HEC Paris, 1, rue de la Libération, 78351 Jouy-en-Josas cedex, France
Received 17 February 2011; received in revised form 4 June 2011; accepted 8 June 2011
Abstract
The current paper reviews the concept of power and offers a new architecture for understanding how power guides and shapes consumer behavior. Specifically, we propose that having and lacking power respectively foster agentic and communal orientations that have a transformative impact on perception, cognition, and behavior. These orientations shape both who and what consumers value. New empirical evidence is presented that synthesizes these findings into a parsimonious account of how power alters consumer behavior as a function of both product attributes and recipients. Finally, we discuss future directions to motivate and guide the study of power by consumer psychologists. © 2011 Society for Consumer Psychology. Published by Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
Keywords: Power; Agentic orientation; Communal orientation; Value; Social hierarchy
Contents
On the nature of power . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0 Power as a construct . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0 Uniqueness of the power construct . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0 Antecedents of power. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0
Structural factors. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0 Cognitive factors . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0 Physical factors . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0 The interplay of structural, cognitive, and physical factors . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0 Manipulated versus measured power . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0
Consequences of power: an agentic versus communal perspective of power . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0 Agentic versus communal orientations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0 Evidence for agentic versus communal orientations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0
Power, action, and control . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0 Power and perspective taking . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0 Power and abstract thinking . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0 Power and physiological consequences . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0
How power shapes who consumers value . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0 Power and spending on self and others . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0
Corresponding author. Fax: +1 847 491 2498. E-mail addresses: [email protected] (D.D. Rucker), [email protected] (A.D. Galinsky), [email protected] (D. Dubois).
1 Fax: +1 847 491 8896. 2 Fax: +33 1 39 67 74 40.
1057-7408/$ - see front matter © 2011 Society for Consumer Psychology. Published by Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. doi:10.1016/j.jcps.2011.06.001
Please cite this article as: Rucker, D.D., et al., Power and consumer behavior: How power shapes who and what consumers value, Journal of Consumer Psychology (2011), doi:10.1016/j.jcps.2011.06.001
Synthesizing how power affects who and what consumers value . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0 Psychological propensities of power versus psychological needs of power . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0 Products lacking an association to status: dominance of psychological propensities . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0 Products possessing an association to status: dominance of psychological needs . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0 Experiment: power and who versus what consumers value . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0
Power and consumer behavior: new opportunities and future directions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0 Power and agentic and communal orientations: new directions in consumer behavior . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0 Agentic and communal orientations versus outcomes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0 New effects of power in new decision making contexts . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0 Manifestations of power in the consumer domain . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0 Psychological propensities associated with power versus psychological needs . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0
Coda . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0 Acknowledgments . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0 References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0
Power has long been argued to be a pervasive and fundamental component of social systems and hierarchies. Russell (1938) went as far as to state, “The fundamental concept in social science is Power, in the same sense that Energy is the fundamental concept in physics […] The laws of social dynamics are laws which can only be stated in terms of power.” The governing effects of power on human behavior have been relentlessly examined in the psychology, organiza- tional behavior, and sociology literatures (see Fiske, 1993; Magee & Galinsky, 2008). Across these literatures, the cumulative evidence suggests that power is an omnipresent force whose tentacles reach out and grasp nearly every situation to guide and ultimately shape human behavior.
Despite the long-recognized value and experimental study of power across the social sciences, the construct of power has been largely absent from efforts to understand consumer behavior. This is somewhat surprising given that different degrees of power exist and can arise in consumers' everyday activities. For example, consumers are often partitioned in the workplace into positions of high (e.g., bosses) and low (e.g., employees) power. Similarly, society's social stratification places consumers in various positions of power based on their economic resources or cultural capital (Bourdieu, 1984). Differences in power can also arise from asymmetric supply and demand, resulting in sellers or consumers engaging in a sales negotiation with differential levels of power. Furthermore, as will be demonstrated, even setting aside structural factors in society that can affect power, differences in power might be activated by architectural features of consumer markets such as advertisements or assortment options. Our basic premise is that all of these differences in power can spill over into how consumers plan their purchase, make decisions, and acquire products and services.
We first introduce the concept of power as a psychological state. Next, we put forth a framework for understanding the
Please cite this article as: Rucker, D.D., et al., Power and consumer behavior: Psychology (2011), doi:10.1016/j.jcps.2011.06.001
influence of power on behavior. Specifically, we delineate how the broad findings in the power literature can be parsimoniously accounted for by recognizing that high-power states prompt an agentic orientation and low-power states prompt a communal orientation. We use this framework to succinctly explain the role of power in shaping who and what consumers value. We then empirically synthesize seemingly contradictory findings into a parsimonious account by presenting a new experiment. Here we introduce a critical distinction between psychological propensities, inclinations or tendencies that are naturally triggered by the psychological experience of power and psychological needs, which represent power-induced motiva- tions or desires that guide one's preference and often produce compensatory behavior. We suggest that power shapes consumer preferences in a systematic fashion depending on a dynamic interplay between both product type and product recipient. The paper concludes by discussing new opportunities and directions for studying power in consumer behavior.
On the nature of power
Power as a construct
Power has traditionally been defined as asymmetric control over valued resources in social relations (Keltner, Gruenfeld, & Anderson, 2003; Thibaut & Kelley, 1959; see Magee & Galinsky, 2008 for a detailed discussion). Magee and Galinsky (2008) used the words asymmetric and social relations to capture the relative state of dependence between two parties: the low-power party is dependent upon the high-power party to obtain rewards and avoid punishments (Emerson, 1962). As a result, power is inherently a social construct that typically involves a comparison or interaction between two or more parties. Magee and Galinsky (2008) also used the term valued because the resource must be important or consequential to at
How power shapes who and what consumers value, Journal of Consumer
3D.D. Rucker et al. / Journal of Consumer Psychology xx (2011) xxx–xxx
least one of the parties. Of course, value is subjectively determined: control over a resource only matters to the extent that at least one party cares about and desires that resource. These resources may include actual monetary resources, ability to reward or legitimate authority, or even intellectual capital, depending on the context and parties involved (see French & Raven, 1959). Importantly, resources are often subjectively determined, in part resulting from individuals' perceptions of these resources and the situation. Thus, power refers to the perceived asymmetric control such that one individual has, or feels as if he or she has, more or less control relative to another.
Although this definition represents a broad, encompassing definition of power, others have differentiated power by the specific bases by which this asymmetric control can arise. In their classic treatise on power, French and Raven (1959) suggest that asymmetries in power can arise from five different bases underpinning a relationship: a relation based on coercion, reward, legitimacy, reference, or expertise. Coercive power refers to the ability to get someone to do something against his or her will. Reward power stems from the ability to give or withhold desired objects from others. Expert power is the possession of information that can be shared or withheld from others. Referent power is based on the ability to command the respect and affection of others, what most scholars today call status (Magee & Galinsky, 2008). Finally, legitimate power refers to the ability to administer to another certain feelings of obligation or the notion of responsibility, but many scholars now see legitimacy as a moderating variable — one achieves reward or coercive power or exercises that power either legitimately or not (Lammers, Galinsky, Gordijn, & Otten, 2008). Although this classic perspective provides a means to segment the power construct, the bases described can be viewed as subcomponents fueling the general possession of power as previously defined (i.e., asymmetric control over valued resources in social relations).
More recently, Lammers, Stoker, and Stapel (2009) have distinguished between power over others (i.e., social power) and freedom from others (i.e., personal power). In a series of experiments, the authors argue and provide evidence for the notion that these two types of power can, because of their opposite associations with independence and interdependence, have unique effects on behavior. Both of these terms reflect different facets of the power relationship, but are subsumed by our general definition as a power relationship can arise from either party having or lacking control. Consistent with this perspective, Lammers et al. (2009) reported that both social and personal power correlated with a more general sense of power.
In the present paper, we focus on power as asymmetric control over valued resources in social relations because a) this is both the broadest and most inclusive definition of power, and b) this is how the vast majority of research efforts have studied the construct. Furthermore, as we will discuss, the psycholog- ical experience of power does not have to stem from a particular basis, nor does it have to be activated with respect to the social or personal subcomponents. Rather, because of its pervasive- ness, individuals can feel a general sense of more or less power due to simple cognitive priming or physical embodiment.
Please cite this article as: Rucker, D.D., et al., Power and consumer behavior: Psychology (2011), doi:10.1016/j.jcps.2011.06.001
Uniqueness of the power construct
Power can be distinguished from a number of other psychological states that have been studied within consumer behavior and might be seen as overlapping or associated with power. In particular, power is conceptually distinct from consumer mood (Labroo & Rucker, 2010; Pham, 1998; Raghunathan & Pham, 1999), mortality salience (Arndt, Solomon, Kasser, & Sheldon, 2004; Mandel & Smeesters, 2008), personal freedom (Levav & Zhu, 2009), and general uncertainty (e.g., Briñol, Petty, & Tormala, 2004; Tormala, Rucker, & Seger, 2008). There are additional psychological states that can be contrasted against power; however, we selected these constructs as illustrative examples because of their relevance to the consumer literature.
With respect to mood,…
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