Moral Violations Reduce Oral Consumption.
Consumers frequently encounter moral violations in everyday life. They watch movies and television shows about crime and deception, hear news reports of corporate fraud and tax evasion, and hear gossip about cheaters and thieves. How does exposure to moral violations influence consumption? Because moral violations arouse disgust and because disgust is an evolutionarily important signal of contamination that should provoke a multi-modal response, we hypothesize that moral violations affect a key behavioral response to disgust: reduced oral consumption. In three experiments, compared with those in control conditions, people drank less water and chocolate milk while (a) watching a film portraying the moral violations of incest, (b) writing about moral violations of cheating or theft, and (c) listening to a report about fraud and manipulation. These findings imply that "moral disgust" influences consumption in ways similar to core disgust, and thus provide evidence for the associations between moral violations, emotions, and consumer behavior.
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Related Subject Headings
- Marketing
- 5205 Social and personality psychology
- 5201 Applied and developmental psychology
- 3506 Marketing
- 1701 Psychology
- 1505 Marketing
Citation
Published In
DOI
ISSN
Publication Date
Volume
Issue
Start / End Page
Related Subject Headings
- Marketing
- 5205 Social and personality psychology
- 5201 Applied and developmental psychology
- 3506 Marketing
- 1701 Psychology
- 1505 Marketing