Eyes Wide Shopped: Shopping Situations Trigger Arousal in Impulsive Buyers

December Eyes Wide Shopped: Shopping Situations Trigger Arousal in Impulsive Buyers Benjamin G. Serfas * 0 1 2 3 5 Oliver B. B uttner 0 1 2 3 4 5 Arnd Florack 0 1 2 3 5 0 Funding: This work was supported by a Marie Curie FP7 Integration Grant within the 7th European Union Framework Program to Oliver B. Bu ttner (FP7-PEOPLE-2011-CIG 293577). The funders had no role in study design, data collection and analysis, decision to publish, or preparation of the manuscript 1 Data Availability: The authors confirm that all data underlying the findings are fully available without restriction. All data files are available from u:scholar, the institutional repository of the University of Vienna (persistent identifier: http:// phaidra.univie.ac.at/o:367887) 2 Editor: Susana Jime nez-Murcia, University Hospital of Bellvitge-IDIBELL; CIBER Fisiopatolog a Obesidad y Nutricio n (CIBERObn), Instituto Salud Carlos III; Department of Clinical Sciences, School of Medicine, University of Barcelona , Spain , Spain 3 Department of Applied Psychology: Work , Education, and Economy , University of Vienna , Vienna , Austria, 4 Department of Economic Sciences, Zeppelin University , Friedrichshafen , Germany 5 Competing Interests: The authors have declared that no competing interests exist The present study proposes arousal as an important mechanism driving buying impulsiveness. We examined the effect of buying impulsiveness on arousal in nonshopping and shopping contexts. In an eye-tracking experiment, we measured pupil dilation while participants viewed and rated pictures of shopping scenes and non-shopping scenes. The results demonstrated that buying impulsiveness is closely associated with arousal as response to viewing pictures of shopping scenes. This pertained for hedonic shopping situations as well as for utilitarian shopping situations. Importantly, the effect did not emerge for non-shopping scenes. Furthermore, we demonstrated that arousal of impulsive buyers is independent from cognitive evaluation of scenes in the pictures. - Buying impulsiveness is consumers tendency to engage repeatedly in spontaneous, on-the-spot purchases, without consideration of potential consequences [1]. Buying impulsiveness has been conceptualized as a one-dimensional construct that reflects individual differences in purchasing behavior along a continuum ranging from non-impulsive buyers to highly impulsive buyers [1][2]. Typical characteristics of impulsive buyers are that they neglect the consequences of their purchasing behavior, and might experience emotional conflicts [3]. Research on impulsive buying commonly uses questionnaires or self-ratings. Thus, it often neglects consumers physiological reactions, though these reactions might represent an important link between individual traits and behavior [4]. For instance, hormone balance influences spending behavior [5]. The physiological reaction we suggest to be crucial in impulsive buying is arousal. An expression used to indicate a state of arousal, as well as that of excitement and joy, is wide-eyed. However, wide-eyed may be more than just a phrase: Previous research suggests that our eyes literally widen in situations in which individuals experience arousal, as demonstrated by physiological literature using pupil responses. Task-evoked pupil dilation is a common measure in psychophysiology [6]. Previous research has shown that pupil dilation is linked to affective arousal [7]. For instance, pupils dilate due to pleasant sounds [8] or valuable cues [9]. However, research on impulsive buyers physiological reaction is scarce. A notable exception is a recent fMRI study, which demonstrated that buying impulsiveness accounts for differences in neural activation patterns due to perceptions of attractive brands [10]. Additionally, impulsive buyers seem to be particularly vulnerable to tempting stimuli in shopping situations [11]. Thus, a high level of buying impulsiveness might be accompanied by physiological responses, specifically arousal. There might be two reasons why shopping situations trigger arousal in impulsive buyers: self-control conflicts and affective responses. Most theories agree that failures in self-control play an important role in buying impulsiveness [12] [13] [14]. A central point of self-control is to regulate inner-subject processes, such as desires and impulses [15]. Struggling with self-control conflicts elicits arousal [16]; consequently, buying impulsiveness can be assumed to be accompanied by physiological arousal. Impulsive buying is related not only to a lack of self-control, but also to increased affective responses [10]. Indeed, Babin, Darden, and Griffin [17] found buying impulsiveness to be linked to hedonic shopping; that is, shopping for mere enjoyment. Consumers joy is closely linked to arousal, and this arousal at the point of purchase is an important factor to explain shopping behavior [18]. However, research on buying impulsiveness with psychophysiological measures of arousal is currently lacking. Furthermore, we assume that arousal in impulsive buyers is domain-specific. Recent research has demonstrated that temptations in self-control conflicts are largely idiosyncratic and domain-specific [19]. Results of a recent study demonstrated that impulsive buyers are more likely to be visually distracted by goal-irrelevant products, but only when the task is framed as a shopping situation [11]. Similarly, we assume a domain-specific arousal in impulsive buyers. Specifically, we assume that buying impulsiveness is correlated with intensity of arousal in shopping scenes, but not in non-shopping scenes. The present study is the first to use a physiological measure to examine processes that underlie buying impulsiveness. Specifically, we suggest arousal to be a crucial mechanism underlying buying impulsiveness. In order to address the role of arousal in shopping situations, we measured pupil dilation while participants viewed pictures of non-shopping and shopping scenes. To demonstrate the effect across a variety of shopping situations, we used pictures of shopping scenes that are typically considered hedonic, such as apparel shopping, and shopping scenes that are typically considered as utilitarian, such as grocery shopping [20]. We expected that arousal in response to shopping scenes (as reflected in pupil dilation) is closely associated with the level of buying impulsiveness. As we expect a domain-specific response, this is only true for shopping scenes. In contrast, for non-shopping scenes, highly impulsive and low-impulsive buyers should not differ regarding arousal. Additionally, we propose that arousal in impulsive buyers is direct physiological reaction, which is independent from the cognitive evaluation of scenes in the pictures. Ethics statement According to the Austrian Universities Act 2002 (UG2002), which was in place at the time the study was carried out, only medical universities were required to appoint e (...truncated)