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The Impact of Consumers' Choice Deferral Behavior on Their Intertemporal Choice Preference
He-Lin Wei1, Chen-Ying Hai1, Shao-Ying Zhu1
1Business School, Guangxi University, Nanning, China.
Frontiers in Psychology
|May 24, 2021
Summary
Choice deferral behavior enhances consumer hopefulness, leading to a preference for larger, longer-term rewards. This finding impacts intertemporal decision-making and consumer psychology.
Area of Science:
- Consumer Psychology
- Behavioral Economics
- Decision Science
Background:
- Understanding consumer decision-making is crucial for economic and psychological research.
- Intertemporal choice preferences, balancing immediate versus future rewards, are complex.
- Choice deferral behavior's impact on these preferences remains under-explored.
Purpose of the Study:
- To investigate how consumers' choice deferral behavior influences their intertemporal choice preferences.
- To examine the mediating role of hopefulness in this relationship.
- To explore the moderating effect of perceived information integrity.
Main Methods:
- Empirical study involving consumer behavior analysis.
- Statistical modeling to assess the influence of choice deferral on intertemporal preferences.
- Analysis of mediating and moderating effects.
Main Results:
- Choice deferral behavior significantly enhances consumers' hopefulness.
- Increased hopefulness leads to a preference for larger, longer-term rewards (intertemporal choice).
- Perceived information integrity moderates the effect: low integrity amplifies the impact of hopefulness.
Conclusions:
- Choice deferral can be a strategy to improve future-oriented decision-making by fostering hope.
- The findings offer insights into consumer psychology and behavioral economics.
- Future research should explore interventions based on these findings.
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