Crisis‐induced behavior: From fear and frugality to the familiar

Abstract

AbstractThis research uncovers the impact of a multifaceted crisis on consumers' immediate shopping behaviors, short‐term financial spending, and long‐term shopping and spending responses. This longitudinal study adopts a future studies approach to expose consumers' current experiences, expectations of the future, and realized future experiences to understand a pandemic's impact on consumers' collective shopping and spending behaviors. Data were collected at the beginning of the COVID‐19 pandemic, during its peak, and as restrictions were being lifted. Findings reveal that consumers adapt their shopping and spending behavior through a crisis in response to constantly shifting environmental stimuli. Consumers moved from fear to frugality and then followed one of two paths—maintaining new crisis‐induced behaviors or, more often, returning to prior familiar consumption behaviors. Retailers and service providers must understand these responses to be able to serve both groups during and after a crisis.