Effects of social exclusion and implicit theories of personality on nostalgic consumption

Abstract

We conducted 2 studies to examine how social exclusion and implicit theories of personality interact to influence preferences for products that evoke nostalgia. In Study 1 we tested how individuals' implicit personality (entity vs. incremental theorist type) moderate the effects of social exclusion on nostalgic consumption. Results showed that socially excluded (vs. socially included) consumers were more likely to consume nostalgic products when the consumers were entity (vs. incremental) theorists. In Study 2 we conducted a different manipulation of social exclusion and individuals' implicit personality, and also examined the mediating role of self-continuity. Results showed that self-continuity mediated the interaction effect of social exclusion and implicit personality on preferences for nostalgic products. The results were robust whether the manipulation of social exclusion was in an online dating or fitness club application context, and for different nostalgic product choices, comprising chips and cookies.