ASSOCIATION FOR CONSUMER RESEARCH

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The Effects of the Menstrual Cycle on Food and Appearance-Related Consumption Gad Saad, Concordia University, Canada Eric Stenstrom, Concordia University, Canada

We examine the influence of the menstrual cycle on women’s food and appearance-related consumption using a 35-day panel study. Results indicate that women’s appearance-related desires, product usage, and purchasing behavior were greater during the fertile phase, whereas food-related desires, consumption, and purchasing behavior were greater during the luteal phase.

[to cite]: Gad Saad and Eric Stenstrom (2011) ,"The Effects of the Menstrual Cycle on Food and Appearance-Related Consumption", in NA - Advances in Consumer Research Volume 38, eds. Darren W. Dahl, Gita V. Johar, and Stijn M.J. van Osselaer, Duluth, MN : Association for Consumer Research.

[url]: http://www.acrwebsite.org/volumes/15841/volumes/v38/NA-38

[copyright notice]: This work is copyrighted by The Association for Consumer Research. For permission to copy or use this work in whole or in part, please contact the Copyright Clearance Center at http://www.copyright.com/. 946 / Working Papers To control for the potentially confounding effects of sex and ethnic heterogeneity (Manning et al. 2007), Pearson correlations between digit ratios and risk measures were performed on the following four subsamples: male Caucasians (n=130), female Caucasians (n=109), all males (n=219), and all females (n=194). In the subsample of male Caucasians, lower rel2 was predictive of greater financial, social, and recreational risk-taking. Lower 2D:4D was predictive of greater risk-taking in two domains (social and recreational) in this group. In the full male sample (ethnically heterogeneous), the only significant correlation was a negative association between 2D:4D and financial risk. In other words, all significant correlations were in the predicted direction. Surprisingly, no significant correlations were found in the female subsamples. Finally, men were more risk-seeking than women across all five contexts. In sum, our results indicate that prenatal testosterone exposure has organizational effects on a man’s recreational, financial, and social risk-taking propensity. Furthermore, our findings suggest that future digit ratio research should account for ethnic heterogeneity and that rel2 should be considered as a potential alternative proxy of prenatal testosterone exposure. Moreover, our study highlights the potential of using physiological markers to predict individual differences in consumer behavior. Ultimately, the digit ratio might serve as a test case for the applicability of morphological segmentation as a viable marketing strategy. Morphological segmentation might be used by marketers perhaps not to identify singular individuals but rather to create segments of similar consumers (e.g., high testosterone men), all of whom can then be targeted with tailored advertising messages and promotional campaigns.

Selected References Auyeung, Bonnie, Simon Baron-Cohen, Emma Ashwin, Rebecca Knickmeyer, Kevin Taylor, Gerald Hackett, and Melissa Hines (2009), “Fetal Testosterone Predicts Sexually Differentiated Childhood Behavior in Girls and in Boys,” Psychological Science, 20 (2), 144-48. Coates, John M., Mark Gurnell, and Aldo Rustichini (2009), “Second-to-Fourth Digit Ratio Predicts Success among High-Frequency Financial Traders,” Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America, 106 (2), 623-28. Kahneman, Daniel and Amos Tversky (1979), “Prospect Theory: An Analysis of Decision under Risk,” Econometrica, 47 (2), 263-91. Levenson, Michael R. (1990), “Risk-Taking and Personality,” Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 58 (6), 1073-80. Loewenstein, George F., Elke U. Weber, Christopher K. Hsee, and Ned Welch (2001), “Risk as Feelings,” Psychological Bulletin, 127 (2), 267-86. Manning, John T., Diane Scutt, James Wilson, and D. Iwan Lewis-Jones (1998), “The Ratio of 2nd to 4th Digit Length: A Predictor of Sperm Numbers and Concentrations of Testosterone, Luteinizing Hormone and Oestrogen,” Human Reproduction, 13 (11), 3000-04. Udry, J. Richard (2000), “Biological Limits of Gender Construction,” American Sociological Review, 65 (3), 443-57. Weber, Elke U., Ann-Renée Blais, and Nancy E. Betz (2002), “A Domain-Specific Risk-Attitude Scale: Measuring Risk Perceptions and Risk Behaviors,” Journal of Behavioral Decision Making, 15 (4), 263-90.

The Effects of the Menstrual Cycle on Food Appearance-related Consumption Gad Saad, Concordia University, Canada Eric Stenstrom, Concordia University, Canada

Consumer behavior is influenced by a wide variety of situational variables (e.g., Argo, Dahl, and Manchanda 2005). We focus on a physiologically-based situational factor unique to women, namely the menstrual cycle. Despite the mounting evidence demonstrating the profound effect that the menstrual cycle has on women’s desires, preferences, and behaviors (e.g., Gangestad et al. 2007), its role in the consumption arena remains relatively unexplored. In the current work, we show that a woman’s appearance- and food-related desires, product usage, and purchasing behavior are influenced by her menstrual cycle. The menstrual cycle begins with the menstrual phase (usually days one to four of a 28-day cycle), followed by the follicular phase (days five to 14), and ending with the luteal phase (days 15 to 28). Women can only conceive during a short fertile window of roughly six days during the late follicular phase, typically occurring between days eight and 15 of a 28-day cycle. Given the evidence suggesting a late follicular peak in mating-related drives (Gangestad, Thornhill, and Garver-Apgar 2005) and associated styling behaviors (Haselton et al. 2007; Durante, Li, and Haselton 2008; Roder, Brewer, and Fink 2009), we expect that women will increase their appearance- related consumption on fertile days in order to maximise their attractiveness to potential mates at this time. Specifically, we predict that women’s appearance-related desires, purchases, and product usage, will be greater during the fertile phase compared to during the luteal phase. Further, given the evidence indicating a peak in caloric intake during the luteal phase (Buffenstein et al. 1995; Fessler 2003), we expect that women’s food-related desires, purchases, and consumption choices will be greater on luteal days compared to fertile days. Fifty-nine normally cycling women who were not taking any hormonal contraceptives were asked to track their expenditures in a shopping diary and to answer online survey questions every evening for a period of 35 days. Participants were asked to complete a short survey consisting of a number of survey items every evening (denoted as survey 1) and to complete a much longer survey containing many additional items on three specific evenings (denoted as survey 2). The reported food and clothing-related Likert-type items were included in both surveys. Participants were asked to track the exact amounts of money that they had spent on food and clothing in a paper shopping diary and to indicate their totals every evening in survey 1. To assess food and appearance-related desires and product usage, participants provided ratings in surveys 1 and 2. Specifically, on a nine-point Likert-type scale anchored by -4 (“far less than usual”), 0 (“about average”), and +4 (“far more than usual”), they were requested to indicate “Over the last 24 hours, compared to most days in the last 12 months, I …” In survey 1, desire for food was measured by “felt hungry today” and “craved highly caloric foods,” whereas actual food consumption was assessed by the items “consumed calories,” and “ate highly caloric foods.” In survey 2, appearance-related desires were measured by the item “felt a desire to look sexy,” while a variety of items assessed appearance-related product usage including Advances in Consumer Research (Volume 38) / 947 “wore sexy clothes,” “wore clothes that showed lots of skin,” “wore a skirt,” and “went sun tanning.” Of the 59 women who began the 35-day study, 48 women completed survey 1 at least once each during the luteal and fertile phases, while 20 did so for survey 2. After excluding the data from 12 women who did not have regular cycles between 27 and 39 days in length and one who reported taking a hormonal contraceptive during the study, the final sample sizes were 35 participants for survey 1 (the food-related Likert-type items and the expenditures in both categories) and 17 for survey 2 (the appearance-related Likert-type items). Each participant’s follicular and luteal phases were estimated based on menstruation information collected via survey 1 (i.e., “did you menstruate today?”) and on subsequent post-study email correspondences. As hypothesized, women reported feeling greater appearance-related desires and engaging in greater appearance-related product usage on fertile days than on luteal days. Despite the large mean difference in the predicted direction, there were no significant differences between the daily amount of money spent on clothing on fertile days and the amount spent on luteal days. However, a more granular split of the data revealed that women spent significantly more money during the fertile phase than during the early follicular phase. Recall that we predict the opposite menstrual cycle effect for food, such that consumption will be greater during the luteal phase than during the fertile phase. As expected, women reported feeling hungrier and stronger cravings for highly caloric foods on luteal days than on fertile days. Similarly, women in their luteal phase reported consuming more calories and more highly caloric foods compared to when they were in their fertile phase. The amounts of money that women spent on food were also significantly influenced by menstrual cycle phase, such that women reported spending significantly more money on food on luteal days than on fertile days. Mediation analyses revealed that the menstrual cycle effect on appearance-related product usage was significantly mediated by appearance-related desires. Further, food-related desires significantly mediated the menstrual cycle effects on food consumption and on food expenditures. The obtained findings relating to actual purchases constitute the first direct economic evidence of a menstrual cycle effect on women’s consumer behavior. Our research is of relevance to consumer welfare in that we are highlighting when women are most vulnerable to succumbing to cyclical temptations for high-calorie foods and appearance-enhancing products. From a managerial perspective, practitioners having access to detailed purchasing data can deduce a particular consumer’s menstrual cycle phase from her food and/ or clothing buying patterns and employ direct marketing strategies accordingly (e.g., send food-related promotions to consumers who are likely to be in their luteal phase). Overall, our findings add to the growing body of work at the nexus of physiology and consumer behavior (Miller, Tybur, and Jordan 2007; Plassmann, O’Doherty, Shiv, and Rangel 2008; Saad and Vongas 2009).

Selected References Argo, Jennifer J., Darren W. Dahl, and Rajesh V. Manchanda (2005), “The Influence of a Mere Social Presence in a Retail Context,” Journal of Consumer Research, 32 (2), 207-12. Buffenstein, Rochelle, Sally. D. Poppitt, Regina M. McDevitt, & Andrew M. Prentice (1995), “Food Intake and the Menstrual Cycle: A Retrospective Analysis, with Implications for Appetite Research,” Physiology and Behavior, 58 (6), 1067-77. Durante, Kristina M., Norman P. Li, and Martie G. Haselton (2008), “Changes in Women’s Choice of Dress across the Ovulatory Cycle: Naturalistic and Laboratory Task-Based Evidence,” Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, 34 (11), 1451-60. Gangestad, Steven W., Christine E. Garver-Apgar, Jeffry A. Simpson, and Alita J. Cousins (2007), “Changes in Women’s Mate Preferences across the Ovulatory Cycle,” Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 92 (1), 151-63. Haselton, Martie G., Mina Mortezaie, Elizabeth G. Pillsworth, April Bleske-Rechek, and David A. Frederick (2007), “Ovulatory Shifts in Human Female Ornamentation: Near Ovulation, Women Dress to Impress,” Hormones and Behavior, 51 (1), 40-45. Miller, Geoffrey, Joshua M. Tybur, and Brent D. Jordan (2007), “Ovulatory Cycle Effects on Tip Earnings by Lap Dancers: Economic Evidence for Human Estrus?,” Evolution and Human Behavior, 28 (6), 375-81. Plassmann, Hilke, John O’Doherty, Baba Shiv, and Antonio Rangel (2008), “Marketing Actions can Modulate Neural Representations of Experienced Pleasantness,” Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 105 (3), 1050-54. Saad, Gad and John G. Vongas (2009), “The Effect of Conspicuous Consumption on Men’s Testosterone Levels,” Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, 110 (2), 80-92.

Compulsive Buying–Also a Male Problem? Mirja Hubert, Zeppelin University, Germany Marco Hubert, Zeppelin University, Germany Oliver B. Büttner, Zeppelin University, Germany Arnd Florack, Zeppelin University, Germany Peter Kenning, Zeppelin University, Germany

Extended Abstract Compulsive Buying (CB) is a problem with increasing relevance for individuals and society. Earlier studies show that the fraction of people who exhibit a strong tendency toward CB is between 5% and 8% of the population in Western societies (Faber and O’Guinn 1992; Koran et al. 2006; Reisch, Neuner, and Raab 2004; Ridgway, Kukar-Kinney, and Monroe 2008). However, previous investigations provide evidence that between 80-95% of compulsive buyers are female (Black 2007; Faber and O’Guinn 1992; Müller and de Zwaan 2004). Remarkably, research indicates that men rarely evidence CB tendencies. In general, compulsive buyers are prone to run into indebtedness because they are characterized by a tendency for repetitive buying with a loss of impulse control over buying (Ridgway et al. 2008). Evidence that overspending and debts are problems that often affect men more seriously than they do women (www.creditreform.de) suggests that CB is a more severe problem among men than is reflected