IJRM-01357; No of Pages 16 International Journal of Research in Marketing xxx (xxxx) xxx Contents lists available at ScienceDirect IJRM International Journal of Research in Marketing journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/ijresmar Full Length Article Does the devil wear Prada? Luxury product experiences can affect prosocial behavior Yajin Wang a,⁎, Deborah Roedder John b, Vladas Griskevicious b a Department of Marketing, University of Maryland, United States of America b Department of Marketing, University of Minnesota, United States of America article info Article history: Despite the explosive growth of luxury consumption, researchers have yet to examine how the First received on June 11, 2019 and was experience of using luxury products affects us both psychologically and behaviorally. In this re- under review for 3½ months search, we explore how the experience of using a luxury product can alter a user's perceptions Available online xxxx of themselves and their behavior toward other people. We gave women either a luxury prod- uct (e.g., Prada handbag) or a non-luxury product (e.g., unbranded handbag) to use, and after- Guest Editor: Sharon Ng wards, we presented women with opportunities to exhibit either selfish or generous behaviors toward others. We found that, after using a luxury product, women exhibited more selfish be- Keywords: havior, such as sharing fewer resources with others and contributing less money to charity Luxury than women who used a non-luxury handbag. We also found this pattern can be reversed, Consumer experience Prosocial behavior with luxury users exhibiting more generous behavior when the generous behavior can be per- formed in front of other people. Further, we show that these patterns of selfish and generous behaviors are mediated by changes in perceived status and superiority that are triggered when women experience using a luxury product. Crown Copyright © 2020 Published by Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved. 1. Introduction Once the purview of only the rich, luxury goods are in the hands of more consumers than ever before. Sales of luxury goods have skyrocketed to €1.2 trillion globally, and over the last decade, the number of luxury consumers has tripled to over 330 mil- lion (D'Arpizio, 2018). Fueling this growth is a change in the composition of luxury consumers, with a shift from the ultra-affluent to younger less-affluent individuals (D'Arpizio, 2018; Phillips, 2012). In fact, Generations Y and Z now represent 45% of all luxury consumers and account for 35% of luxury purchases (Arienti, 2019; D'Arpizio, 2018). Luxury goods are now more available than ever, with luxury brands expanding their online presence and adding new product lines at lower prices (Kapferer & Bastien, 2012). Luxury goods are also readily available from online consignment shops and online rental stores, where the finest designer handbags and clothing can be rented for a brief time. Despite the widespread growth of luxury consumption, there has been little examination of the consequences of introducing luxury goods into the lives of so many consumers. Key to such an inquiry is understanding how the experience of using luxury goods affects us both psychologically and behaviorally. Consumers are motivated to acquire luxury goods for several reasons, ⁎ Corresponding author at: University of Maryland, Robert H. Smith School of Business, 3319 Van Munching Hall, College Park, MD 20740, United States of America. E-mail address: [email protected].(Y.Wang). https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ijresmar.2020.04.001 0167-8116/Crown Copyright © 2020 Published by Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved. Please cite this article as: Y. Wang, D.R. John and V. Griskevicious, Does the devil wear Prada? Luxury product experiences can affect prosocial behavior, International Journal of Research in Marketing, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ijresmar.2020.04.001 2 Y. Wang et al. / International Journal of Research in Marketing xxx (xxxx) xxx such as boosting one's self-esteem, happiness, or feelings of power (Belk, 1985; Charles, Hurst, & Roussanov, 2007; Richins, 1987; Rucker, Galinsky, & Dubois, 2012), communicating one's sense of self (Berger & Ward, 2010; Han, Nunes, & Drèze, 2010; Mazzocco, Rucker, Galinsky, & Anderson, 2012; Sundie et al., 2011), and to satisfy one's hedonic and aesthetic needs (Berry, 1994; Hagtvedt & Patrick, 2009). Clearly, these are powerful motivations, and thus, there is reason to believe that using luxury products should have substantial psychological and behavioral consequences. For example, when consumers experience using luxury products, do they see themselves differently? Do they behave differently or interact with other people differently? In this article, we begin to address these questions, exploring how the experience of using a luxury product can alter a user's perceptions of themselves and their behavior toward other people. We provide women with either a luxury product (e.g., Prada handbag) or a non-luxury product (e.g., unbranded handbag) to use, and then assess their psychological state while using the product. Afterwards, we provide women with opportunities to exhibit either selfish or generous behaviors toward others. For ex- ample, we ask them to allocate money to themselves versus others, indicate how likely they would be to help a person in need, and donate money to a charity. We find that the experience of using a luxury product leads women to exhibit more selfish behavior, such as sharing fewer resources with others and contributing less money to charity than women using a non-luxury handbag. We also found this pattern can be reversed under certain conditions. Women using a luxury product behave in a more generous manner, donating more money to charity than women using a non-luxury product, when their donations occur in public, in front of other people. Further, we show that both patterns of behavior, whereby luxury users exhibit more selfish and more generous behavior, are driven by changes in women's self-perceptions of social status that are triggered by luxury product experiences. Our findings make several contributions to luxury research. To our knowledge, we are the first to study the psychological and behavioral consequences that are triggered by actual experiences with luxury products. Prior research has examined the motiva- tions for why people desire luxury goods, how luxury goods can help repair feelings of inadequacy, how luxury goods can enable people to express and communicate who they are (e.g., Belk, 1985; Berger & Ward, 2010; Rucker et al., 2012; Sundie et al., 2011), and how luxury use affects people's perceptions of the user (Cannon & Rucker, 2018; Nelissen & Meijers, 2011). However, most of these studies have utilized hypothetical scenarios about using or obtaining luxury products, stopping short of examining the actual experience of using luxury products and how it might impact the user in psychological or behavioral terms. Further, we provide a methodology for studying actual luxury experiences in the laboratory. To date, luxury research using ex- perimental methods has often employed hypothetical scenarios asking participants to respond in terms of imagined luxury expe- riences and hypothetical responses. This approach has proven useful in understanding facets of luxury consumption, yet studying actual consumer experiences and capturing their responses to these experiences in real time can reveal deeper aspects of con- sumer behavior (Schmitt, 2010). Using our methodology, researchers can expand our line of research and begin to capture what it actually feels like for consumers to experience the use of a luxury product, and how these experiences produce important psychological and behavioral changes. 2. Conceptual background Luxury products are offered at a premium price and quality level (Patrick & Hagtvedt, 2009). A defining feature of luxury prod- ucts is their relative rarity and exclusivity (Fuchs, Prandelli, Schreier, & Dahl, 2013; Han et al., 2010; Phau & Prendergast, 2000; Vigneron & Johnson, 2004). Our research focuses on products from high-end luxury brands such as Prada, Louis Vuitton, and Burberry. We propose that the experience of using a luxury product has important psychological and behavioral consequences related to prosocial behavior, as shown in Fig. 1. First, we predict that that the experience of using a luxury product elicits a perception of higher social status. Second, we predict that perceived higher social status impact willingness to engage in prosocial behavior, de- pending on the context in which the behavior occurs. In a private context, perceived higher social status results in less prosocial behaviors (e.g., being more selfish); in a public context, perceived social status results in more prosocial behaviors (e.g., being more generous). Fig. 1. Conceptual model of the effects of luxury product experiences. Please cite this article as: Y. Wang, D.R. John and V. Griskevicious, Does the devil wear Prada? Luxury product experiences can affect prosocial behavior, International Journal of Research in Marketing, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ijresmar.2020.04.001 Y. Wang et al. / International Journal of Research in Marketing xxx (xxxx) xxx 3 In this section, we discuss the conceptual rationale for these predictions. Following Fig. 1, we begin by examining the link be- tween the experience of using a luxury product and perceptions of higher social status. This is followed by a discussion of theo- retical and empirical work that links social status to selfish behavior and lack of concern for others. Finally, we discuss theoretical and empirical work that links social status to generous behavior. 2.1. Luxury use and social status Social status refers to an individual's rank in a social hierarchy or position in society (Dreze & Nunes, 2009; French Jr. & Raven, 1959; Magee & Galinsky, 2008). Higher social status is often associated with having power (Rucker & Galinsky, 2008, 2009; Wong & Shavitt, 2010) and being admired by others (Magee & Galinsky, 2008; Ridgeway & Walker, 1995). Social status is relative in that one's rank in a social hierarchy depends on the relative power or resources of others in a group.