This study responds to literature calls to investigate the different social and psychological antecedents of negative consumer emotional well-being in the context of the health crisis Covid-19. We perform a path analysis on a sample of Australian consumers during the Covid-19 lockdown. We find that social norms and word-ofmouth increase consumer fear-of-missing-out which in turn fuels panic buying behavior. Such behavior is moreover spurred by positive motivations to panic buy. By contrast, we find that consumer ability to self-regulate during Covid-19’s reduces their tendencies to succumb to panic buying. We moreover find that such self-regulation is enhanced through sustainable product consumption behavior during Covid-19. Lastly, it was found that panic buying has a negative influence on emotional well-being of consumers. Implications of our findings for theory and future research directions are provided.

Compulsive buying is a problematic behavior that could lead to negative outcomes (e.g., debts and negative relationships with relatives). Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, people changed their shopping behavior and experienced various life events. This research aims at exploring the relationship between life events and compulsive buying in Indonesia. A qualitative approach using in-depth interviews was employed. Nineteen participants who faced changing course of life, either positive (e.g., give birth) or negative (e.g., sudden death of family), during the pandemic were interviewed. We found that positive life events cause people to feel over-excited and over-grateful and shop compulsively. Negative life events that result in self-doubt and lower self-esteem also lead to a compulsive behavior. The study contributes to the compulsive behavior literature by exploring the antecedent of compulsive buying from the live events perspective and provide implications for policy makers and marketers.

Recently, the luxury sector has witnessed a significant rise in luxury consumption, reaching £233 Billion in 2022 (Statista, 2022). This rise demonstrates the growing popularity of the luxury consumption phenomenon globally. However, the climate crisis may impact future trends in luxury consumption (Gardetti and Muthu, 2019). The luxury sector has endorsed a considerable growing demand for sustainability from environmental and ethical luxury consumers. In recent years, concerns have grown around the ethicality of supply chains, where consumers develop contradictory feelings and beliefs, veering between conscious and hedonistic decision-making (Kleinhaus, 2011; Helm, 2020; Wang et al. 2021). Moreover, consumers face a conflict between choosing what they believe is ethically right and indulgence (Hennigs et al. 2013). The supply chain plays an important role in achieving sustainability goals, and yet some researchers argue that the luxury supply chain can involve ethical and environmental breaches in terms of labour and raw materials, such as use of leather and fur (Klerk et al. 2018). However, some luxury brands such as Stella McCartney and Vivienne Westwood are focused on sustainability and the use of vegan raw materials (YNAP, 2021).

This research focuses on analyzing the impact of a recommendation system on customer behavior in the e-commerce industry. The study examines the use of big data-driven product recommendations and tailored promotions to enhance customer engagement, conversion rates, and revenue generation. The importance of prioritizing customer engagement in the early stages of the purchasing process is emphasized, and key statistics related to customer behavior in e-commerce are presented. The objective of this research is to investigate the effectiveness of a recommendation system in influencing customer behavior and driving conversions in the e-commerce industry. The research design incorporates a case study analysis of a prominent marketplace in Indonesia. Data was collected from three automation trigger campaigns: browsing abandonment, wishlist/cart abandonment, and purchase reminders. The findings of the research indicate that a recommendation system based on big data has a significant impact on costumer behavior in the e-commerce industry. The research highlights the importance of prioritizing customer engagement and implementing effective recommendation systems to drive conversion rates and revenue in the e-commerce industry.

Live streaming commerce is a novel form of an e-commerce platform, which works by establishing a temporary virtual community shared by streamers and customers in real time. With the popularity of live streaming shopping, many e-retailers adopted this new platform to promote their products in an effort to boost their sales volume. On the basis of signalling theory and social exchange theory (SET), this study proposes a research model to examine the informational signals and customer-streamer exchanges that two parties shared using live streaming platform. An online survey with 735 samples was collected through a professional online survey service platform (i.e., Wenjuanxing) to measure our model. Our results indicate that both service-centred signal (interaction quality) and product-centred signal (streamer credibility) have significant positive influences on customer evaluation of information quality. The results also denote that the received information quality acts as a significant predictor of customer engagement and buying tendency. Moreover, the results confirm the mediation role of customer engagement in predicting impulsive buying tendency, and the moderation effects of guanxi orientation on customer engagement and impulsive buying tendency. By synthesizing the preceding findings, theoretical and practical implications are discussed in the context of live streaming commerce.

Digital channels are becoming increasingly important in consumer purchase decisions. Yet, the availability of several different channels present consumers the opportunity to switch between one and another, such a phenomenon is called cross-channel free riding. This research aims therefore at exploring whether cognitive dissonance and opportunistic behavior are relevant antecedents of cross-channel free riding.

중국 소비자들의 소비영향력이 커지고 있음에도 불구하고 라이프스타일과 명품소비에 관한 연구는 매우 부족 한 실정이다. 본 논문은 중국의 소비 주체인 여성 소비자 중에서 특히 명품소비의 새로운 계층으로 등장한 20대 젊은 여성 소비자 321명에 대해 설문조사를 실시하였으며 그들의 라이프스타일을 분석하고 명품소비행동을 연구하였다. 연구 결과에 따르면 20대 중국 여성 소비자들의 라이프스타일(의생활, 식생활, 주생활, 소비생활, 여가생활, 가치관)을 분류한 결과 전통적 보수형, 계획적 성공추구형, 비계획적 소비추구형 3가지 라이프스타일로 분류되었다. 전통적 보수형은 소득수준이 낮고 모든 요인들에 있어서 보수적이고 소극적 태도를 보였며, 계획적 성공추구형은 여성의 사회진출 증가로 인해 사회적 성공을 추구하면서 계획적으로 생활하는 집단이며, 비계획적 소비추구형은 쇼핑을 즐기며 지출을 많이 하는 특성을 보여주었다. 구입한 명품 브랜드의 종류, 연간 명품 구매 수량, 연간 명품 구매 금액 및 명품 구매 이유는 통계적으로 유의한 차이가 있었으나 명품 품목, 명품 구매 장소와 정보원은 유의한 차이가 없었다. 최근 중고명품 시장이 크게 증가하고 있어 새 명품과 중고 명품에 대한 태도와 행동을 비 교한 결과 새 명품의 구매의도와 추천의도가 중고 명품에 비해 더 높은 것으로 나타났다. 본 논문은 중국 소비자들에 대한 체계적 연구의 틀과 방법 및 유용한 자료를 제공함으로써 중국 소비자 행동 연구와 라이프스타일 연구, 명품 소비 연구의 학문적 발전에 기여할 수 있는 것으로 기대된다. 또한 명품 브랜 드들이 20대 중국 여성들을 위한 마케팅 전략을 수립하는 데 있어 실무적인 시사점도 제공할 수 있는 것으로 기대된다.

This study investigated differences in cosmetic buying behavior and personal characteristics between cosmetic involvement groups. Cosmetics buying behavior refers to reason for using cosmetics, use of information sources, selection criteria, place of purchase, use/non-use of cosmetics, purchase propensity, purchase frequency, purchase amount, and satisfaction with cosmetics. Personal characteristic contains pursuing image, age, residence area, job, and average household monthly income. Data was collected from 5-10 December 2016, from 308 females in their 20s using an internet survey. The analysis included descriptive statistics, t-tests, Mann-Whitney U tests, and chi-square tests. The respondents were divided into two groups (a high cosmetic involvement group and a low cosmetic involvement group) according to the degree of cosmetic involvement. The results of t-tests revealed significant differences between groups in terms of reasons for using cosmetics, use of information sources, selection criteria, purchase frequency, place of purchase, use/non-use of cosmetics, and satisfaction with cosmetics. The results of Mann-Whitney U tests highlighted a significant difference in purchase frequency between both groups. The results of chi-square tests indicated significant differences in purchase frequency, purchase amount, pursuing image, and average household monthly income. However, no significant differences were evident in terms of purchase propensity, age, job, and area of residence between groups.

Before purchasing new products, customers often have the desire to consult a variety of information sources (e.g., product tests, online reviews, frontline-employee advices) to make better purchase decisions (Broilo et al. 2016). However, the process of information search has changed tremendously over the past decades due to digitalization and an increasing number of online content (Jerath et al. 2014; Noble et al. 2006). Companies’ reactions to these new information search opportunities are very different. For example, Amazon decided to dispense with frontline-employees in their physical store (Forbes 2017). Other companies provide free Wi-Fi access in their bricks-and-mortar stores to support customer online activities (e.g., Woolworths and Best Buy). The purpose of this investigation is to uncover how frontline-employee interaction and mobile Internet search at the store affect consumers’ buying decision process. Initially, an exploratory study on different information sources at a physical store was designed with the aim to provide insights about the impact of information search on consumers’ product choice certainty. The qualitative data analysis shows that most participants had a main focus on content that is related to the considered products. However, there is an essential difference between the focus on perception of information and the source characteristics for participants in the mobile search and frontline-employee condition. While consumers who use their mobile devices to search online for information were more aware of information characteristics, consumers who get personal advice from a frontlineemployee mostly indicated expertise, credibility, and persuasiveness of the information source to be relevant. The results of a quantitative field study provide an initial examination of the influence of the information source on customers’ product choice certainty and its drivers. In this context, the investigation demonstrates that mobile Internet search as well as customer service can support customers in case of making a certain purchase decision for a product. However, customers who got their information by frontline-employees instead of using their mobile devices to search online for information are more certain about their product choice. This is in line with the results of the qualitative study, since an interaction with the frontline-employee leads to higher interactive decision making.

The flourishing trend of using multiple technology-based self-service channels (hereafter, SSCs) can be found across various service industries. So far, no studies have explored the effect of multichannel interaction on breadth consumer relationship breadth (i.e., cross-buying intention). Based on brand extension theory and the cross-buying literature, this study proposed a conceptual model for understanding the key determinants of consumer cross-buying intention in the context of multiple SSCs. A total of 262 respondents who had experience with using both online and mobile banking were collected. The result revealed that perceived online banking quality (i.e., original SSC), image congruity, and value congruity facilitate consumer trust and satisfaction toward a mobile banking service (i.e., extension SSC). In addition, the trust and satisfaction toward mobile banking have a positive influence on crossbuying intention. The result of this study not only provides an academic contribution to the multichannel service and SSC literature but also provides suggestions for service providers who wish to develop their multiple-SSC strategies.

This study aims to examine the relationship among media multitasking, impulse buying, and psychological well-being. Two competing perspectives exist to explain the relationship. The breadth-biased cognitive control perspective suggests that media multitasking influences impulse buying, which in turn influences affective well-being (i.e., depression or anxiety) and cognitive well-being (i.e., life satisfaction)(van der Schuur, Baumgartner, Sumter, & Valkenburg, 2015). The mood regulation perspective, instead, suggests that cognitive well-being (i.e., life satisfaction) influences media multitasking, which in turn influences impulse buying, and consequently affective well-being (i.e., depression or anxiety)(Seinauskiene, Mascinskiene, Petrike, & Rutelione, 2016). This study employed an online survey across three universities located in northern, central and southern Taiwan. A total of 662 valid responses were obtained. The results supported the breadth-biased cognitive control model.

“When the going gets tough, the tough go shopping.” This expression used as a part of an article, (Cotton Incorporated's Lifestyle Monitor™, 2002) look into the group that depicts a part of numerous contemporary consumers' ways of life, that is, shopping to ease a negative state of mind. This type of shopping is alluded to as retail therapy or retail therapy. "Retail therapy" or "compensatory consumption" is frequently connected in the observation to brighten oneself up through the buy of self-treats and additionally lacking self. The significance of the study is to identify the factors influencing the consumption behaviour among women with reference to retail therapy. Most of the research in this area belongs to socio-psychology, psycho-sociology and clinical psychology. The concrete and crystallized conceptual framework in the field of consumer research is very few. The complex theoretical background which lacks unified conceptual framework. Thus, the present research aims to understand the influence of selfconcept theories on consumption behaviour. The research question broadly focuses on the two major aspects of the study that is importance of self-discrepancy in understanding behavioural response in consumer behaviour. Another aspect is to investigate in detail the various moods and emotions related to retail therapy among women. The research question of self-discrepancy has several sub-components ideal-self, self-incongruence, ought-self, satisfaction, dissatisfaction, dejection, disappointment and actual-self are analysed. The various emotions (described in the hypotheses section) related to consumption behaviour w.r.t retail therapy which are aligned and relatable to self-discrepancy concepts are analysed to understand the relationship with the outcome-retail therapy among women. The study uses the sequential transformative strategy of mixed method research. In the present study, the qualitative data is collected is followed by quantitative data collection. The qualitative approach includes in-depth interviews, focus group discussion and quantitative data collection was through the self-administered questionnaires. The study uses inferential analysis and structural equation modelling for the data analysis. The present work holds critical ramifications for consumers' well-being and prosperity. The findings propose that consumer’s uncovered passionate turbulence may be more inclined to overspending and sinking overwhelmingly into obligation because of their expanded eagerness to pay for status-related items. the consumption is both reactive and proactive which originates from self and terminates in consumption. This is cyclic and extends temporary relief.

Introduction Compulsive buying refers to a condition where consumers make purchases repetitively and excessively (Ridgway, Kukar-Kinney & Monroe, 2008; Japutra, Ekinci & Simkin, 2017). Previous literature shows that two types of behaviors characterize compulsive buying: impulsive buying and obsessive-compulsive buying (Ridgeway et al, 2008). Impulsive buying refers to unplanned purchase due to consumers’ inevitable impulse (Kacen & Lee, 2002), and obsessive-compulsive buying reflects a preoccupation in buying to reduce anxiety (Ridgway et al, 2008). Compulsive buying behaviors have been analyzed under the framework of motivation theory (McGuire, 1976). Nevertheless, research is still needed to understand more on the phenomena of compulsive buying (e.g., Kukkar-Kinney et al., 2016; Japutra et al., 2017). This study aims to explore the antecedents of compulsive buying behaviors using implicit theories. According to the implicit theories, mindset shapes the motivation of consumer behaviors (Dweck, 2000; Murphy & Dweck, 2016). Mindset refers to the beliefs about the nature of human characteristics, and individuals may possess two types of mindset – fixed and growth mindset (Murphy & Dweck, 2016). People with a fixed mindset believe that individuals’ qualities such as intelligence and competence are set and hard to change, whereas those with a growth mindset tend to believe that all individuals are able to change and develop through efforts and experiences. We argue that mindsets influence compulsive buying, and we propose that deal proneness mediates the relationship between mindset and compulsive buying. In doing so, we aim to enhance our knowledge in understanding how mindset affects compulsive buying behavior. Literature review and hypotheses According to the implicit theories, consumers with fixed mindsets believe that one’s abilities are fixed and hard to improve, and thus feel the need to prove, to themselves and others, that they have the abilities and/or they are successful (Murphy & Dweck, 2016). Thus, fixed mindset consumers tend to demonstrate their worth by using image-enhancing products and brands (Park & John, 2012). Deals, such as free gifts and offer of coupons, reduce the transaction cost and increase the perceived value of these image-enhancing purchases. In particular, since fixed mindset consumers favor success with little effort (Murphy and Dweck, 2016), deals can help them achieve their goal of image enhancement with lower cost. Thus, we hypothesize that: H1 Fixed mindset is positively related to deal proneness. For consumers with growth mindsets, a major motivation for their consumer behavior is to learn and improve (Murphy & Dweck, 2016). As the research by Blackwell et al. (2007) shows, growth mindset consumers are eager to participate in the self-improving process and achieve mastery. Thus, growth mindset consumers may perceive the information of discounts, free gifts and coupons as part of the adventurous process where they make the cost-benefit analysis and improve their abilities as wiser consumers. Thus, we propose: H2 Growth mindset is positively related to deal proneness. Previous studies show that compulsive buying is associated with high deal proneness (Kukar-Kinney et al, 2012). Deals may imply perceived value of the purchase and enhanced shopping enjoyment (Grewal, Monroe, & Krishnan, 1998), and thus serve as an effective contextual factor in inducing compulsive behaviors (Kukar-Kinney et al, 2016). Furthermore, deals provide an excuse and rationale for the purchase, which can be used to overcome the sense of guilt compulsive buyers often experience after their compulsive buying behavior (O’Guinn & Faber, 1989). Thus, we make the following hypotheses. H3 Deal proneness is positively related to impulsive buying. H4 Deal proneness is positively related to obsessive-compulsive buying. Finally, we argue that deal proneness mediates the relationship between consumer mindsets and compulsive buying behavior. According to the implicit theories, consumer mindsets inspire how consumption goals are pursued (Murphy & Dweck, 2016). Consumers with a fixed mindset pursue a performance goal, and they tend to use brands to feel positive about themselves and improve impression on others (Park & John, 2010). In contrast, consumers with a growth mindset hold that people can always learn and improve and thus are tuned to learning goals (Murphy & Dweck, 2016). Hence, for fixed mindset consumers, deal offers suggest lower costs for image-enhancing purchases, and provide an excuse for the compulsive buying behavior. For growth mindset consumers, deal offers can imply a learning and adventurous process .These consumers may feel that they can make better purchasing decisions by taking advantage of various deals. We thus hypothesize that: H5 Deal proneness mediates the relationship between fixed mindset and impulsive buying (H5a), between fixed mindset and obsessive-compulsive buying (H5b), between growth mindset and impulsive buying (H5c), and between growth mindset and obsessive-compulsive buying (H5d). Method A questionnaire was developed to gather responses and test the hypotheses. All of the items to measure the constructs were developed from existing scales based on previous research. Fixed and growth mindsets were measured using scales developed by Park and John (2012). Deal proneness was measured using items following Lichtenstein et al. (1997). Impulsive buying and obsessive-compulsive buying were measured using items developed by Ridgway et al. (2008). All items were rated on a 7-point Likert scale, ranging from “strongly disagree” (1) to “strongly agree” (7). The questionnaire was administered using an online survey (N=421 respondents). Of these, 57.7% were female, 71.5% had a university degree, 50% were 31-40 years old, 41% were 26-30 years old, and 46.3% had a monthly income of 5,001-10,000 RMB. Results and discussion To test the hypotheses within the research model, a Structural Equation Modeling (SEM) approach was employed, using AMOS 18.0. First, a measurement model was created to assess the validity and reliability of the scales. The distribution of the data was checked. The absolute value of the skewness and kurtosis of each items were within +/- 1, suggesting normal distribution was achieved. The measurement model produced good fit (Hair et al., 2010): χ2(109) = 281.21, χ2/df = 2.58, GFI = .93, NFI = .93, CFI = .96, and RMSEA = .06. All values representing the AVE were greater than 0.5 and greater than the squared inter-constructs correlations, indicating convergent and discriminant validity were achieved (Fornell & Larcker, 1981). Cronbach’s alpha values exceeded .70, indicating the constructs were reliable (Hair et al., 1995). The results of the checking common-method variance problem through exploratory factor analysis (EFA) test revealed 3 factors with Eigen values greater than 1. The results accounted for 64.67% of the total variance, where the first factor accounted for 27.55% of the total variance, suggesting that common-method variance did not pose a significant problem since there was no general factor in the un-rotated structure (Podsakoff et al., 2003). Next, a structural model was created. The structural model produced good fit (Hair et al., 2010): χ2(114) = 476.15, χ2/df = 4.18, GFI = .89, NFI = .89, CFI = .91, and RMSEA = .09. Table 1 displays the results of SEM. The results support H1 and H2. Both fixed and growth mindsets are positively associated with deal proneness. The results support H3 and H4, which shows that deal proneness are positively associated with impulsive and obsessive-compulsive buying. The results support H5a, which states that deal proneness mediates the relationship between fixed mindset and impulsive buying. However, the results do not support H5b, H5c and H5d. Conclusion Using the implicit theories, this research aims to gain better insight into compulsive buying behavior. Our findings, obtained from a sample of respondents in China, show that deal proneness serves as a mediator between fixed mindset and compulsive buying behaviors. According to the implicit theories, consumer mindsets inspire how consumption goals are pursued (Murphy & Dweck, 2016). For instance, consumers with a fixed mindset pursue a performance goal. They tend to use brands to feel positive about themselves and improve impression on others (Park & John, 2010). Thus, it is likely that fixed mindset consumers buy compulsively to signal and communicate their “self” to others. In particular, for fixed mindset consumers, deals may increase the perceived value of image-enhancing purchases. Thus, deals provide an excuse for the compulsive purchase where fixed mindset consumers can improve self-image and demonstrate their worth with lower costs. Given this mediating role of deal proneness between fixed mindset and compulsive buying, it will be interesting to test further how consumers with a fixed mindset respond to different types of deals in future research. For firm managers and public policy makers, our findings imply that, to lessen consumers’ overspending, firms should reduce excessive number of deals, and governments should also regulate firms’ advertisement so that it will not overly promote deals.

In order to identify the antecedents of internet purchasing intention toward fashion items, this study examines shopping-related variables as both direct antecedents of internet purchasing intention, and as indirect antecedents of internet purchasing intention through online-related variables. Impulse buying and market mavenism were considered as shopping-related variables, whilst online interaction readiness and online consumer procrastination were considered as online-related variables. It was hypothesized that impulse buying and market mavenism not only directly influence purchasing intention toward fashion items, but also indirectly influence it through online interaction readiness and online consumer procrastination. Data were gathered by surveying university students in Seoul using convenience sampling. A total of 286 questionnaires were used in the statistical analysis. SPSS was used for exploratory factor analysis, and AMOS was used for confirmatory factor analysis and path analysis. The factor analysis of market mavenism, impulse buying, and online consumer procrastination revealed one dimension, whilst the factor analysis of online interaction readiness revealed two dimensions: ‘online relationship’ and ‘internet role.’ Tests of the hypothesized path proved that impulse buying indirectly influences internet shopping intention only through online consumer procrastination, whereas market mavenism influences internet shopping intention indirectly through both online interaction readiness and online consumer procrastination. The results will be useful for Internet shopping mall marketers and for future study.

There is a general consensus in the literature that impulse buying is normatively wrong, but accounts for a substantial volume of the goods sold every year across the broad range of product categories, including fashion products. Research revealed that young consumers particularly contributed greatly to the increase of impulse buying. While lack of self-control has been found strongly associated with the unplanned nature of impulse buying, with an environment of abundance and consumerism, self-indulgence, rather than lack of self-control, may become a more important driver for impulse buying for modern consumers (Sharma, Sivakumaran, & Marshall, 2011). Therefore, the purpose of this study is to investigate how self-indulgence influences young consumers’ impulse buying and the post purchase consumer regret. This study also aims to test the role of fashion consciousness in the relationship between young consumers’ self-indulgence and impulse buying for fashion products. Self-indulgence is considered a hedonistic tendency, which includes enjoying spending money on oneself, buying things for one’s own pleasure, and trying to enjoy life (Sharma, Sivakumaran, & Marshall, 2011). It was recognized as one of the two opposing cognitive forces leading to impulse behavior (Miao, 2011). While the impulse to purchase is comprised of anticipated pleasures and immediate gratification (Rook, 1987), ironically, consumer regret is one of the major emotional consequences associated with impulse buying. There are two types of consumer regret: cognitive dissonance, resulted from an immediate post-purchase comparison of what was purchased versus the other available alternatives, and consumer guilt, related specifically to the consumption decision situations. Literature suggested that individuals show interest in fashion products with the belief that fashion products will contribute to their appearance, image, and/or bring enjoyment to their life (Workman & Kidd, 2000). In that same token, an individual with high self-indulgence tendency is more likely to show interest in fashion in hopes of identifying fashion items for indulgence purpose. Moreover, this indulgence motivated fashion consciousness will more likely lead to high impulse buying for fashion products. Based on the literature, hypotheses were developed for this study as represented in the following figure. Data was collected using a survey of college students majored in textile/fashion management at a large southeast university in the USA. A total of 190 surveys were distributed and returned. The majority of the subjects were females (73.7%), white (74.7%), and held part-time work (56.7%). Existing scales were adopted to measure self-indulgence (Sharma, Sivakumaran, & Marshall, 2011) and fashion consciousness (Bruner & Hensel, 1998). Impulse buying behavior and post-purchase regret were measured by asking subjects to retroactively recall their shopping trips for fashion products during the past three months. A group of items developed by the researchers were used to measure both the impulse buying behavior and consumer regret. A Confirmatory Factor Analysis (CFA) was first employed to assess the psychometric properties of the constructs. Overall, the fit indices of the measurement model were acceptable (NFI=0.86, IFI=0.935, RMSEA=0.066, CMIN/DF=1.7). A Structural Equation Modeling (SEM) was conducted to test the relationship proposed in the hypotheses. To test the mediating effect of fashion consciousness on the relationship between self-indulgence and impulse buying behaviors, a bootstrapping bias-corrected confidence interval procedure was conducted. Overall, the fit indices of the SEM model were acceptable (CMN/df=1.338, NFI=0.90, IFI=0.97, RMSEA=0.044). The SEM results suggested that self-indulgence had a significant influence on impulse buying for fashion products directly and indirectly via fashion consciousness. The impulse purchase behavior had a positive influence on the consumers’ feeling of guilt for the impulse purchase behavior, while no significant influence was found on cognitive dissonance. This research makes several contributions to the literature of impulse buying. First, the study suggests that consumers’ self-indulgence exerts significant direct and indirect influences on consumers’ impulse buying for fashion products. This result may provide an explanation to the phenomenon of increasing impulse buying behavior in the marketplace, even though it is widely considered as a “misbehavior”. Secondly, this study suggests a significant mediating role of fashion consciousness in the relationship between self-indulgence on consumers’ impulse buying for fashion products. The abundance of fashion products in the market and the appreciation of the social and affective function of fashion products contribute to the chain effect from self-indulgence to fashion consciousness and finally to impulse purchase for fashion products. Third, this study confirms the negative guilt feeling resulted from the impulse buying behavior.

Over the past two decades, consumer moralism, or moralism about consumption in a broad sense, has received much academic attention in answer to the growing concern for fair-trade, corporate social responsibility, environmental sustainability, and other anti-consumption initiatives and movements (McGregor, 2006; Newholm and Shaw, 2007). This theoretical trajectory not only pay attention to how everyday consumption practice is shaped by and help shape certain sorts of ethical dispositions (Clive et al., 2005), but it also extends to the understanding of the intertwined relationship between morality, consumption, and consumers’ identity narratives (Thompson, 2011). While previous research has focused on understanding moral consumption as a politically and morally motivated collective practice (Luedicke et al., 2010; Thompson, 2007), limited research has been done on revealing how personal moral identity project institutionalize and contest the socio-cultural power structure through ascribing social meanings in consumption practice to legitimatize seemingly unethical behavior in the marketplace (Brace-Govan and Binary, 2010). This research concerned the creation and negotiation of moralistic identities among a group of young consumers in Hong Kong who engaged in counterfeit consumption. We focused on how consumers strategically appropriate moralistic meanings in their everyday counterfeit consumption, in which their identity work utilized these ‘alternative’ market resources to echoed with, or even reproduce, the entrenched Chinses social relationships and marketplace ideological conditions (Giesler and Veresiu, 2014; Luedicke et al., 2010).

Cross-buying refers to the customer action of buying additional products and/or services from the same provider (Valentin 2004). With the belief that cross-buying enables firms to increase profit from existing customers, firms have steadily placed greater emphasis on cross-selling strategies for profitability. To date, numerous studies show that cross-buying behavior of customers has a positive effect on firm profitability. Business reality, however, offers a different perspective; namely, that high levels of cross-buying may not always be linked to firm profitability. For example, Best Buy (an electronics retailer in the United States) has identified approximately 20% of its customers as unprofitable in spite of them purchasing multiple items (McWilliams 2004). Shah, Kumar, Qu, and Chen (2012) found that customers who persistently exhibit certain types of behavior (e.g., excessive service requests, high levels of returning products, lower levels of revenue growth, promotion maximizers) are unprofitable even though they purchased more than one product category.The aforementioned research implies that cross-buying can exert a negative impact on profitability, thereby calling for further examination of cross-buying behavior. It is conceivable that a repeated purchase propensity (contrasted with a cross-buying propensity) concentrated on a single brand is more profitable. Therefore, our primary objective in this paper is to identify a more beneficial type of customer among those who tend to patronize a limited number of brands versus those who tend to patronize a variety of brands, using a one-dimensional model (brand dispersion index). In addition, the second goal of this research is to investigate the boundary conditions where cross-buying will not lead to an increase in sales (unprofitable cross-buying conditions). As two moderating factors that weaken a customer’s crossbuying propensity and a firm’s sales (frequency and transaction size of firms), we consider (1) promotion dependency and (2) spending limiter condition. We use transaction data that include partners in various industries such as gasoline stations, convenience stores, banks, restaurants, and online shopping malls, covering forty-seven categories. Because multiple partners in many categories are available, this allows us to study whether a customer’s cross-buying level in the current period (t) affects the customer’s purchase frequency and transaction size in the subsequent period (t+1). The observation period for the data set extends over three years. Findings from this study indicate that a high level of cross-buying at period t has a positive impact on increasing customer frequencies and transaction sizes in the subsequent (t+1) period. This means that cross-buying has the potential to increase the firm’s profitability. Customers who show a high level of cross-buying propensity tend to exhibit higher levels of loyalty than customers who concentrated on limited brands. Firms should find ways to induce customers with low cross-buying propensity to increase crossbuying. Regarding moderating effects, promotion dependency and spending growth (decline vs. stagnation), spending growth has a considerable moderating effect on the relationship between cross-buying propensity and a customer’s transaction size. Specifically, the effect of cross-buying on transaction size weakens when spending is shrinking. This result makes an important contribution to cross-buying research. If customers showing a high level of cross-buying do not increase their spending level, they may be merely switching to other brands in the program under a fixed budget. So while the rate of crossbuying seems to increase, profit might not increase. The findings from this study imply that it is crucial to target and motivate customers who tend to use various brands and contribute to sales to do more cross-buying instead of suggesting cross-buying to random customers. The promotion dependency, however, turns out to not have significant moderating effects on the relationship between the customer’s propensity to cross-buying and the customer’s purchase frequency and transaction size. For marketing purposes, it is important to consider which customers are more profitable among those who tend to do cross-buying among multi-brands versus those who tend to purchase repeatedly in a limited number of brands. This research provides a solution with a one-dimensional index, the brand dispersion index. Whether cross-buying is shown to be a positive or negative impact on sales, the results are meaningful in implementing customer relationship management. Regardless of the direction in the level of crossbuying, both directions provide a solution to allocate marketing resources. For instance, if the propensity for cross-buying increases sales, the firm should implement marketing strategies to encourage people to use a variety of brands by adding new brands. If repeat purchases increase sales, the company should concentrate on certain brands that customers use most frequently. In addition, by finding the conditions that do not increase sales (e.g., spending limiter condition), it makes marketing practitioners think that cross-buying does not always bring positive results. Overall, the findings from this study are that it is crucial to motivate and target customers who tend to use various brands and contribute to sales to do crossbuying activity, instead of promoting cross-buying to random customers. Conceptual Framework Figure 1 provides an overview of our framework for the relationship between brand dispersion and visiting frequency and transaction size of customers. Specifically, we hypothesize how customer frequencies and transaction sizes in time t+1 will be influenced by customer brand dispersion levels (the extent that customer transactions occur across a broad range of brands) in time t. In addition, we examine the moderating influence of two customer specific variables: (1) degree of promotion dependency and (2) spending limits.