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Brands invest tremendous resources into building engagement with their customers on social media. But considerably less focus is placed on addressing disengagement, when users actively choose to distance themselves from the brand through reduced posting or even unfollowing. The authors find that the same self–brand connections that lead individuals to defensively protect the brand can also lead them to experience shame vicariously when others mention the brand in socially unacceptable ways. Experiencing vicarious shame motivates them to distance themselves from the brand, driving disengagement. Three mixed-method studies show that a socially unacceptable behavior—using profanity while mentioning the brand—leads highly connected consumers to experience vicarious shame, prompting disengagement motivations and ultimately leading to real-world unfollowing behaviors on social media. The authors also show that proactive moderation behaviors by the brand can attenuate these responses. These results provide insight into the process by which self–brand connection interacts with socially unacceptable brand mentions and suggest a limitation to the insulating effects of strong self–brand connections. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Do different loan application formats affect consumer loan requests? Six studies show that when consumers are asked to provide a preferred monthly payment (MP) (vs. loan amount [LA]), they request different principal amounts. This is because these loan application formats differ in the scale-compatible information they bring to consumers' mind. When LAs are elicited, consumers think of and request the cost of the expenditure they seek to finance. When MPs are elicited, however, consumers think of their monthly budget slack to construct and then request MPs they perceive to be affordable. For lower cost loans with a given term and interest rate, the MP (vs. LA) format results in larger principal requests. This effect reverses for higher cost acquisitions because individuals' budget slack caps out around $500 per month. These studies provide insight into how consumer loan application formats can affect consumer borrowing, as well as the psychological underpinnings responsible for the effect. Theoretical, managerial, and consumer welfare implications of the findings are discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Various explanations have been proposed to account for discrepancies in product valuation, pertaining particularly to the buyer-seller valuation gap called the endowment effect. Previous research has examined the roles of loss sensitivity, strategic responding, differences between buyers and sellers in information processing, self-enhancement, and psychological ownership as causes of the endowment effect. This article presents a conceptual perspective based on the theory of the extended self that integrates previously proposed mechanisms for the endowment effect. The self-extension perspective generates novel predictions about possible moderators of the endowment effect. Further, the self-extension perspective also raises questions for product valuation in general. By integrating previous research and posing new questions, the self-extension perspective provides a new base for the advancement of research on product valuation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]