• DOI:10.1509/jmkr.48.5.855
• Corpus ID: 145290946

Warm Glow or Cold, Hard Cash? Social Identity Effects on Consumer Choice for Donation versus Discount Promotions

@article{Winterich2011WarmGO,
  title={Warm Glow or Cold, Hard Cash? Social Identity Effects on Consumer Choice for Donation versus Discount Promotions},
  author={Karen Page Winterich and Michael J. Barone},
  journal={Journal of Marketing Research},
  year={2011},
  volume={48},
  pages={855 - 868}
}

• Karen Page Winterich, M. Barone
• Published 1 October 2011
• Business
• Journal of Marketing Research

Across five studies, the authors investigate how social identification influences consumer preference for discount-based promotions (i.e., cents-off deals) versus donation-based promotions (in which purchase results in a donation to a charitable cause). In doing so, they demonstrate the interplay between self-construal and a specific social identity (i.e., that associated with the particular charity featured in a donation-based promotion) on consumers' preferences for these two types of promotions. The results show that, in general, consumers possessing interdependent self-construals prefer donations to a greater extent than those with independent self-construals. However, the findings further indicate that these effects of self-construal are attenuated if (1) the donation-based promotion does not involve a charity that is identity congruent or (2) a cause-congruent identity is more salient than self-construal at the time of decision making. The authors also identify boundary conditions of charity efficiency and product type for these self-construal effects. In addition to demonstrating how multiple identities interact to influence consumer promotion preferences, the authors discuss important managerial implications regarding the use of discount versus donation-based promotions.