its not me, its you: how gift giving creates giver identity threat as a

Journal of Consumer Research Inc.

It’s Not Me, It’s You: How Gift Giving Creates Giver Identity Threat as a Function of SocialClosenessAuthor(s): Morgan K. Ward and Susan M. BroniarczykSource: The Journal of Consumer Research, Vol. 38, No. 1 (June 2011), pp. 164-181Published by: The University of Chicago PressStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/10.1086/658166 .Accessed: 21/06/2011 16:17

Your use of the JSTOR archive indicates your acceptance of JSTOR's Terms and Conditions of Use, available at .http://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsp. JSTOR's Terms and Conditions of Use provides, in part, that unlessyou have obtained prior permission, you may not download an entire issue of a journal or multiple copies of articles, and youmay use content in the JSTOR archive only for your personal, non-commercial use.

Please contact the publisher regarding any further use of this work. Publisher contact information may be obtained at .http://www.jstor.org/action/showPublisher?publisherCode=ucpress. .

Each copy of any part of a JSTOR transmission must contain the same copyright notice that appears on the screen or printedpage of such transmission.

JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, and build upon a wide range ofcontent in a trusted digital archive. We use information technology and tools to increase productivity and facilitate new formsof scholarship. For more information about JSTOR, please contact [email protected].

The University of Chicago Press and Journal of Consumer Research Inc. are collaborating with JSTOR todigitize, preserve and extend access to The Journal of Consumer Research.

http://www.jstor.org

http://www.jstor.org/action/showPublisher?publisherCode=ucpress

http://www.jstor.org/stable/10.1086/658166?origin=JSTOR-pdf

http://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsp

http://www.jstor.org/action/showPublisher?publisherCode=ucpress

164

� 2011 by JOURNAL OF CONSUMER RESEARCH, INC. ● Vol. 38 ● June 2011All rights reserved. 0093-5301/2011/3801-0009$10.00. DOI: 10.1086/658166

It’s Not Me, It’s You: How Gift GivingCreates Giver Identity Threat as a Functionof Social Closeness

MORGAN K. WARDSUSAN M. BRONIARCZYK

Prior research has established that consumers are motivated to purchase identity-consistent products. We extend consumer identity research into an important con-sumer context, gift giving, in which individuals may make product choices that runcounter to their own identities in order to fulfill the desires of the intended recipient.We find that purchasing an identity-contrary gift for a close (vs. distant) friend whois an integral part of the self can itself cause an identity threat to the giver. Fourexperiments in a gift registry context show that after making an identity-contrarygift choice for a close (vs. distant) friend, givers subsequently engage in behaviorsthat reestablish their identity such as indicating greater identity affiliation with thethreatened identity and greater likelihood to purchase identity-expressive products.This research highlights the opposing forces that product purchase may exert onconsumer identity as both a potential threat and means of self-verification.

The issue of identity threat has not been a major focusof the consumer behavior literature. Extant constructs

describe a consistent, monolithic self that influences anddefines consumers’ choices (Birdwell 1968; Levy 1959).More recently, identity threat research has shown that whenan individual feels constrained from accurate self-expression

Morgan K. Ward is assistant professor of marketing at the Cox Schoolof Business, Southern Methodist University, 6212 Bishop Blvd. Dallas,Texas 75275 ([email protected]). Susan M. Broniarczyk is the SamBarshop Centennial Professor of Marketing at the McCombs School ofBusiness at the University of Texas at Austin, 1 University Station, Austin,TX, 78712 ([email protected]). Correspondence:Morgan Ward. The authors acknowledge the helpful input of the editor,associate editor, and reviewers. This article is based on a portion of thefirst author’s dissertation and has benefited greatly from the guidance andsupport of the committee, Darren Dahl, Julie Irwin, Bill Swann, and YingZhang. Additional thanks to fellow PhD students Sunaina Chugani, Szu-Chi Huang, and Jae-Eun Namkoong as well as Jonah Glover and KellyHan for their experimental assistance. Finally, the authors would like toacknowledge the Eugene and Dora Bonham Memorial Fund, which gen-erously supported this research.

Baba Shiv served as editor and Patti Williams served as associate editorfor this article.

Electronically published January 31, 2011

or challenged by discrepant feedback, s/he compensates byintensifying his efforts to choose highly symbolic items inorder to reassert his/her precarious self-concept (Gao,Wheeler, and Shiv 2009). However, inverse effects have notbeen explored in depth. Specifically, can purchases that donot verify one’s personal identity actually threaten the self-concept, and what are the resultant outcomes?

In this research we consider an occasion that may ne-cessitate that an individual make a choice or perform a taskthat is contrary to his/her identity: gift giving. When choos-ing a gift, a giver is sometimes faced with making a purchasethat opposes his/her own identity in order to fulfill the needsand desires of the intended recipient. We examine how sucha choice can influence the giver’s own identity certainty andthe subsequent behaviors that verify the giver’s sense ofself.

We contribute to the identity threat literature in severalways. To our knowledge, this is the first research that iden-tifies a common consumer self-induced identity threat re-sulting from an individual putting a gift recipient’s productdesires and preferences in front of his/her own. Second, weidentify the important moderating role of social closenessin an identity threat resulting from a gift purchase. Specif-ically, we show that choosing an identity-contrary gift foran individual who is an integral part of self poses more of

IT’S NOT ME, IT’S YOU 165

an identity threat than purchasing the same product for arecipient who does not play a large role in the self. In re-sponse to this identity threat, we propose that the gift giverwill be more inclined to reassert his/her identity and choosean identity-expressive (vs. -nonexpressive) product for him/herself in a subsequent choice.

We consider the gift registry context for our inquiry asit presents a circumstance in which the purchaser (i.e., thegift giver) may choose an item that is not reflective of his/her identity in order to honor the recipient’s explicit pref-erences. The results of a pilot study and four lab experimentssupport our theses and shed insight on how consumer pur-chases for others may affect givers’ identities and subse-quent purchases for themselves.

THEORETICAL BACKGROUND

Identity Threat

While people try to avoid acting in ways that oppose theirself-views, there are occasions in life when a person’s ac-tions necessarily contradict these views. To examine howactual gift givers manage such a situation, we conducted aqualitative investigation of these processes and their mean-ings among gift givers of both genders between the ages of19 and 65 via Amazon Mechanical Turk (MTurk, http://www.mturk.com/) for small compensation. Thirty partici-pants answered a short questionnaire asking them about theirrecollection of a gifting situation in which they had feltcompelled to choose a gift that was at odds with their ownidentity. Ninety percent (27 out of 30) of the participantscould describe an instance in which they had made such agift choice. Below is a selection of their responses describingtheir feelings and reactions to this type of gift choice:

[Participant 1, aged 54, female] My daughter-in-law is nowa devout Christian. I have sent her presents with religiousleanings even though I’m an atheist. I don’t feel good aboutbuying these gifts but I’m not going to have to look at orread the religious book. It’s in her house.

[Participant 3, aged 24, male] I bought a girlfriend a RedSox Cap when I’m an Oakland A’s fan (and actively dislikethe Red Sox). I felt a little weird buying a Red Sox hat butit was nice to get something for my girlfriend.

[Participant 4, aged 24, female] I always am in this situationwhen I go shopping for my best friend. She is a fur freakand I don’t see the point of buying real fur for any reason.

[Participant 5, aged 55, female] I bought a friend a gift cer-tificate to a steak house and I am a vegetarian. I didn’t feelgood about it but I knew she would enjoy it.

As these examples illustrate, givers experience discomfortwhen choosing a gift that is at odds with their own identitybut are motivated to do so to please their friends. Further,when one’s self-views are momentarily shaken, his/her me-tacognitions signal that something is wrong (Gao et al.

2009), resulting in an identity threat. Since individuals desireto maintain a stable sense of self, they will subsequently bestrongly motivated to restore their shaken self-views (Gaoet al. 2009).

We add to this literature by showing how choosing anidentity-threatening product inversely affects identity. Inparticular, we extend the identity-threat research into a con-sumer context and focus on a situation in which individualsmay make product choices that run counter to their ownidentities, thereby creating an identity threat: the gift-givingcontext.

Gift Purchases: Self versus Other

Consumer spending on gifts for family and friends ac-counts for approximately 10% of the total retail market inthe United States, amounting to $300 billion spent annually(Unity Marketing Gifting Report 2007). Besides its obviouseconomic significance, gift giving is instrumental in main-taining social ties and serves as a means of symbolic com-munication in relationships (Belk 1979; Caplow 1982). Ac-cording to Schwartz (1967), gifts develop and maintainidentity. Gifts become “containers for the being of the donorwho gives a portion of that being to the recipient” (Sherry1983). Since the gift imposes an identity on both the giverand the receiver, the acceptance of a gift is acknowledg-ment by both people that the identity imposed is accepted(Schwartz 1967). Indeed, the giver’s self-identity may beconfirmed by presenting it to others in the objectified formof a gift (Belk 1979).

The choice of the right gift is more complex than choosingsomething for oneself because of the tension inherent inselecting a product that is appropriate for the recipient whilestill reflective of the giver’s own identity and the relationshipbetween the individuals. However, the literature has shownthat a giver’s identity often exerts a dominant force, whetherexplicitly or implicitly, in their gift purchases. Aron et al.(1991) found that when making the choice of an item fora close other, individuals often mix elaborate knowledge ofthe other with information about the self, thus conflating therecipient’s preferences with the givers’ own tastes. Thesemispredictions often lead givers to choose gifts that are notliked or well received by the recipient (Gino and Flynn 2010;Teigen, Olsen, and Solas 2005).

Gift recipients are increasingly turning to gift registriesto explicitly declare their product preferences: annually, inthe United States, a staggering $19 billion of gifts are reg-istered for and more than $5 billion are purchased (Mintel2008). Compiled by the recipient, gift registries formallycatalog an assortment of products that s/he desires for anupcoming event or holiday (e.g., wedding, baby shower, orbirthday), which are available for purchase at a specificretailer. This mechanism increases the likelihood that therecipient will receive what s/he desires.

Registries provide perfect information about a recipient’spreferences and expectations for an occasion. Ideally, a giverchoosing from a gift registry could make a choice that ismutually satisfactory to him/her and to the gift recipient.

166 JOURNAL OF CONSUMER RESEARCH

However, for a myriad of reasons (e.g., purchasing after thepreferred gifts already have been chosen by other givers,having different tastes than the recipient, being constrainedto less preferred gifts due to price point), the giver is oftenobliged to purchase something contrary to his/her own iden-tity when choosing from a prescribed list of gifts. Given theimportant role that gifts play in expressing the giver’s self-concept to the recipient, we contend that the purchase of anidentity-contrary gift may threaten the giver’s identity andthat this will be especially true when the giver and recipienthave a close relationship.

Indeed, research suggests that close relationships are es-pecially likely to influence one’s notions of self and resultingbehavior. Maslow (1967, 103) took it for granted that “be-loved people can be incorporated into the self.” The relatednotion of “possessing” the other (you are mine; I am yours)has been part of classical discussions of love (Berl 1924;Freud 1921/1951) for more than a century. The principle isthat in a close relationship, individuals act as if some or allaspects of the close other are partially the person’s own.Aron and Aron (1986) emphasized that in close relationshipsthe individual may perceive the self as including resources,perspectives, and characteristics of the other. For instance,individuals who include a close relationship partner in theself are less likely to differentiate between the self and theother in allocating resources, tend to vicariously share theother’s characteristics, and tend to think about the other asmuch as they think about the self (Aron et al. 1991).

Moreover, individuals in close relationships may perceivethemselves to be more similar than they actually are (Ger-shoff and Johar 2006; Lerouge and Warlop 2006). They arealso motivated to agree with liked others and conversely areuncomfortable in situations in which they feel at odds witha close other (Zajonc 1968). When an individual is facedwith differences between him/herself and a close friend, thedissimilarity is often a stronger threat to the individual’sidentity than holding opposite attitudes within oneself(Priester and Petty 2001). People feel strong conflict anddiscomfort to the degree to which they perceive their atti-tudes to be in disagreement with those of important others,and they actively seek to rectify these situations once iden-tified (Priester and Petty 2001) and to reassert their chal-lenged self-views (Cast and Burke 2002).

In sum, relationships define and influence individuals’behavior. While people are naturally inclined to be attunedto the needs and desires of those around them, they areespecially sensitive to those with whom they have closerelationships, as these relationships are integrated into theself and are particularly important in defining one’s self-concept. Further, individuals are motivated to present them-selves accurately to close others and feel threatened whenthey engage in incongruous behaviors, such as presenting agift that is not self-reflective.

HYPOTHESESOur main thesis centers on the idea that the social closenessbetween the giver and recipient influences the extent to

which the giver feels the need to self-verify after choosingan identity-contrary gift. We posit that choosing such a giftfor a close friend is more of an identity threat than pur-chasing the same item for a recipient who does not play alarge role in the self. This is because the giver is self-im-posing an identity threat resulting from presenting a falseself (in the form of a gift) both to the recipient whom s/heperceives as integral to his/her self-concept and him/herself.In response to the threat, we predict that the giver willsubsequently want to verify his/her identity with an identity-expressive behavior or choice. Conversely, when the giverpurchases an identity-contrary gift for a distant friend, wedo not predict an identity threat nor a difference in thegiver’s propensity to purchase an identity-expressive prod-uct in a subsequent choice, as the recipient is not self-rel-evant to the giver. Our formal hypotheses are:

H1: Purchasing an identity-contrary (vs. -verifying)gift for a close (vs. distant) friend will lead togreater identity threat.

H2a: Purchasing an identity-contrary (vs. -verifying)gift for a close (vs. distant) friend will lead togreater identity verification behavior, includingproduct choices.

H2b: Identity threat will mediate the relationship be-tween purchasing an identity-contrary (vs. -ver-ifying) gift for a close (vs. distant) friend andgreater identity verification behavior.

Below, we outline five studies that support this perspec-tive. A pilot study and study 1 support hypothesis 1 thatgivers are more likely to experience an identity threat afterchoosing from a close (vs. distant) friend’s gift registry. Instudies 2 and 3, the data reveal that choosing an identity-contrary gift for a close (vs. distant) friend necessitates thatthe individual subsequently self-verify in order to restorehis/her identity (hypothesis 2a). Further, in study 3, we showthat subsequent choice of the self-verifying products is me-diated by the giver’s feelings of threat (hypothesis 2b). Fi-nally, in study 4 we extend our examination to a differentidentity and find that the self-verification effects still holdwhen the products are less symbolic.

PILOT STUDY

We conducted a pilot study on MTurk asking 56 partici-pants to describe either an identity-contrary or identity-verifying gift registry purchase and then assessed the socialcloseness of the gift recipient. Specifically, 28 (28) par-ticipants in the identity-contrary (identity-verifying) con-dition were asked to recall an instance in which buying agift from a friend’s gift registry was a difficult (vs. easy)task because the recipient’s tastes and preferences weremisaligned (vs. aligned) with the giver’s own. After de-scribing the gift they chose and their feelings about the


choice, participants rated the social closeness of the giftrecipient on a (1 p distant friend, 7 p close friend) scale.

Consistent with our expectations, participants who wereasked to describe choosing an identity-contrary (vs. identity-verifying) gift indicated that the recipient was a closer friend(MID Contrary p 5.57 vs. MID Verifying p 4.50; F(1, 55) p 7.80,p ! .0073). These results lend initial support to the idea thatchoosing a gift for a close (vs. distant) friend is a highlyself-relevant decision and, as such, is more likely to pose athreat to the giver’s own identity. In the following fourstudies, we will further investigate this finding in a lab-oratory setting.

STUDY 1

In the first study, we provide evidence that givers do feel athreat to their identity when they choose an identity-contrarygift. The stereotype threat literature has established that in-dividuals unconsciously put greater physical distance be-tween themselves and persons who threaten their in-group(Goff, Steele, and Davies 2008). Study 1 tests whether giversrespond similarly to a gift that threatens their identity. Spe-cifically, we examine whether choosing an identity-contrarygift for a close (vs. distant) friend will cause the giver tofeel threatened and subsequently physically distance him/herself from the offending item.

Design and Procedure

In a 2 (product identity congruence: contrary vs. veri-fying) # 2 (social closeness of recipient: close vs. distant)experimental design, 50 participants from the University ofTexas chose a gift for a friend from a gift registry. Wemanipulated the social closeness of the giver to the recipientby instructing participants to “Imagine your close (vs. dis-tant) friend is about to have a birthday.” Participants thenwere provided certain information about the recipient, in-cluding his/her hobbies, personal tastes and school alle-giance in order to mimic a real gifting situation in whichthe giver would know some information about the personfor whom s/he was buying the gift. Social identity theory(Tajfel and Turner 1986) contends that individuals who aremembers of a group incorporate that group into their un-derstanding of who they are. In identity-verifying scenarios,participants were told explicitly that the recipient attendsthe participant’s school and is actively involved with anddisplays items from the school around his/her room. Con-versely, in identity-contrary scenarios, the friend attends anearby rival school, Texas A&M University, but behavesidentically. After reading about the recipient, participantsare asked to record a friend’s initials who fits the descriptionof the recipient to increase the realism of the choice.

Participants were then faced with making the choice ofone mug from a set of five mugs for the recipient. In all ofthe conditions, participants were told the recipient had cre-ated a gift registry; next they were presented with five mugs,one of which was the registry mug, which was designatedwith a yellow star placed explicitly on the front. Thus, in

identity-contrary conditions the mug from the rival schoolfeaturing the A&M maroon logo was starred; in the identity-verifying conditions the mug from the giver’s own schoolfeaturing the Texas Longhorn burnt orange logo, was starred(see app. A).

After selecting a gift from a registry, participants weretold to pick up the mug that they chose and bring it to adifferent table where they would be asked to answer thesecond part of the study. In order to preserve the salienceof the social closeness between the giver and their intendedrecipient as they transitioned from the first to the secondpart of the study, participants were told that they would bewriting a note to accompany the gift and should think aboutwhat to say in the note to their intended recipient.

Dependent Measure

When participants arrived at the second table with themug, they placed the mug down next to them as they an-swered additional questions. After they left the room, wecaptured participants’ feelings of threat by measuring thephysical distance each person placed the mug from him/herself. We took this measurement by recording the lineardistance (in inches) from where the participant sat to wheres/he placed the mug. After the dependent measure was com-pleted, participants answered two manipulation check ques-tions pertaining to their liking for the gift selected (not atall/very much) and their perceived social closeness to therecipient (very distant/very close) on 7-point Likert scales.

Pretest

A pretest confirmed that participants from the same poolof University of Texas students perceived the rival school,Texas A&M, as a threat. Twenty-two participants were askedto rate several universities on 1–7 Likert scales on thestrength of rivalry between their own university and thetarget university (1 p no rivalry, 7 p fierce rivalry). Bycomparing participants’ ratings of the rival school, TexasA&M, to the midpoint of the scale, we see that participantsperceive the identity-contrary school as a rival to their ownschool (MScale p 4.0 vs. MID Contrary p 6.9; t(21) p 26.4, p! .0001).

Results

Manipulation checks confirmed that those in the close (vs.distant) friend condition indicated having a closer relationshipwith the recipient than those in the distant relationship (MClose

p 6.28 vs. MDistant p 5.04; F(1, 49) p 17.64, p ! .0001)and that the school attended by the recipient had no effecton givers’ reported closeness to the recipient (MID Verifying p5.80 vs. MID Contrary p 5.70; F(1, 49) p .12, p ! .74). Wealso confirmed that participants preferred the identity-veri-fying to the identity-contrary mug (MID Verifying p 5.75 vs.MID Contrary p 4.10; F(1, 49) p 21.37, p ! .0001).

Next we examined how choosing an identity-contrary (vs.-verifying) gift for a close (vs. distant) friend affected givers’


FIGURE 1

INTERACTION OF SOCIAL CLOSENESS AND IDENTITY CONGRUENCE ON GIFT DISTANCE FROM PARTICIPANT (STUDY 1)

spatial distance from the gift. We observed a significant maineffect of threat on the distance participants placed the mugsfrom themselves (MID Contrary p 16.14 vs. MID Verifying p 14.17;F(1, 49) p 10.12, p ! .0026) but no main effect of socialcloseness (MClose p 15.41 vs. MDistant p 14.92; F(1, 49) p.57, p ! .45). Supporting hypothesis 1, we observed a sig-nificant product identity congruence # social closeness in-teraction (F(1, 49) p 10.04, p ! .0027), indicating that aftergivers chose the identity-contrary (vs. -verifying) gift for aclose (vs. distant) friend, they felt threatened and consequentlywere more likely to place the item farther from themselves.The simple effects indicate that when participants were choos-ing for a close friend, they were more likely to place greaterdistance between themselves and the gift after choosing anidentity-contrary (vs. -verifying) gift (MID Contrary p 17.00inches vs. MID Verifying p 13.75 inches; F(1, 49) p 8.22, p !

.0062). Conversely, when participants were choosing for adistant friend, after choosing an identity-contrary (vs. -veri-fying) product, there was not a significant difference in thedistance they placed the item from themselves (MID Contrary p14.83 inches vs. MID Verifying p 15.00 inches; F(1, 49) p 2.18,p ! .12; see fig. 1).

Discussion

In this experiment, we gauged participants’ felt threat bymeasuring their physical responses to the gifts they chosefrom the registry. Confirming hypothesis 1, we found thatindividuals who chose an identity-contrary gift for a close(vs. distant) friend felt threatened and responded by placingthe chosen gift farther from themselves. These findings il-lustrate that one way individuals may offset feelings of threatis to distance themselves physically from the source ofthreat. In our next study, we observe how gift givers offset

their feelings of threat by increasing their affiliation withthe threatened identity.

STUDY 2

According to self-verification theory (Swann 1983), peopleare motivated to restore their threatened identities in theirsubsequent decisions. In the study described below, wetested whether choosing an identity-contrary gift influencedgift givers’ desire to assert the relevant identity at their nextopportunity. In this study design, we test hypothesis 2a, thatafter choosing an identity-contrary (vs. identity-verifying oridentity-incongruent neutral) gift for a close (vs. distant)friend, participants will self-verify and reestablish their iden-tity. To isolate that our effect is due to the identity threatmechanism and not merely to buying a non-identity-reflec-tive gift, in study 2, we included two kinds of identity-incongruent gifts: one gift that threatened the giver’s identityand another that was identity incongruent and neutral. Wecompared participants’ scale measures before and after theexperimental conditions to see how choosing an identity-contrary (vs. -neutral or -verifying) gift affected partici-pants’ subsequent desire to express the relevant identityon a scale measure.


Two hundred and twenty-six undergraduate students par-ticipated in a 3 (product identity congruence: contrary vs.verifying vs. neutral) # 2 (social closeness of recipient:close vs. distant) # 2 (identity measure time: pre-gift vs.post-gift) study. Participants acted as gift givers and chosea gift for a recipient from a gift registry using the sameprocedure and social closeness manipulation as described in


study 1. Participants were provided information about therecipient including his/her school allegiance and were askedto record the initials of a close (vs. distant) friend who fitthe description of the recipient described in the scenario. Inthe identity-verifying condition, participants were told thatthe recipient attends the participant’s school, University ofTexas. In the identity-threatening condition, the friend at-tends the nearby rival school, Texas A&M, whereas in theidentity-incongruent neutral condition, participants weretold that the recipient attends a local community college.

Pretest

A pretest confirmed that participants from the same poolof students perceived the nearby rival school, Texas A&M,as personally threatening and the community college as iden-tity-incongruent and neutral. Fifty-two participants wereasked to rate both schools on 1–7 Likert scales on howfamiliar they were with each school (not familiar/very fa-miliar), the personal rivalry they felt with the target school(no personal rivalry/fierce personal rivalry), and agreementwith statements about how purchasing a gift with the targetschool’s logos and colors emblazoned on it from a gift reg-istry would make them uneasy, threaten their identity, andmake them not want to buy the item (1 p strongly disagree,7 p strongly agree about their feelings regarding this giftchoice). Participants reported being equally familiar withboth identity-incongruent schools (MID Contrary p 4.0 vs.MID Neutral p 3.80; t(38) p �.18, p ! .87) but indicatedthat they felt more of a personal rivalry with the identity-contrary school, Texas A&M (M p 4.9) than the nearbyidentity-incongruent neutral, community college (M p1.1; t(52) p 13.71, p ! .0001). Further, participants in-dicated that they would feel more uneasy (MID Contrary p3.8 vs. MID Neutral p 2.5; t(52) p 4.89, p !.0001), theiridentity would be more threatened (MID Contrary p 3.6 vs.MID Neutral p 2.1; t(52) p 4.9, p ! .0001), and they wouldexperience stronger feelings of not wanting to buy theitem (MID Contrary p 4.1 vs. MID Neutral p 2.51; t(52) p5.02, p ! .0001) when they were considering choosingsomething from the identity-contrary, rival school versusthe identity-incongruent neutral, community college, re-spectively.

Dependent Measure

The identity time measure was a within-subject measureof participants’ affiliation with their school identity beforeand after their gift choice. Prior to participating in the study,participants filled out an initial identity measure online tocapture how strongly aligned they felt with their schoolidentity (i.e., a pre-gift identity measure). Participants ratedtheir school identity on a three-measure scale adopted fromthe work of Bolton and Reed (2004), which includes threestatements pertaining to their feelings of affiliation with theiruniversity: “I would describe myself as a school affili-ated identity,” “I would feel a loss if I were forced togive up being a school affiliated identity,” and “Being

a school affiliated identity is an important part of whoI am,” on a 1 (strongly disagree) to 7 (strongly agree) scale(see app. B).

When participants arrived at the lab, they read a hypo-thetical gift scenario that included a description of the re-cipient. Participants subsequently chose one mug from a setof five mugs for their friend. Similar to the experimentaldesign in prior studies, in all of the conditions participantswere told that the recipient had created a gift registry andthat the mug s/he had chosen for his/her registry was de-lineated with a prominent yellow star. In the identity-veri-fying conditions the mug from the participant’s school wasstarred. Conversely, in the identity-contrary conditions themug from the rival school was starred; in the identity-in-congruent neutral conditions, the mug from a local com-munity college was starred.

After choosing the gift, participants were presented withan ostensibly unrelated task of filling out a second set ofidentity measures (i.e., post-gift identity measure). In orderto prevent participants from simply indicating identities con-sistent to those they made prior to the experiment, we useda pictorial 5-point scale measure of school identity (Aron,Aron, and Smollan 1992; see app. B). Scores on such scalesare associated with verbal measures of identification with agroup and the perceived similarity of an individual’s atti-tudes to those of a particular group. Last, participants an-swered the same manipulation check questions on 7-pointLikert scales pertaining to liking for the gift selected andperceived social closeness to the recipient.

Results

Confirming our manipulations, we found that those inthe close friend condition indicated having a closer re-lationship with the recipient than those in the distantfriend condition (MClose p 6.4 vs. MDistant p 4.9; F(1,225) p 101.08, p ! .0001) and that the school that therecipient attended had no effect on givers’ reported close-ness to recipients (MID Contrary p 5.6 vs. MID Verifying p 5.6vs. MID Neutral p 5.7; F(2, 224) p .09, p ! .91). We alsoconfirmed that participants liked the identity-verifying mugmore than the identity-incongruent mugs (MID Verifying p 5.17vs. MID Contrary p 3.5 and MID Neutral p 3.6; F(1, 225) p 49.44,p ! .0001). Further, we confirmed that the school identitywas strongly held, with most participants (81%) indicatingtheir affiliation with their school identity at or above themidpoint of the scale.

In this study, we consider how participants’ pre-measuresof identity interact with gift-identity congruence and socialcloseness to predict their post-experimental measure of iden-tity. Our expectation is that participants’ pre-gift identity ispredictive of their post-gift identity measures except in theexperimental condition of purchasing an identity-contrarygift for a close friend. As the school identity is a stronglyheld identity, we expect the majority of participants to feelthreatened by the identity-contrary gift scenario (Spears,Doosje, and Ellemers 1999) when choosing for a close friend


and consequently to exhibit greater identity verification onthe post-experimental identity measure.

The means are presented in figure 2. We tested the fullmodel of main effects and interactions (social closeness #identity threat # pre-identity measure) in predicting partic-ipants’ post-gift identity (see table 1, part A). We observedsignificant main effects for product identity congruence, so-cial closeness, and pre-identity measure (p’s ! .05). Cor-roborating study 1 and hypothesis 2a, we observed a sig-nificant product identity # social closeness interaction (F(1,226) p 8.35, p ! .01). In further hypothesis support, wefound a significant three-way interaction of social closeness# identity threat # pre-gift identity measure on partici-pants’ post-gift identity measures (F(1, 226) p 5.60, p !

.019). In order to understand how the slopes in the pre-versus post-identity measures relate to one another in eachcondition, we examined the simple effects of the interaction.As expected, we find that the pre-gift identity measure ispredictive of the post-gift identity measure in all conditions(p’s ! .05) except for the close-friend, identity-contraryproduct condition (F(1, 226) p .07, p ! .79; see table 1,part B). Finally, to confirm that the identity-contrary choice,close-friend condition exhibited greater identity verificationthan all of the other post-gift choice conditions, we createdcontrast codes that allowed us to pit this condition againstthe others in the full model. The results confirmed that post-gift identity verification in the identity-contrary choice,close-friend condition was significantly greater than theother conditions (MID Contrary, Close p 3.57 vs. MOther conditions p2.55; F(1, 226) p 8.3, p ! .004).

Discussion

The results of study 2 indicate that after choosing anidentity-contrary gift for a close (but not for a distant) friend,givers felt compelled to verify themselves by heighteningtheir endorsement of the relevant threatened identity (e.g.,school identity). Our data also clearly show that self-veri-fying behaviors only occur after the individuals made threat-ening choices (but not after making incongruent neutralchoices). This finding rules out the alternative explanationthat individuals will display verifying behaviors after anyidentity-incongruent choice because such a choice will maketheir own identity more accessible or salient. These resultssupport our contention that choosing an identity-contrarygift can create an identity threat resulting in givers’ sub-sequent need to self-verify. Next, we examine how the sameexperimental conditions affect consumers’ desire to self-verify with their product choices and confirm that thesechoices are mediated by givers’ felt threat.

STUDY 3

In a follow-up study using a procedure almost identical tothat in study 2, we examine how consumers select identity-related products after making identity-contrary (vs. -veri-fying) gift choices. Our predictions are that after choosingan identity-contrary (vs. -verifying) gift for a close (vs. dis-

tant) friend, givers will self-verify (hypothesis 2a) by in-creasing their likelihood of choosing identity-expressiveproducts and that this product choice will be mediated bythe givers’ experienced identity threat (hypothesis 2b).


Fifty-eight undergraduate students participated one at atime in study 3 as part of a data collection session thatincluded a series of unrelated studies. In a 2 (product identitycongruence: verifying vs. contrary product) # 2 (socialcloseness of recipient: close vs. distant) experimental designparticipants were told that they were purchasing a mug fora friend. Our scenario and manipulations of product identitycongruence and social closeness were the same as in priorstudies. After reading the scenario, participants were toldthat they should walk over to a nearby table where the actualmugs were displayed and make their gift selection. Theexperimenter explained to each participant that s/he wouldbe videotaped while s/he made his/her choice. No furtherinstructions were given because we wanted to observe par-ticipants’ natural behavior when making the choice. Afterchoosing the gift, participants filled out a 5-minute fillertask.

Dependent Measure

After completing the filler task, participants were pre-sented with an ostensibly unrelated choice (for themselves)between a less-liked but more verifying product and an ob-jectively more appealing product. The products used in thischoice were a less-preferred plastic pen with the participant’sschool logo, the University of Texas Longhorn, printed onit (a self-verifying item) versus a more-preferred silver pen.Participants were told that they had the chance to win theproduct they chose. The two pens were labeled as Pen 1(the silver pen) and Pen 2 (the identity-verifying pen). Thedependent measure asked participants to indicate their pref-erence for the pens on a scale from 1 p strongly prefer Pen1 to 7 p strongly prefer Pen 2. Again, after the dependentvariable, participants answered the same additional manip-ulation check measures reported in prior studies gaugingsocial closeness and liking for the gift they selected.

A pretest confirmed a difference in the pens’ attractive-ness. Specifically, 49 participants were asked which pen theywould be more likely to choose to win as part of a raffle.The more attractive silver pen was labeled as 1 and theidentity-verifying pen was labeled a 7. On average, partic-ipants indicated strong preference for the attractive silverpen with an average rating of 2, which is significantly lowerthan the midpoint of the scale of 4 (t(48) p �9.70, p !

.0001).Using the videos of each participant’s product choice, we

measured and coded participants’ nonverbal threat behav-iors. The stereotype threat literature shows that when in-dividuals are faced with a threat to their group, those whoare highly identified with the challenged group identity mayinterpret and respond to the threat as if it were a direct threat


FIGURE 2

PRE- VERSUS POST-EXPERIMENTAL IDENTITY MEASURE (STUDY 2)

to the self (Swann et al. 2009). Furthermore, individualsrespond to threat with nonverbal (physical) signs that areoften more reliable signals of identity threat than self-re-ported measures (Bosson, Haymovitz, and Pinel 2003).

In order to code the nonverbal threat responses, twojudges who were blind to all procedures and hypotheseswatched each videotaped gift product choice and rated par-ticipants’ nonverbal threat behaviors and facial expressionswhen making their product choices. Coders could see par-ticipants’ behaviors and expressions but could not see thegift that was designated on the registry in order to keepthem blind to the condition they were coding. Following theBosson et al. (2003) method of coding nonverbal indicationsof identity threat, the coders were instructed to “considerthe extent to which the target appears uncomfortable” andlook for “any behaviors that communicate discomfort, anx-

iety, awkwardness, or a similar emotion.” Specifically,judges rated signs of threat on two 7-point Likert scales:facial expression threat (1 p no facial expression, 7 pstrong facial expression) and body language threat (1 p nodiscomfort evident, 7 p extreme discomfort evident). Asdetailed in appendix C, indications of facial expression threatincluded chewing on lips, nervous smiling, averting or nar-rowing eyes, flinching, and sneering. Indications of bodylanguage threat included fidgeting, playing with hair, bitingnails, stiff posture, or crossed arms. The two judges hadhigh reliability (r(58) p .88, p p .01) and differences wereresolved in a meeting between them. The facial expressionsand body language nonverbal threat measures exhibited highcorrelation (r(58) p .84, p p .04) and were averaged toform a single measure of nonverbal threat.


TABLE 1

STUDY 2: ANALYSIS OF POST-GIFT IDENTITY MEASURE

Type III SS Mean square F-value P-value

A. Post- identity measure p social closeness # product identity congruence# pre-identity measure

Variable:Product identity congruence 10.96 10.96 8.13 .0048Social closeness 23.33 23.33 17.29 .0001Product identity congruence

# social closeness 11.27 11.27 8.35 .0042Pre-gift ID measure 29.52 29.52 21.88 .0226Product identity congruence

# pre-gift ID measure 7.12 7.12 5.27 .0026Social closeness # pre-gift

ID measure .58 .58 .43 .5137Product identity congruence

# social closeness #pre-gift ID measure 7.56 7.56 5.60 .0188

B. Simple effects: Post-gift identity measure p pre-gift identity measure

Condition:Distant friend, ID verifying 11.93 11.93 6.86 .01Distant friend, ID neutral 23.32 23.32 17.29 .0001Distant friend, ID contrary 12.17 12.17 10.68 .002Close friend, ID verifying 33.45 33.45 25.47 .0001Close friend, ID neutral 23.33 23.33 17.30 .0001Close friend, ID contrary .06 .06 .07 .79

Results

Manipulation checks confirmed that those in the close(vs. distant) friend condition indicated having a closer re-lationship with the recipient (MClose p 5.48 vs. MDistant p3.34; F(1, 57) p 4.60, p ! .0001) and that the school thatthe recipient attended had no effect on the givers’ reportedcloseness to the recipient (MID Contrary p 4.50 vs. MID Verifying

p 4.41; F(1, 57) p .03, p ! .87). We also confirmed thatparticipants liked the identity-contrary mug less than theidentity-verifying mug (MID Contrary p 4.00 vs. MID Verifying p5.38; F(1, 57) p 11.12, p ! .002).

Next, we investigated how choosing a threatening (vs.verifying) gift for a close (vs. distant) friend affects productchoice of the more preferred pen versus the less preferredbut identity-verifying pen. The data revealed significantmain effects of product identity congruence (MID Contrary p3.04 vs. MID Verifying p 2.0; F(1, 57) p 8.20, p ! .005) andsocial closeness (MClose p 2.93 vs. MDistant p 2.1; F(1, 57)p 4.0, p ! .05). Importantly, the results in study 3 supporthypothesis 3 that after givers choose a threatening (vs. ver-ifying) gift for a close friend (vs. distant friend), they aremore likely to choose the less appealing but more identity-verifying pen for themselves. Specifically, we observed asignificant product identity congruence # social closenessinteraction (F(1, 57) p 5.10, p ! .03). The simple effectsconfirmed that when participants were choosing for a closefriend, they were more likely to self-verify by choosing theidentity-aligned pen after choosing an identity-contrary (vs.-verifying) gift (MID Contrary p 3.7 vs. MID Verifying p 2.2; F(1,57) p 13.77, p ! .0005). Conversely, when participants

were choosing for a distant friend, after selecting an identity-contrary (vs. -verifying) product, there was no difference intheir choice of the identity-verifying item (MID Contrary p 2.4vs. MID Verifying p 1.8; F(1, 57) p .22, p ! .64; see fig. 3A).

Furthermore, the data revealed that product identity con-gruence did not have a significant effect on participants’nonverbal threat behaviors (MID Contrary p 4.81 vs. MID Verifying

p 4.20; F(1, 57) p 2.14, p ! .15); however, social closenessdid have a significant effect on these behaviors (MClose p5.0 vs. MDistant p 4.1; F(1, 57) p 4.67, p ! .03). Further,we observed a significant product identity congruence #social closeness interaction (F(1, 57) p 10.61, p ! .002).These results support hypothesis 1, which states that aftergivers choose the identity-contrary (vs. -verifying) gift fora close (vs. distant) friend they are more likely to feel threat-ened. The simple effects confirm that when participants chosean identity-contrary (vs. -verifying) gift for a close friend,they were more likely to exhibit nonverbal indications ofthreat (MID Contrary p 5.7 vs. MID Verifying p 3.50; F(1, 57) p6.25, p ! .0001), while there was no difference when choosingfor a distant friend (MID Contrary p 3.00 vs. MID Verifying p 2.9;F(1, 57) p 1.45, p ! .23; see fig. 3B).

Moderated Mediation Analysis

Next we examine whether the relationship between choos-ing an identity-contrary versus aligned gift and givers’ sub-sequent preference for identity-verifying (vs. -non-verify-ing) products is mediated by their feelings of identity threat.In our model the relationship between the identity congru-ence of the gift and his/her subsequent product choice is

FIGURE 3

STUDY 3: INTERACTION OF SOCIAL CLOSENESS AND IDENTITY CONGRUENCE ON VERIFYING (VS. CONTROL) PRODUCTCHOICE (A) AND ON NONVERBAL IDENTITY THREAT BEHAVIORS (B); MODERATED MEDIATION (C)


mediated by identity threat (mediator), and this mediationprocess is moderated by the social distance between the giverand recipient. That is, the path from identity congruence ofthe gift (independent variable) to product choice (dependentvariable) operates through identity threat and should applyto close relationships but not distant relationships (see fig.3C for reference).

To assess this moderated mediation model we analyzedthe conditions using an SPSS macro designed by Preacher,Rucker, and Hayes (2007, model 2) which incorporates abootstrapping procedure that generates a sample size of5,000 to assess the regression models necessary for a me-diation.

The first model regressed product choice on givers’ feel-ings of identity threat (B p �.68, SE p 1.0; t(58) p 6.89,p ! .0001). The second model regressed givers’ identitythreat on the identity congruence of the chosen gift, socialcloseness, and their interactions, which yielded the two-wayinteraction (B p �1.15, SE p .32; t(58) p �3.41, p !

.01). The third model regressed product choice on the iden-tity congruence of the gift, which produced a significanteffect (B p �.83, SE p .19; t(58) p �4.39, p ! .0001).Supporting hypothesis 2b, when givers’ felt identity threatwas added to the model tested above, the independent var-iable decreased in significance (B p �.48, SE p .17; t(58)p �2.78, p ! .007).

Finally, we tested the conditional indirect effects of themoderator. We find that social closeness moderates the pathfrom identity-congruence of the gift to the identity threatfelt by the giver. In the close friend condition, the conditionalindirect effect is significant (B p �.38, SE p .18; z p�2.1, p p .03), but not in the distant friend condition (Bp �.02, SE p 07; z p �.34, p p .73).

Discussion

The correspondence between the results of study 2 andstudy 3 underscores the fact that givers react to an identitythreat by verifying both when endorsing an identity scalemeasure and choosing a product. From these two studies,we conclude that when givers choose a threatening item fora close friend, they will experience an identity threat andsubsequently exhibit our predicted response of verifyingtheir identity in future choices. It is important to note thatchoosing an identity-contrary gift does indeed cause an iden-tity threat, and the effect of the threat on the individual’ssubsequent choices is much stronger when the gift is in-tended for a close friend (vs. a distant friend) as close friendsare much more self-relevant than distant friends to thegiver’s self-concept. Furthermore, our test for mediation in-dicates that givers’ felt threat drives these self-verificationbehaviors as they endeavor to offset these aversive feelingswith identity-expressive product choices.

Next, we examine a new identity to establish that ourfindings generalize beyond the school identity. Further weused more subtle products that were less overtly symbolicof the threatened identity to determine how representative

the identity-aligned item must be in order to effectivelyverify participants’ threatened identities.

STUDY 4


This study has a setup similar to that of study 3; however,we changed the relevant identity to participants’ politicalidentities (i.e., Democrat vs. Republican). Prior to the study,we collected participants’ political affiliations (i.e., Demo-crat or Republican) and randomly assigned them to an iden-tity-contrary (vs. identity-verifying) experimental condition.If the participant indicated being Independent, s/he was notincluded in the study.

In the focal study, 141 participants took part in a 2 (prod-uct identity congruence: identity contrary vs. verifying) #2 (social closeness of recipient: close vs. distant) experiment.Givers chose a gift mug for a close (vs. distant) friend’supcoming birthday from a wish list. Participants then wereprovided with additional information about the recipient,including his/her hobbies, personal tastes and political af-filiation in order to make the scenario more realistic. Thevariables of the givers’ political identity and identity con-gruence between giver and recipient were fully crossed inthe experimental design. That is, in identity-verifying sce-narios, participants were explicitly told that the recipient hasthe same political leanings as the participant (i.e., if theparticipant is a Democrat, the friend is also a Democrat),whereas in identity-contrary scenarios, the recipient has theopposite political affiliation (i.e., if the participant is a Dem-ocrat, the friend is a Republican). Similar to the prior studies,two of the mugs available were explicitly politically affil-iated, as they displayed one of the two political icons (i.e.,the donkey or the elephant, which represent the Democratand Republican political parties, respectively). In verifyingconditions, the mug from the congruent political party isstarred; in identity-contrary conditions, the mug from theopposite political party is starred. The stimuli used are pre-sented in appendix A.

Dependent Variable

After making the choice of an identity-contrary or verifyingmug from the wish list, participants were told that to thankthem for participating, they would be entered in a lottery forone of two magazine subscriptions. Products vary in the de-gree to which they communicate things about their users (Ber-ger and Heath 2007; Escalas and Bettman 2005). While inprior studies we used a product choice that was highly identityexpressive (a school-related pen visually depicting schoolidentity), in this study we used magazine subscriptions to testwhether participants still would use these more subtle identity-symbolic products to self-verify. Specifically, after choosingthe identity-contrary (vs. -verifying) gift, we instructed par-ticipants to choose between a less-preferred but politicallyverifying magazine subscription versus a more-preferred (butpolitically neutral) subscription.


FIGURE 4

INTERACTION OF SOCIAL CLOSENESS AND IDENTITY CONGRUENCE OF GIFT ON IDENTITY-VERIFYING (VS. -CONTROL)PRODUCT CHOICE (STUDY 4)

Pretest

A pretest of 52 participants was conducted to identifyappropriate periodicals on 7-point Likert scales, measuringhow affiliated each was with the respective Democrat andRepublican parties (low/high affiliation with political party).Participants also indicated how much they liked each pub-lication (do not like/like very much). Participants perceivedthe New York Times (M p 6.5) as more Democrat-affiliatedthan the Wall Street Journal (M p 3.2; F(1, 51) p 4.24,p !.03) and Time magazine (M p 4.1; F(1, 51) p 2.58, p! .01). Conversely, the Wall Street Journal (M p 6.7) wasperceived as more Republican-affiliated than the New YorkTimes (M p 3.0; F(1, 51) p 4.48, p ! .02) and Timemagazine (M p 4.2; F(1, 51) p 4.35, p ! .01). Finally,the pretest confirmed that Time magazine was preferred toboth of the above periodicals, regardless of political identity(Democrat: MTime p 5.8 vs. MNY Times p 3.0; F(1, 51) p5.48, p ! .01) and (Republican: MTime p 5.8 vs. MWall St J p3.7; F(1, 51) p 3.24, p ! .04).

As each political party is associated with specificpublications, Democrats and Republicans made differentidentity-verifying choices. The Democrat (Republican) par-ticipants were faced with a choice between a less-preferredbut more identity-verifying subscription to the New YorkTimes (Wall Street Journal) versus a more-preferred sub-scription of Time magazine. The dependent measure askedparticipants to indicate their preference for a magazine sub-scription on a scale from 1 p strongly prefer Time magazineto 7 p strongly prefer New York Times (Wall StreetJournal). Following the dependent variable, participants an-swered the same additional measures reported in prior stud-ies gauging social closeness and liking for the chosen gift.

Results

Manipulation checks confirmed that those in the close(vs. distant) friend manipulation indicated having a closerrelationship with the recipient (MClose p 6.2 vs. MDistant p4.5; F(1, 140) p 25.24, p ! .0001) and that the recipient’spolitical affiliation had no effect on the giver’s reportedcloseness to the recipient (MID Verifying p 5.8 vs. MID Contrary p5.5; F(1, 140) p 1.29, p ! .29). We also confirmed thatparticipants had greater liking for the identity-verifying thanthe identity-contrary mug (MID Verifying p 4.7 vs. MID Contrary p3.8; F(1, 140) p 3.85, p ! .05). Figure 4 shows how choos-ing an identity-contrary (vs. -verifying) gift for a close (vs.distant) friend affects participants’ subsequent choice of apreferred but less identity-expressive subscription versusthe less-preferred but more identity-expressive subscrip-tion. We observed a marginally significant main effect ofthreat (MID Contrary p 3.73 vs. MID Verifying p 3.05; F(1, 140)p 2.85, p ! .09) but did not find a main effect of socialcloseness on participants’ choice of magazine (MClose p 3.56vs. MDistant p 3.19; F(1, 140) p .79, p ! .38). Confirminghypothesis 2a, we find a significant product identity con-gruence # social closeness interaction (F(1, 140) p 33.64,p ! .0128). When choosing for a close friend after choosingan identity-contrary (vs. -verifying) product, participantswere more likely in their next choice to choose an identity-expressive subscription (MID Contrary p 4.5 vs. MID Verifying p2.7; F(1, 140) p 3.03, p ! .003). Conversely, when par-ticipants were choosing for a distant friend, after choosingan identity-contrary (vs. -verifying) product there was nodifference in their next choice of an identity-expressive sub-scription (MID Contrary p 3.1, MID Verifying p 3.3; F(1, 140) p.45, p ! .65). To further test hypothesis 2a, we created a


dichotomous choice measure from the relative preferencescale (scale midpoint and below vs. above scale midpoint)and corroborated our predicted interaction between productidentity congruence # social closeness (x2(1, 140) p 4.91,p ! .03).

Discussion

Study 4 replicates our prior pattern of results as well asgeneralizes these findings to different identity and productdomains. These results corroborate our finding that the socialcloseness between the giver and recipient moderates thedegree to which the giver feels threatened and drives his/her subsequent verifying choice.

Notably, the prior results are replicated even when the self-verifying product choice options are less symbolic of theshaken identity. In other words, when an individual’s identityhas been threatened, s/he is highly motivated to resolve thethreat and will attempt to verify at the next opportunity. Evenif the product is not overtly identity expressive, people arelikely to be attentive to its culturally imbued meanings andwill self-verify by choosing products that are aligned (evento a lesser degree) with the threatened identity.

GENERAL DISCUSSION

The results of five studies show that an identity-contrarygift purchase for a close friend whom the gift giver hasintegrated into his/her own self-concept may create an iden-tity threat. In response to this threat, we show that the giverwill seek to verify his/her identity in a subsequent decisionor purchase. The pilot study and study 1 demonstrate thatafter choosing a gift for a close friend that opposes thegiver’s identity, s/he experiences a felt identity threat (hy-pothesis 1) as evidenced in study 1 by the participants plac-ing the identity-contrary gift at a greater physical distancefrom themselves. In study 2, we build on these results andconfirm that in response to such a threat, s/he is likely tomake an effort to reassert the relevant identity by strength-ening his/her identity endorsement in the next task (hy-pothesis 2a). In study 3, we generalize these findings to aproduct choice context. We find that after experiencing anidentity threat resulting from a choosing an identity-contrarygift choice for a close (vs. distant) friend, participants weremore inclined to bolster their identities by choosing a prod-uct that is symbolic of the shaken identity (hypothesis 2a).Notably, we show that these product choices are mediatedby givers’ feelings of threat as evidenced by their nonverbalthreat behaviors (hypothesis 2b). Finally, in study 4, wereplicate the prior results using a new set of identities andsymbolic products. Further, we show that following a con-trary gift purchase for a close friend, people are motivatedto reassert their identities and will do so even when theproduct is not overtly symbolic.

Identities serve as scripts for social interaction, tellingpeople what to expect, how to conduct themselves, and howto interpret events they encounter. Self-verification theory(Swann 1983) predicts that people want others to see them

as they see themselves. One way that people express theiridentities is through the products that they purchase andconsume. There is a long tradition of identity research thatsupports the idea that people often are attracted to productsand brands that are linked to their identities (Berger andHeath 2007; Escalas and Bettman 2005; Forehand, Desh-pande, and Reed 2002; Sirgy 1982). This linkage may comeabout because the brand or product symbolizes the con-sumer’s own personality traits (Aaker 1997) or embodiesan aspiration identity that the consumer strives to become(Belk, Bahn, and Mayer 1982; Levy 1959). This body ofresearch suggests that consumers link products to particularsocial identities and form impressions of consumers whouse these products (Kleine, Kleine, and Kernan 1993; Shavittand Nelson 2000). Thus, products serve as proxies to assertone’s identity. An individual who is motivated to assert aspecific identity may choose a product that is imbued witha specific cultural meaning and is universally understood byothers. Further, recent research shows that givers value giftsthat they have customized more highly than items designedby an expert, as customized gifts are imbued with and re-inforce the giver’s own identity (Bonney, Herd, and Moreau2010).

Across all of the studies we see evidence that consumersare deeply affected by identity threats and enact strong ef-forts to correct in future decisions. Specifically, in all of thestudies presented, we find a main effect of threat such thatgivers who made an identity contrary gift purchase subse-quently verified with products or exaggerated behaviors thatrelated to the threatened identity. Moreover, we find thatmaking purchases for close friends is especially likely toresult in an identity threat, as the recipient is considered anintegral part of the self.

We contribute to the existing literature on identity in sev-eral important ways. First, while the extant literature focuseson how individuals choose products that verify their identity,we find that the choice of an identity-contrary product cancause a threat to one’s self-concept. Interestingly, in thesestudies we show that product purchase is such an importantidentity marker that even when the product is intended forsomeone else, it still may threaten the identity of the pur-chaser.

Second, while earlier work has shown that an individual’sself-concept can be threatened when they receive discrepantfeedback from external sources (e.g., identity-contrary feed-back from another person or from failing an identity-relevanttest), the studies discussed in this research indicate that thereare situations in which consumers create their own identitythreat in order to achieve an important personal goal.

Furthermore, while this work focuses on the choice of aproduct for another person, there are many times that in-dividuals are faced with such an identity-threatening situ-ation even when choosing for themselves. For example, anindividual who possesses a casual identity may need to dressmore elegantly for a first-time meeting with his fiancee’sconservative parents. While the individual may feel that apair of jeans is most representative of his identity, he must


present himself more traditionally if he hopes to win therespect and trust of his new in-laws. In this situation, theconsumer chooses to present himself in a way that runscounter to his true identity in order to conform to socialnorms and expectations. Similarly, when making a joint pur-chase with another person, an individual may have to sac-rifice a central identity to appease the other purchaser. Forexample, a person with a “hi-tech” identity may need tocompromise this identity and buy a simpler model of tele-vision or stereo so that his/her spouse can operate the prod-uct. We posit that such purchases, while necessary to ac-complish the consumer’s goals, might come at the cost ofthe individual’s identity certainty. As a result of such apurchase, we predict that the consumer may make additionalpurchases later to reclaim his/her shaken identity.

Research has examined how people manage their multipleidentities as they navigate different product choices and findsthat a consumer’s sense of self can be developed from amonga wide range of possible identities and that only a subset ofthem will influence the consumer in any given situation(LeBoeuf, Shafir, and Belyavsky 2010; Reed 2004). Thisresearch indicates that people are flexible and are able tointegrate many (at times opposing) choices into their self-concepts. However, as our research indicates, there are cer-tain situations in which people are inflexible with their iden-tities, and when they act in ways that are contrary to theseimportant self-views, the consequence is a threat to theiridentity. Interestingly, although prior research has found dif-ferences in gift-giving behavior as a function of gender, ourresults on identity-contrary gifts leading to an identity threatwere robust across both genders in all our studies.

Our findings provide direction for future research. Onequestion that arises is, how does the relative importance ofthe threatened self-view affect the identity threat? In theresearch presented above, we chose identities that vary inimportance. While students’ school identity is generallyquite important (MSchool ID p 5.0 on a 7-point scale) acrossthe participant population, participants’ political leaningswere less self-defining (MPolitical ID p 3.5 on a 7-point scale).Our results replicate across identities; however, future re-search might explore the boundaries of these effects.

We show that people may exhibit nonverbal threat be-havior when choosing an identity-contrary gift for a closefriend (study 3) and seek to offset this threat by distancingthemselves physically from the threatening object (study 1).Given these results, one interesting question is how con-scious individuals are of their felt threat and their desire toresolve it. We collected verbal thought protocols from par-ticipants following the same design as study 1 to gauge howexplicitly individuals expressed their felt threat after makingan identity-contrary gift choice. Participants’ oral responseswere coded for whether they expressed feelings of threatafter making their gift choices (e.g., “I’m not sure I couldbuy something with the rival school logo on it”). Weobserved an interaction of product identity congruence #social closeness (x2(1, N p 72) p 5.2, p ! .02) on expressedthreat such that givers choosing for a close friend were more

likely to express threat after choosing an identity-contrary(52%) versus identity-verifying gift (17%; x2(1, N p 72) p5.2, p ! .02). Conversely, when participants were choosingfor a distant friend, there was no difference in expressedthreat after choosing an identity-contrary (22%) versus iden-tity-verifying gift (28%; x2(1, N p 72) p .94, p p .33).We conjecture that verbalizing their feelings of discomfortafter choosing an identity-contrary gift may be one way thatgivers neutralize an identity threat.

Future research on the topic might investigate how thecontext of the gift purchase and exchange influences thepersistence of the identity threat. Gao et al. (2009) foundthat after an individual has the opportunity to restore his/her shaken self-view, s/he no longer persists in identity ver-ification in future opportunities. This finding suggests thatphysical distancing and verbal expression behaviors mayneutralize the threat and mitigate givers’ need to self-verifyin their subsequent choices. It would be interesting to ex-amine whether the identity threat experienced after the actualpurchase of an identity-contrary product is severe enoughto lead to persistence with consumers seeking self-verifi-cation across multiple decisions in a retail setting. Addi-tionally, we speculate that givers may re-experience theidentity threat when presenting the gift to the recipient.

One further issue worth investigating is how threat func-tions differently for the giver and the recipient. While it maybe threatening for the giver to choose something that isincongruous with his/her own identity, we think that it wouldbe equally or possibly more threatening to receive an iden-tity-contrary gift from a close friend. An interesting directionto pursue would be an examination of how an identity threatfelt by a recipient might differ from that of the giver. Ourintuition is that recipients would feel unknown by the giverand act in ways that reassert his/her important identities.

Finally, in these studies, we have created a context inwhich the giver is forcibly constrained by a gift registry(Botti et al. 2008). That is, the choices they make are con-strained by the mechanism of the gift registry, which ex-plicitly indicates which product the recipient desires. Inter-estingly, 4%–7% of participants across studies did not selectthe registry-designated item, and they were predominantlyin the close friend, identity-contrary gift condition. In futureresearch, it would be interesting to vary the giver’s agencyin his/her own gift decision. One could hypothesize that anindividual would feel a stronger identity threat if he hadmore control of his/her own threatening choice. However,according to self-perception theory, the opposite hypothesismight be true: an individual would feel less threatened whens/he has more control of the decision as s/he would simplyinfer that this choice was indicative of his/her true identity.

The findings of these studies have important implicationsfor retail practice. There is evidence that after choosing giftsfrom a registry, consumers may feel increased motivationto choose something for themselves that is highly represen-tative of self. Retailers might capitalize on this finding byincluding identity-relevant products in their assortments andpositioning these products near the gift registry so that con-


sumers can have the immediate gratification of self-veri-fying. Also, given the insight that certain gifts can be threat-ening to the givers, retailers who include a gift registry intheir store might further emphasize ways in which giverscan customize the items they choose for their friends andthus self-verify, including writing a custom note or choosinga personalized wrapping paper.

CONCLUSIONIn conclusion, our research investigates how the purchaseof an identity-contrary gift can cause an identity threat. Be-

cause close relationships are integral to an individual’s senseof self, givers are motivated to choose gifts that match re-cipients’ preferences but are threatened by presenting a giftthat challenges their own self-concept. These studies showthat people who experience an identity threat are motivatedto make subsequent product choices that bolster their shakenself-images in order to restore important self-concepts. Fur-ther, we add to the existing literature on the relationshipbetween products and consumers’ identities and illuminatehow products can serve as both a mode of personal ex-pression and a threat to a giver’s self-concept.

APPENDIX A

NOTE.—Color version available as an online enhancement.

APPENDIX B

NOTE.—Color version available as an online enhancement.


APPENDIX C

NONVERBAL THREAT CODINGPROTOCOLS (STUDY 3)

Before doing the coding, please watch each video com-pletely. Then, start the video again and code each video(according to the participant number) on the following var-iables:

Facial Expression: Does his/her face indicate an annoyed,disgusted or uncomfortable expression? The indications ofthis are:

Jaw tightening, furrowed forehead (frown), lips tight to-gether, nervous smiling, avoiding direct eye contact withproduct, squinting at the product, flinching, scowling or crin-kling of nose, narrowing of eyes, biting the lip, lip licking.

Compared to the other participants, please rate the extentto which each participant displays these facial expressionswhen s/he looks at the registry gift on a 1–7 scale (1 p nofacial expression/ 7 strong facial expression).

Body Language: Does the participant appear uncomfortableby behaving in any of the following ways when s/he examinesthe threatening mug:

Torso lean (away), sudden arm cross with grip, chest puff,withdrawn arms, folded arms, nail biting, stiff posture.

Compared to the other participants, please rate the extentto which each participant displays this body language whens/he looks at the registry gift on a 1–7 scale (1 p no dis-comfort evident/ 7 extreme discomfort evident).

REFERENCESAaker, Jennifer (1997), “Dimensions of Brand Personality,” Jour-

nal of Marketing Research, 34 (August), 347–57.Aron, Arthur and Elaine N. Aron (1986), Love and the Expansion

of Self: Understanding Attraction and Satisfaction, New York:Hemisphere.

Aron, Arthur, Elaine N. Aron, and Danny Smollan (1992), “In-clusion of Other in the Self Scale and the Structure of Inter-personal Closeness,” Journal of Personality and Social Psy-chology, 63 (4), 596–612.

Aron, Arthur, Elaine N. Aron, Michael Tudor, and Greg Nelson(1991), “Close Relationships as Including Other in the Self,”Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 60 (2), 241–53.

Belk, Russell W., ed. (1979), Gift Giving Behavior, Vol. 2, Green-wich: JAI Press.

Belk, Russell W., Kenneth D. Bahn, and Robert N. Mayer (1982),“Developmental Recognition of Consumption Symbolism,”Journal of Consumer Research, 9 (3), 4–15.

Berger, Jonah and Chip Heath (2007), “Where Consumers Divergefrom Others: Identity Signaling and Product Domains,” Jour-nal of Consumer Research, 34 (2), 121–34.

Berl, Emmanuel (1924), The Nature of Love, London: Chapman& Hall.

Birdwell, Al E. (1968), “A Study of the Influence of Image Con-gruence on Consumer Choice,” Journal of Business, 41 (Jan-uary), 76–88.

Bolton, Lisa E. and Americus Reed II (2004), “Sticky Priors: The

Perseverance of Identity Effects on Judgment,” Journal ofMarketing Research, 41 (November), 397–411.

Bonney, Leff, Kelly B. Herd, and Page C. Moreau (2010), “ForYou or for Me? How the Intended Recipient Influences theCustomization Experience and Valuations of CustomizedProducts,” working paper, University of Colorado at Boulder.

Bosson, Jennifer, Ethan L. Haymovitz, and Elizabeth C. Pinel(2003), “When Saying and Doing Diverge: The Effects ofStereotype Threat on Self-Reported versus Non-Verbal Anx-iety,” Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, 40 (2),247–55.

Botti, Simona, Susan M. Broniarczyk, Gerald Haubl, Ron Hill,Yanliu Huang, Barbara Kahn, Praveen Kopalle, Donald Leh-mann, Joe Urbany, and Brian Wansink (2008), “Choice underRestrictions,” Marketing Letters, 19 (3), 183–99.

Caplow, Theodore (1982), “Christmas Gifts and Kin Networks,”American Sociological Review, 47 (3), 383–92.

Cast, Alicia D. and Peter Burke (2002), “A Theory of Self-Es-teem,” Social Forces, 80 (3), 1041–68.

Escalas, Jennifer E. and James R. Bettman (2005), “Self-Construal,Reference Groups, and Brand Meaning,” Journal of Con-sumer Research, 32 (December), 378–89.

Forehand, Mark R., Rohit Deshpande, and Americus Reed II(2002), “Identity Salience and the Influence of DifferentialActivation of the Social Self-Schema on Advertising Re-sponse,” Journal of Applied Psychology, 87 (6), 1086–99.

Freud, Sigmund (1921/1951), Group Psychology and the Analysisof the Ego, New York: Liveright.

Gao, Leilei, S. Christian Wheeler, and Baba Shiv (2009), “The‘Shaken Self’: Product Choices as a Means of Restoring Self-View Confidence,” Journal of Consumer Research, 36 (1),29–38.

Gershoff, Andrew D. and Gita V. Johar (2006), “How Well DoYou Know Me? Consumer Calibration of Others’ Knowl-edge,” Journal of Consumer Research, 32 (4), 496–503.

Gino, Francesca and Francis J. Flynn (2010), “Give Them WhatThey Want: The Benefits of Explicitness in Gift Exchange,”working paper, Harvard University.

Goff, Phillip, Claude M. Steele, and Paul G. Davies (2008), “TheSpace between Us: Stereotype Threat and Distance in Inter-racial Contexts,” Journal of Personality and Social Psychol-ogy, 94 (1), 91–107.

Kleine, Robert E., III, Susan S. Kleine, and Jerome B. Kernan(1993), “Mundane Consumption and the Self: A Social Iden-tity Perspective,” Journal of Consumer Psychology, 2 (3),209–35.

LeBoeuf, Robyn A., Eldar Shafir, and Julia Belyavsky (2010), “TheConflicting Choices of Alternating Selves,” OrganizationalBehavior and Human Decision Processes, 111 (1), 48–61.

Lerouge, Davy and Luk Warlop (2006), “Why It Is So Hard toPredict Our Partner’s Product Preferences: The Effect of Tar-get Familiarity on Prediction Accuracy,” Journal of ConsumerResearch, 33 (December), 393–402.

Levy, Sidney (1959), “Symbols for Sale,” Harvard Business Re-view, 37 (July–August), 117–24.

Maslow, Abraham H. (1967), “The Theory of Metamotivation:The Biological Rooting of the Value-Life,” Journal of Hu-manistic Psychology, 7 (2), 93–127.

Mintel (2008), Gift Registries—US (May), Retrieved from http://academic.mintel.com/.

Preacher, Kristopher, Derek D. Rucker, and Andrew F. Hayes(2007), “Addressing Moderated Mediation Hypotheses: The-


ory, Methods, and Prescriptions,” Multivariate Behavioral Re-search, 42 (1), 185–227.

Priester, Joseph R. and Richard E. Petty (2001), “Extending theBases of Subjective Attitudinal Ambivalence: Interpersonaland Intrapersonal Antecedents of Evaluative Tension,” Jour-nal of Personality and Social Psychology, 80 (1), 19–34.

Reed, Americus, II (2004), “Activating the Self-Importance ofConsumer Selves: Exploring Identity Salience Effects onJudgments,” Journal of Consumer Research, 31 (2), 286–95.

Schwartz, Barry (1967), “The Social Psychology of the Gift,”American Journal of Sociology, 73 (1), 1–11.

Shavitt, Sharon and Michelle R. Nelson (2000), “The Social Iden-tity Function in Person Perception,” in Why We Evaluate:Functions of Attitudes, ed. Gregory R. Maio and James M.Olson, Mahwah, NJ: Erlbaum, 35–57.

Sherry, John F., Jr. (1983), “Gift Giving in Anthropological Per-spective,” Journal of Consumer Research, 10 (2), 157–68.

Sirgy, Joseph (1982), “Self-Concept in Consumer Behavior: ACritical Review,” Journal of Consumer Research, 9 (Decem-ber), 287–300.

Spears, Russell, Bertjan Doosje, and Naomi Ellemers (1999),“Commitment and the Context of Social Perception,” in SocialIdentity: Context, Commitment, Content, ed. Naomi Ellemers,Russell Spears, and Bertjan Doosje, Oxford: Blackwell,59–83.

Swann, William B., Jr. (1983), “Self-Verification: Bringing SocialReality into Harmony with the Self,” in Social PsychologicalPerspectives on the Self, Vol. 2, ed. J. Suls and A. G. Green-wald, Hillsdale, NJ: Erlbaum, 33–66.

Swann, William B., Jr., Angel Gomez, D. Conner Seyle, J. Fran-cisco Morales, and Carmen Huici (2009), “Identity Fusion:The Interplay of Personal and Social Identities in ExtremeGroup Behavior,” Journal of Personality and Social Psy-chology, 96 (5), 995–1011.

Tajfel, Heri and John C. Turner (1986), “The Social Identity Theoryof Inter-Group Behavior,” in Psychology of Intergroup Re-lations, ed. Stephen Worchel and William G. Austin, Chicago:Nelson-Hall.

Teigen, Karl Halvor, Marina V. G. Olsen, and Odd Egil Solas(2005), “Giver-Receiver Asymmetries in Gift Preferences,”British Journal of Social Psychology, 44 (1), 125–44.

Unity Marketing Gifting Report (2007), “The Who, What, Where,How Much and Why of Gift Giving and Shopping” (July 1),Pub ID: UM1526890, http://www.unitymarketingonline.com/cms_gifting/gifting/report_06.php.

Zajonc, Robert B. (1968), “Attitudinal Effects of Mere Exposure,”Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 9 (MonographSuppl. No. 2, Part 2), 1–27.

its not me, its you: how gift giving creates giver identity threat as a

Documents