A PLURALISTIC APPROACH TO CONSUMER MORALITY

While several scholars have examined the influence of morality in consumption contexts, the extant research has largely assumed a monistic definition of morality. That is, the research has assumed that morality consists of harm/fairness concerns. Contrastingly, this dissertation introduces a pluralistic approach to morality. That is, I demonstrate how different moral beliefs (harm, fairness, respect, loyalty, and sanctity) motivate divergent behaviors across four consumer contexts. Consequently, I show how investigating the diversity in moral beliefs can shed light on heterogeneous consumer preferences across political and cultural groups. First, Chapter 1 demonstrates how heterogenous moral beliefs can increase or decrease preferences for conspicuous consumption. Chapter 2 demonstrates how certain moral beliefs can suppress the desire for sensory pleasure. Chapter 3 demonstrates how different moral beliefs influence reactions to the SNAP welfare program. Finally, Chapter 4 demonstrates how heterogenous moral beliefs shape attitudes towards bodily markets. Importantly, these chapters show how the moral insights can explain paradoxical consumption patterns and subsequently be used to generate targeted marketing and policy campaigns. Hence, this dissertation underscores the importance of using a pluralistic lens to investigate the heterogeneity in consumers’ moral beliefs.

Name thesis:degree_name

Ph. D., Management

Level thesis:degree_level

Doctor of Philosophy

Discipline thesis:degree_discipline

Management

Grantor

Cornell University

Year dc:date.issued

2020

Author dc:creator

• Goenka, Shreyans

Committee members dc:contributor.committeemember

• Gilovich, Thomas
• Kim, Soo
• van Osselaer, Stijn

• Bodily Markets
• Conspicuous Consumption
• Consumer Behavior
• Moral Values
• Sensory Pleasure
• Welfare Programs

Statement dc:rights

• Attribution 4.0 International

Licence dc:rights.uri

• https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/

Language dc:language.iso

en

DOI

https://doi.org/10.7298/0az1-c860

Dc Identifier Other

ProQuest Submission ID: 11942
ProQuest Publication ID: 27956686

OAI identifier oai:identifier

oai:ecommons.cornell.edu:1813/70418