Culture and personal preferences: Implications for decision making, information processing, and brand equity

This dissertation explores two ways culture shapes the meaning of personal preferences. Decades of research has built on two assumptions about the role of personal preferences in decision making: 1) preferences that come quickly to mind are useful for making decisions and 2) behaviors reflect one’s personal preferences. However, studies supporting both assumptions were conducted in cultural contexts that emphasize an independent self-construal. In these contexts, people are socialized to form preferences that express their individuality and act in a way that fulfills their personal goals. In cultural contexts where an interdependent self-construal is emphasized, fitting in and adjusting to others’ needs is prioritized. In these contexts, people need to be responsive to norms as they make decisions. Informed by cross-cultural perspectives, we theorize and test the ideas that, for interdependents, 1) personal preferences that come quickly to mind can reduce one’s readiness to act and 2) information about others’ preferences may be more persuasive than information about others’ actions. Together, this dissertation suggests ways that cultural theories and attitude theories can expand productively by considering the deeper meanings of personal preferences.

Name thesis:degree_name

Ph.D.

Level thesis:degree_level

Dissertation

Discipline thesis:degree_discipline

Business Administration

Grantor

University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign

Year dc:date

2020

Author dc:creator

• Barnes, Aaron Jeffrey

Contributors dc:contributor

• Shavitt, Sharon
• Cohen, Dov
• Torelli, Carlos J
• White, Tiffany B

• culture, independent and interdependent self-construal, attitude accessibility, consensus cues, persuasion

Statement dc:rights

• Copyright 2020 Aaron Barnes

Language dc:language

en

Handle dc:identifier

http://hdl.handle.net/2142/107982

OAI identifier oai:identifier

oai:www.ideals.illinois.edu:2142/107982