Although the idea of brand concepts has been around for a while, very little research addresses how brand concepts may influence consumer responses to corporate social responsibility (CSR) activities. Four studies reveal that communicating the CSR actions of a luxury brand concept causes a decline in evaluations, relative to control. A luxury brand's self-enhancement concept (i.e., dominance over people and resources) is in conflict with the CSR information's self-transcendence concept (i.e., protecting the welfare of all), which causes disfluency and a decline in evaluations. These effects do not emerge for brands with openness (i.e., following emotional pursuits in uncertain directions) or conservation (i.e., protecting the status quo) concepts that do not conflict with CSR. The effects for luxury brand concepts disappeared when the informativeness of the disfluency was undermined but were accentuated in an abstract (vs. concrete) mind-set. These findings implicate brand concepts as a key factor in how consumers respond to CSR activities.Aunt Jemima focuses its giving on a key need: the education of children in low-income communities. (auntjemima.com)Rolex supports a variety of programs that demonstrate innovative thought and contribute to the betterment of humankind. (rolex.com) Apple iTunes hosts music for an organization that uses African music to help people caught in the escalating ethnic violence in Darfur, Su-

We argue for the importance of a relatively new cultural distinction in the horizontal (valuing equality) or vertical (emphasizing hierarchy) nature of cultures and cultural orientations. A review of the existing cross-cultural literature is presented suggesting that, although the contribution of the horizontallvertical distinction is sometimes obscured by methods that conflate it with other dimensions, its impact is distinct from that associated with individualism-collectivism. We present studies that highlight several sources of value for the horizontallvertical distinction-as a predictor of new consumer psychology phenomena and as a basis for refining the understanding of known phenomena. Results support the utility of examining this distinction for the understanding of personal values, advertising and consumer persuasion, self-presentational patterns, and gender differences. Methodological issues in studying the horizontallvertical distinction are also discussed.

Five studies indicate that conceptualizations of power are important elements of culture and serve culturally relevant goals. These studies provide converging evidence that cultures nurture different views of what is desirable and meaningful to do with power. Vertical individualism is associated with a conceptualization of power in personalized terms (i.e., power is for advancing one's personal status and prestige), whereas horizontal collectivism is associated with a conceptualization of power in socialized terms (i.e., power is for benefiting and helping others). Cultural variables are shown to predict beliefs about appropriate uses of power, episodic memories about power, attitudes in the service of power goals, and the contexts and ways in which power is used and defended. Evidence for the cultural patterning of power concepts is observed at both the individual level and the cultural-group level of analysis.

In most parts of the world, globalization has become an unstoppable and potent force that impacts everyday life and international relations. The articles in this issue draw on theoretical insights from diverse perspectives (clinical psychology, consumer research, organizational behavior, political psychology, and cultural psychology) to offer nuanced understanding of individuals' psychological reactions to globalization in different parts of the world (). These articles address the questions of how people make sense of and respond to globalization and its sociocultural ramifications; how people defend the integrity of their heritage cultural identities against the "culturally erosive" effects of globaliza- tion, and how individuals harness creative insights from their interactions with global cultures. The new theoretical insights and revealing empirical analyses presented in this issue set the stage for an emergent interdisciplinary inquiry into the psychology of globalization.At the turn of the century, Albert Bandura (2001) noted that societies today are undergoing drastic social, informational, and technological changes, and that

Global brands are faced with the challenge of conveying concepts that not only are consistent across borders but also resonate with consumers of different cultures. Building on prior research indicating that abstract brand concepts induce more favorable consumer responses than functional attributes, the authors introduce a generalizable and robust structure of abstract brand concepts as representations of human values. Using three empirical studies conducted with respondents from eight countries, they demonstrate that this proposed structure is particularly useful for predicting (1) brand meanings that are compatible (vs. incompatible) with each other and, consequently, more (less) favorably accepted by consumers when added to an already established brand concept; (2) brand concepts that are more likely to resonate with consumers with differing cultural orientations; and (3) consumers' responses to attempts to imbue an established brand concept with new, (in)compatible abstract meanings as a function of their own cultural orientations.

In globalized economies, people often encounter symbols of dissimilar cultures simultaneously. Research on the psychological effects of simultaneous exposure to dissimilar cultures is therefore strategically located at the intersection of globalization, culture, and psychology. In seven experiments, we showed that exposure to a commercial product that embodies symbols of two dissimilar cultures can enhance perceptibility of cultural differences (Experiments 2, 5, and 6) and perceptions of cultural incompatibility (Experiment 1). Furthermore, following simultaneous exposure to two dissimilar cultures, individuals may display defensive responses to "cultural contamination" of an iconic cultural brand when mortality concerns are salient (Experiments 3, 4, and 7). Finally, although we obtained a robust

Results from four studies uncover a relatively automatic cultural congruency mechanism that can influence evaluations of culturally charged brand extensions, overriding the impact of perceived fit on extension evaluations. Culturally congruent extensions (i.e., when both the brand and the extension category cue the same cultural schema) were evaluated more favorably than culturally neutral extensions, which in turn were evaluated more favorably than culturally incongruent ones (i.e., cue two different cultural schemas). The effects emerged with both moderate and low fit brand extensions, as well as for narrow and broad brands. However, they only emerged when both the brand and the product were culturally symbolic, likely to automatically activate a cultural schema but did not emerge for brands low in cultural symbolism. The effects were driven by the processing (dis)fluency generated by the simultaneous activation of the same (different) cultural schemas by the product and the brand.

This research makes strides toward reconciling mixed findings in the value-behavior relation by positing that values are abstract representations of ideal end states that are more likely to influence behavior when individuals think abstractly (vs. concretely) and focus on high-(vs. low-) level motivations for interpreting their actions. In 6 experiments, the authors measured the importance of values (or made them salient via a priming procedure) and simultaneously manipulated accessible mindsets (abstract vs. concrete), and assessed their effect on judgments and behaviors. An abstract (and not a concrete) mindset led participants to engage in judgments or behaviors that were consistent with a broad range of values, including power, benevolence, universalism, self-direction, individualism, and collectivism. These results support the notion that values are more likely to be expressed through value-congruent judgments and behaviors when individuals think abstractly about their actions, and not when they think concretely. Two of the experiments examined the process underlying these effects. Keywords: values, mindsets, behaviorOne recurring theme in personality psychology is the relative influence of values on judgments and behaviors. Values are conceptions of desirable end states that reflect what is important to us in our lives (Feather, 1990(Feather, , 1995Schwartz & Bilsky, 1987. For instance, an individual might think of him-or herself as a person who values equality and social justice. The natural way to live up to these values is by behaving in ways that express them-such as by devoting time to improve the life of others. Although numerous empirical studies support a value-behavior relation (e.g., Rokeach, 1973;Schwartz, 1996), the variability in the size of this relationship across different value domains suggests that its strength may be impacted by facilitating or impeding factors (see Bardi & Schwartz, 2003). This research tries to reconcile reported inconsistencies in the strength of the valuebehavior relation by studying the effect of abstract and concrete ways of thinking on the expression of values. A mechanism is proposed to predict the conditions under which values will be expressed through value-congruent judgments and behaviors.We argue that the strength of the value-behavior relation is affected by the accessibility of cognitive operations, or mindsets (see Gollwitzer, 1996), that facilitate (or impair) defining a situation in terms of relevant values (e.g., as one in which social justice is involved). The accessibility of cognitive operations that facilitate defining or construing a situation in terms of relevant values should lead to value-congruent judgments and behaviors. In contrast, the activation of cognitive operations that impair construing a situation in terms of values should lead to judgments and behaviors dissociated from these values. The main objective of this research is to analyze the effect of making readily accessible cognitive operations that facilitate (impair) the focus on th...