The brand relationship literature shows that the humanizing of brands and products generates more favorable consumer attitudes and thus enhances brand performance. However, the authors propose negative downstream consequences of brand humanization; that is, the anthropomorphization of a brand can negatively affect consumers’ brand evaluations when the brand faces negative publicity caused by product wrongdoings. They find that consumers who believe in personality stability (i.e., entity theorists) view anthropomorphized brands that undergo negative publicity less favorably than nonanthropomorphized brands. In contrast, consumers who advocate personality malleability (i.e., incremental theorists) are less likely to devalue an anthropomorphized brand from a single instance of negative publicity. Finally, the authors explore three firm response strategies (i.e., denial, apology, and compensation) that can affect the evaluations of anthropomorphized brands for consumers with different implicit theory perspectives. They find that entity theorists have more difficulty in combating the adverse effects of brand anthropomorphization than incremental theorists. Furthermore, they demonstrate that compensation (vs. denial or apology) is the only effective response among entity theorists.
Although past research has shown that anthropomorphism enhances consumers' attraction to a brand when social-connectedness or effectance motives are active, the current research demonstrates that anthropomorphizing a brand becomes a detrimental marketing strategy when consumers' distinctiveness motives are salient. Four studies show that anthropomorphizing a brand positioned to be distinctive diminishes consumers' sense of agency in identity expression. As a result, when distinctiveness goals are salient, consumers are less likely to evaluate anthropomorphized (vs. nonanthropomorphized) brands favorably and are less likely to choose them to express distinctiveness. This negative effect of brand anthropomorphism, however, is contingent on the brand's positioning strategy-brand-assupporter (supporting consumers' desires to be different) versus brand-as-agent (communicating unique brand features instead of focusing on consumers' needs) versus brand-as-controller (limiting consumers' freedom in expressing distinctiveness). Our results demonstrate that an anthropomorphized brand-as-supporter enhances consumers' sense of agency in identity expression, compared to both an anthropomorphized brand-as-agent and an anthropomorphized brand-ascontroller. In turn, enhancing or thwarting consumers' sense of agency in expressing their differences from others drives the differential impact of anthropomorphizing a brand positioned to be distinctive.
This research shows that brand anthropomorphization increases the perceived unfairness of price increases and the perceived fairness of price decreases. First, analyzing a household panel data set, the authors demonstrate the real-world consequences of brand humanization on consumers' price sensitivity. Second, building on the theoretical premise that fairness judgments depend on consumer focus on the self versus others, they find that brand humanization enhances perceived unfairness of price increases for agency-oriented consumers, who tend to maximize their own self-interests. However, for communion-oriented consumers, who generally consider the needs of others, brand humanization increases perceived fairness of both price increases and decreases. Furthermore, because consumers' focus on the self versus others also depends on relationship goals, the nature of consumer–brand relationships interacts with agency–communion orientation to influence the effect of brand humanization on perceived price fairness. For example, exchange relationship norms reduce the power of brand anthropomorphization to enhance perceived fairness of price changes for communion-oriented consumers. In contrast, the communal nature of these relationships makes both agency- and communion-oriented consumers infer greater positive intent from a humanized (vs. nonhumanized) brand, thus leading to a more positive effect of brand humanization on price fairness for price decreases.
Anthropomorphizing a brand (i.e., imbuing a brand with humanlike features) serves as an important brand positioning strategy for marketing managers. This research identifies a key brand anthropomorphization strategy—positioning a brand as either oriented to interact with consumers or not. Managers generally rely on this brand interaction strategy to enhance consumer brand engagement regardless of the social context. However, given that consumers often experience brands in a social context, this research demonstrates that social crowdedness moderates the positive impact of interaction-oriented anthropomorphized brands on consumer brand preferences. Specifically, the authors show that consumers’ inferences of an anthropomorphized brand's intentionality to interact with them in a socially crowded context trigger greater social withdrawal, thereby resulting in lower preferences for the brand. The authors further demonstrate that the core negative effect of social crowdedness is contingent on the type of crowding (goal-related vs. goal-unrelated). In particular, a goal-related crowding decreases social withdrawal reactions, which, in turn, leads to greater preferences for interaction-oriented anthropomorphized brands relative to brands with other positioning strategies. In contrast, the effect of social crowdedness on consumer preferences for interaction-oriented anthropomorphized brands remains negative in goal-unrelated crowded settings.
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