Influencing support of charitable objectives in the near and distant future: delay discounting and the moderating influence of construal level

Economic situation and time discounting: Does construal level matter?

“…The role of income in delay discounting was not the only effect observed. In particular, as (1) Sheehy-Skeffington and Haushofer (2014) outlined the possibility that a person living in poverty adapts their mindset by narrowing the focus on more concrete and proximal goals, tasks, or events; and, as (2) an emerging body of evidence (e.g., Bischoff and Hansen, 2016;Fujita et al, 2006;Malkoc et al, 2010;Yi et al, 2017) documents, that one's construal level can be manipulated through procedural priming (for a deeper level neural and cognitive basis of this manipulation, see, e.g., Gilead et al, 2014), the second research question aimed to corroborate how does the construal level manipulation affect one's time discounting. When cogitating this research question, the present pattern of results is rather nuanced.…”

“…From both perspectives, the present pattern of the results contrasts with what could be expected based on the propositions derived from the construal level theory. For instance, as summarized by Bischoff and Hansen (2016), in comparison to concrete mindset, the abstract mindset "may trigger the expectation that a resource is equally available in the near and distant future, which would countervail the delay discounting effect. A concrete mindset, on the other hand, would emphasize the delay discounting effect because it enhances a focus on detail and a more contextdependent representation of the resources and lowers sensitivity to delay" (p. 9).…”

“…In fact, as summarized by Gilead et al (2014), so far, more than 20 studies have employed the first and more than 50 studies the second task. Moreover, based on research implementing these two manipulations, an emerging body of evidence suggests a positive effect of abstract, high-level construal on various measures related to self-control in general (Fujita et al, 2006;Fujita & Han, 2009;Chang & Chiou, 2015;Chiou et al, 2013;Sweeney & Freitas, 2014) and delay discounting in particular (Bischoff & Hansen, 2016;Fujita et al, 2006;Malkoc et al, 2010;Yi et al, 2017). Although this line of research seems promising, the existing evidence on this topic is rather limited.…”

“…Although this line of research seems promising, the existing evidence on this topic is rather limited. The available studies on construal level and delaye discounting often presents the results that usually were either nonsignificant (e.g., Bischoff & Hansen, 2016;Yi et al, 2017) or with p-values just below the conventional .05 significance threshold (e.g., Bischoff & Hansen, 2016;Fujita et al, 2006); with mainly hypothetical scenarios (e.g., Fujita et al, 2006;Yi et al, 2017); use modest sample size (e.g., Fujita et al, 2006); work with student populations (e.g., Bischoff & Hansen, 2016;Fujita et al, 2006;Yi et al, 2017); and do not account for other potentially important factors as economic situations or perceived reliability of the environment.…”

“…To capture the key difference between the two, metaphorically speaking, in concrete/lowlevel construal, the ability to see the forest beyond trees is no longer preserved and an individual keeps losing a broader perspective and finds themself to be lost in concreteness (Fujita et al, 2006). Based on such conceptualization, self-control failure can be understood as a "goal shortsightedness" caused by concrete, low-level construal mindset (Carnevale & Fujita, 2016;Fujita et al, 2006;Fujita & Han, 2009) and such goal-related myopia is associated not only to various health-related self-regulatory issues (Chiou et al, 2013;Fujita et al, 2006;Fujita & Han, 2009) but also to economic decision-making such as delay discounting, as indicated by an emerging body of evidence (e.g., Bischoff & Hansen, 2016;Fujita et al, 2006;Malkoc et al 2010;Yi et al, 2017). It is believed that high delay discounting, that is, high impulsivity or impatient behavior contributes to a person's adverse economic situation or traps the person in the poverty cycle (Carvalho, 2010;Epper et al, 2019;Farah and Hook, 2017;Haushofer and Fehr, 2019).…”