Consumers are often exposed to recurrent temptations that might threaten the achievement of their long‐term goals (e.g., savings, diet), and while they might initially resist the temptation, they may find that with the passage of time, they eventually indulge in the goal‐conflicting act. In such instances, does the ultimate goal failure undermine consumers' perceptions of self‐control, or does the mere act of delaying the goal transgression serve to buffer against negative self‐views? In the current research, we term delayed goal failure the sequence of events whereby a consumer initially resists a goal‐conflicting temptation, but upon subsequent exposure to the same temptation, follows through with the goal transgression. Our findings show that delayed (vs. immediate) goal failure allows consumers to maintain positive perceptions of self‐control, particularly when the cause of failure is unspecified (i.e., open to interpretation), allowing consumers to interpret their ultimate decision as thought‐through and justified. Finally, our findings reveal a positive downstream effect of delayed (vs. immediate) goal failure on subsequent self‐regulation, and identify positive perceptions of self‐control as the underlying driver of this effect.

中文翻译：

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在等待中获得回报：延迟目标失败对自我感知和自我调节的影响

消费者经常会遭受反复的诱惑，这可能会威胁到实现其长期目标（例如，储蓄，饮食），尽管他们最初可能会抵制诱惑，但他们可能会发现，随着时间的流逝，他们最终会沉迷于与目标冲突的行为。在这种情况下，最终的目标失败是否会破坏消费者对自我控制的认识，还是仅仅延迟目标违规行为就可以起到消极消极自我观的作用？在当前的研究中，我们称延迟目标失败消费者最初抵制与目标冲突的诱惑，但随后又受到相同诱惑的事件序列，随之而来的是目标违规。我们的研究结果表明，延迟（相对于即时）目标失败使消费者保持积极的自我控制感，特别是在失败原因未明（即可以解释）的情况下，这使消费者将最终的决定解释为经过深思熟虑的行为。和合理的。最后，我们的发现揭示了延迟（相对于即刻）目标失败对后续自我调节的积极下游影响，并确定了自我控制的积极观念是这种影响的潜在驱动力。