ABSTRACT

Nowadays companies are increasingly engaging in social-political issues. In light of the Construal Level Theory, this study examined the polarizing/depolarizing effects of perceived psychological distance on consumers’ expectation of corporate social advocacy and evaluations among consumers from different partisan identities. A between-subjects experiment (N = 296) with a continuous independent variable – perceived psychological distance – was employed. The study found that consumers with a closer perceived psychological distance to the company tended to have a higher expectation of corporate social advocacy. However, perceptions of psychological distance resulted in mixed effects regarding people’s attitudes and buycott/boycott intentions, where consumer-company identification mediated these relationships. Theoretical and practical implications are discussed.

摘要

如今，公司越来越多地参与社会政治问题。根据解释水平理论，本研究考察了感知心理距离对不同党派身份的消费者对企业社会宣传的期望和评价的极化/去极化效应。受试者间实验（N= 296）具有连续自变量——感知心理距离——被采用。研究发现，与公司心理距离较近的消费者往往对企业社会倡导的期望更高。然而，对心理距离的感知对人们的态度和购买/抵制意图产生了混合影响，其中消费者-公司识别在这些关系中起到了中介作用。讨论了理论和实践意义。