1999/02/01 by Jennifer L. Aaker, Jennifer Aaker · 582 citations
Business, Management and Accounting · Psychology · Social Sciences · #Behavioral Health and Interventions #Big Five personality traits #Consumer Behavior in Brand Consumption and Identification #Personality #Persuasion #Psychology #Salient #Self-enhancement #Set (abstract data type) #Situational ethics #Social and Intergroup Psychology #Social psychology
paper · doi:10.1177/002224379903600104
published in Journal of Marketing Research 36(1), 45-57 (SAGE Publishing)
openalex publication_date 1999/02/01 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/07/31
Considerable research in consumer experimental psychology has examined the self-expressive role of brands but has found little support for the premise that the interaction of the personality traits associated with a brand and those associated with an individual's self-concept influence attitudes. The current research focuses on the influence of the malleable self-concept on consumer attitudes toward a brand, based on the its personality associations. The results of two experiments demonstrate that traits that are made accessible by salient situational cues and those that are chronically accessible (schematic traits) positively influence consumer attitudes toward a brand based on its personality associations. More important, these effects are tested in a set of theory-based interactions that rely on the self-monitoring individual difference variable. Self congruity is enhanced for low versus high self-monitoring subjects, whereas situation congruity is enhanced for high versus low self-monitoring subjects. Together, these experiments shed light on the self-expressive use of brands and the role of the malleable self-concept in influencing consumer attitudes.