Economics Insights @ CBS

Research on symbolic consumption and status signaling has primarily examined how consumers spend money on possessions that display their identity and status. We review research suggesting that the way in which consumers spend their time can also serve as a form of conspicuous consumption. In particular, we examine status inferences based on how consumers allocate time between work and leisure, and how consumers choose to spend their discretionary leisure time.

We examine how signals of a candidate’s capability affect perceptions of that person’s commitment to an employer. In four experimental studies that use hiring managers as subjects, we test and show that managers perceive highly capable candidates to have lower commitment to the organization than less capable but adequate candidates and, as a result, penalize high-capability candidates in the hiring process.

Consumer robots are predicted to be employed in a variety of customer-facing situations. As these robots are designed to look and behave like humans, consumers attribute human traits to them—a phenomenon known as the “Eliza Effect.” In four experiments, we show that the anthropomorphism of a consumer robot increases psychological warmth but decreases attitudes, due to uncanniness. Competence judgments are much less affected and not subject to a decrease in attitudes.