The Effect Of Basic Psychological Need And Subjective Social Class On Impact Bias Of Consumption Decisions

Previous studies have found that people tend to have different degrees of impact bias when making consumption decisions.According to self-determination theory,the needs of autonomy,competence and relatedness should be considered in the understanding of motivation.It emphasizes that the basic psychological needs are the necessary conditions for the complete psychological growth.When the basic psychological needs are met,the internal motivation will be enhanced.According to previous studies,different social classes occupy different social resources and require different levels of psychological needs.Accordingly,its consumption level and behavior also exist difference.When individuals of different subjective social classes face different basic psychological needs,will their emotional prediction bias in consumption decisions be affected? This study combined the basic psychological need theory in self-determination theory with the subjective social class to explore its impact on the impact bias in consumption decisions through three experiments.Experiment One took 120 college students as participants,and took the formula,2(subjective social class: high social class/low social class)× 2(autonomic need:autonomic need was satisfied/autonomic need wasn’t satisfied),as the experimental design.This study initiated the subjective social class of the participants through the subjective social class initiating materials,and initiated the autonomic needs of the participants with chocolate as the consumer product,in order to explore the influence of autonomic needs and subjectve social class on impact bias of consumption decisions.Finally,it was found that when the autonomic need of individuals in the high social class was satisfied,it was easier to overestimate their emotional experience,the impact bias was the largest,and the consumer’s willingness to purchase was greatest.Experiment Two took 120 college students as participants,and took the formula,2(subjective social class: high social class/low social class)× 2(competence need:competence need was satisfied/competence need wasn’t satisfied),as the experimental design.This study initiated the subjective social class of the participants through the subjective social class initiating materials,and initiated the competence needs of the participants with English test materials,in order to explore the impact of competenceneeds and subjectve social class on impact bias of consumption decisions.Finally,it was found that when the competence need of individuals in the high social class was satisfied,it was easier to overestimate their emotional experience,the impact bias was the largest,and the consumer’s willingness to purchase was greatest.Experiment Three took 120 college students as participants,and took the formula,2(subjective social class: high social class/low social class)× 2(relatedness need:relatedness need was satisfied/relatedness need wasn’t satisfied),as the experimental design.This study initiated the subjective social class of the participants through the subjective social class initiating materials,and initiated the relatedness needs of the participants with virtual voting,in order to explore the impact of relatedness needs and subjectve social class on impact bias of consumption decisions.Finally,it was found that when the relatedness need of individuals in the low social classes was satisfied,it was easier to overestimate their emotional experience,the impact bias was the largest,and consumers’ willingness to purchase was greatest.This study helps us to understand the essence and process of impact bias more deeply,promote the theoretical construction of affective forecasting research,further enrich the domestic empirical research on impact bias,and enrich the related theory of basic psychological needs and subjectve social class of human beings.The research results can also be applied to the consume field,aiming at different products and consumers,formulate different marketing plans.Moreover,it is more conducive to helping consumers set up correct consumption concepts and make correct consumption decisions.Therefore,it has great theoretical and practical significance.