The current research examines the relationship between crowding and consumers’ responsiveness to sales promotions. Six studies show that the experience and feeling of crowdedness reduce the impact of sales promotions, demonstrating that consumers’ product/service purchase intention changes to a lesser extent in response to such promotions. This effect is found to be driven by consumers shifting their attention from the external environment to their internal feelings and thoughts when experiencing crowdedness. As a result, consumers rely more on their internal feelings and thoughts than on external cues in judgment, and consequently their purchase intention becomes less susceptible to external sales promotion information. In addition, this effect is found to be attenuated in situations where product attitudes are detached from consumers’ own preferences, such as in the context of gift choices, and when the experience of crowding is not aversive (e.g., watching an exciting football game in a bar).

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- PhD: The Chinese University of Hong Kong
- MPhil: The Chinese University of Hong Kong
- Bachelor: Sun Yat-Sen University
Zhongqiang (Tak) Huang joined the University of Hong Kong in 2017. He is generally interested in the effects of the emotions and feelings that individuals happen to be experiencing at the time they make a product decision on the nature of this decision.
- Emotions and feelings about different points in time (e.g., nostalgia, death anxiety)
- Mortality salience and consumer behavior
- Metacognitive processes in consumer behavior
- Variety-seeking behavior
- Fan, Linying (Sophie), Zhongqiang (Tak) Huang, Xing-Yu (Marcos) Chu, and Yuwei Jiang (2024), “Stick to My Guns: The Impact of Crowding on Consumers’ Responsiveness to Sale Promotions,” Journal of the Academy of Marketing Science, 52, 914–33.
- Liang, Yitian (Sky), Zhongqiang (Tak) Huang, and Lei Su (2023), “Too Time-Crunched to Seek Variety: The Influence of Parenting Motivation on Consumer Variety Seeking,” Journal of Marketing Research, 60(4), 812–33. (Equal Authorship)
- Tang, Yangyi (Eric), Zhongqiang (Tak) Huang, and Lei Su (2023), “The Influence of Event-Time (vs. Clock-Time) Scheduling Style on Satiation,” Journal of Consumer Psychology, 33(1), 123-32. (Equal Authorship)
- Yin, Yunlu and Zhongqiang (Tak) Huang (2022), “Social-Jetlagged Consumers and Decreased Conspicuous Consumption,” Journal of Consumer Research, 49(4), 616–33. (Equal Authorship)
- Huang, Zhongqiang (Tak), Yitian (Sky) Liang, Charles B. Weinberg, and Gerald J. Gorn (2019), “The Sleepy Consumer and Variety Seeking,” Journal of Marketing Research, 56 (2), 179-96.
- Huang, Zhongqiang (Tak), Xun (Irene) Huang, and Yuwei Jiang (2018), “The Impact of Death-Related Media Information on Consumer Value Orientation and Scope Sensitivity,” Journal of Marketing Research, 55 (3), 432-45. (Equal Authorship)
- Huang, Xun (Irene), Zhongqiang (Tak) Huang, and Robert S. Wyer, Jr. (2018), “The Influence of Social Crowding on Brand Attachment,” Journal of Consumer Research, 44 (5), 1068-84.
- Huang, Xun (Irene), Zhongqiang (Tak) Huang, and Robert S. Wyer, Jr. (2016), “Slowing Down in the Good Old Days: The Effect of Nostalgia on Consumer Patience,” Journal of Consumer Research, 43 (3), 372-87.
- Huang, Zhongqiang (Tak) and Jessica Y. Y. Kwong (2016), “Illusion of Variety: Lower Readability Enhances Perceived Variety,” International Journal of Research in Marketing, 33 (3), 674-87.
- Huang, Zhongqiang (Tak) and Robert S. Wyer, Jr. (2015), “Diverging Effects of Mortality Salience on Variety Seeking: The Different Roles of Death Anxiety and Semantic Concept Activation,” Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, 58, 112-23.
Parenting motivation, the inspiration and drive to take care of one’s children, is regarded as a powerful instinct for facilitating human reproduction. In a set of hypotheses, the authors address how, why, and among whom parenting motivation affects a pervasive decision-making tendency, namely variety seeking. Six studies, including a large-scale panel data study and five online and lab studies, show that parenting motivation spurs feelings of time crunch that further result in less variety seeking among consumers. The effect is diminished when time-saving parenting support exists (which reduces feelings of time crunch in parenting), when consumers are led to believe that they have sufficient time available for shopping, or when they do not have much loyalty to any brand offered in the choice set and thus cannot save time by simply choosing the top-of-mind product option. The current research thus contributes to the growing literature on how parenting motivation affects consumer decision making. In addition, it augments the literature on variety seeking by identifying an important factor that can influence it.
消費者經常需要規劃不同的活動。採用時鐘時間作規劃方式的消費者會根據外部時間線索(例如時鐘)決定何時從一項活動過渡到下一項活動,而採用事件時間作規劃方式的消費者傾向於執行每項活動,直到他們內心覺得活動已完成。是項研究指出消費者的日程規劃方式(時鐘時間方式對比事件時間方式)會影響他們對重複消費的滿足感。四項涉及不同領域(如音樂、藝術品、食物)的實際消費研究發現,採用事件時間作規劃方式比採用時鐘時間作規劃方式會更快令消費者在重複消費中感到厭倦,因為採用事件時間規劃方式的消費者更關注自我感受。研究結果進一步顯示,當消費者分神或得悉其他影響消費刺激的線索時,會減弱日程規劃方式在重複消費方面所帶來的厭倦感。




