Talk 1: Reflecting on the Reflection Effect

Kristen Duke (presenter), Rotman, University of Toronto

Daniel Mochon, Tulane University

On Amir, Rady School of Management, UC San Diego

Individuals tend to be risk averse in gains and risk seeking in losses, a pattern termed the reflection effect. This is typically attributed to the curvature of the value function—that is, how individuals process payoffs. Instead, we implicate how individuals process probabilities. Six experiments show that changing from percentages to probability representations that are easier to mentally simulate (e.g., the outcome of a die roll) can weaken and even eliminate the classic reflection effect. This occurs in part because people judge easier-to-simulate risky outcomes as more likely, encouraging risk-taking among gains and risk aversion among losses.

Talk 2: How Relative Distance from Fundraising Goals Can Enhance Charitable Giving

Rishad Habib (presenter), Ted Rogers of Management, Ryerson

David J. Hardisty, Sauder School of Business, UBC

Katherine White, Sauder School of Business, UBC

Crowdfunding platforms allow individuals to compare several different projects when deciding which one to support. Research on the goal gradient effect predicts that people will contribute more to projects that are closer to reaching their goals. However, we demonstrate that when individuals are asked to choose between two similar charities, as is common in digital giving, they donate more to the charity that is further from its goal. This occurs because joint evaluations highlight the relative need of the organization further from its goal, compelling consumers to donate to it.

Talk 3: The Signals We Give: Gender, Feedback, and Competition

Alexander Coutts (presenter), Schulich School of Business, York U

Boon Han Koh, University of East Anglia

Zahra Murad, University of Portsmouth

Giving feedback to others in workplace and academic environments is both ubiquitous and a powerful tool. Yet, do those tasked with giving feedback, such as managers, pass it on to those who need it? In a stylized online experiment, we ask managers to give performance feedback to workers who decide whether to enter a tournament. Contrary to our theoretical benchmark, managers withhold a substantial fraction of information – even when feedback would be positive. Finally, though there is no overall difference in the proportion of feedback withheld from women, feedback nonetheless exacerbates the gender-competition gap.

Talk 4: The Value of Behaviourally-Informed Financial Advice

David R. Lewis (presenter) BEworks

Kelly Peters, BEworks

Nate Barr, BEworks

Sarah Carpentier, BEworks

Pierre-Jean Malé, BEworks

The decision to seek and follow expert advice when making decisions is not well understood. Despite the fact professional financial advice is associated with more normatively optimal financial decision-making and enhanced well-being, a minority of people seek and follow advice. In an investment decision-making simulation experiment, we explore barriers to seeking and following advice, we show the value of such advice, and successfully apply behavioural science to encourage more people to seek and follow professional financial advice to achieve better financial outcomes.

Talk 5: Why Recipients Don’t Appreciate Expensive Gifts: The Role of Suspicion

Aybike Mutluoglu (presenter), Smith School of Business, Queen’s

Laurence Ashworth, Smith School of Business, Queen’s

Nicole Robitaille, Smith School of Business, Queen’s

Prior work on gift-giving shows that recipients are surprisingly insensitive to the amount of money givers spend on gifts (Flynn & Adam, 2009). Given that more expensive gifts represent a greater investment on the part of the giver and impart greater value to recipients, we suggest that recipients’ apparent indifference may be explained by competing reactions to gift expense. Across four studies, we show that gift expense can cause recipients to become suspicious that givers possess ulterior motives, which undermines recipients’ otherwise positive reactions to more expensive gifts. We show that this occurs because of money’s association with instrumentality.

Talk 6: Professional Employees’ Voluntary Furlough Decisions

Leslie Berger, Wilfrid Laurier University

Lan Guo, Wilfred Laurier University

Kelsey Matthews (presenter), Wilfred Laurier University

To reduce operating costs during the Covid-19 pandemic, many professional firms implemented voluntary furloughs, where employees were invited to accept a reduction in pay with a corresponding reduction in work hours. Scant research has examined voluntary furloughs and how employees approach the volunteering decision. Guided by the Theory of Planned Behaviour (Ajzen 1991), we examine beliefs that impact professional employees’ volunteering intention. Study 1, a survey conducted among 100 professional accountants, explores factors they considered when offered a voluntary furlough. Study 2, a case-based experiment conducted among 162 professional workers, examines two firm actions that may influence furlough volunteering intention.

Talk 7: Meal Typicality and Consumer Decisions to Engage with Social Media Content: An Examination of Restaurants’ Use of Instagram

Matthew Philp (presenter), Ted Rogers School of Management, Ryerson

Jenna Jacobson, Ted Rogers School of Management, Ryerson

Ethan Pancer, Sobey School of Business, Saint Mary’s University

Aiming to stand out, restaurants often offer elaborate foods designed to be “Instagrammable.” This study examines how visual characteristics of food relates to consumer decisions to engage with social media content. Results demonstrate that food images that are more confidently recognized by Google Cloud Vision (a proxy for meal typicality) is positively associated with social media engagement. A follow-up experiment shows that exposure to typical appearing foods elevates positive affect, suggesting they are easier to mentally process, which subsequently drives engagement. Therefore, contrary to current restaurant industry trends, it is more normal appearing foods that receive more social media engagement.

Talk 8: That’s an Overreaction!” Emotional Displays on Social Media In Response To Objectionable Advertisements

Saeid Kermani (presenter), Schulich School of Business, York U

Peter R. Darke, Schulich School of Business, York U

This work examines consumers’ evaluations of brands that face social media backlash in response to potentially offensive advertisements and how the emotional tone of negative social media comments can influence these evaluations. This research focuses on two common types of emotional displays on social media: anger and humor. Two studies provide evidence that humorous comments expressing disapproval of mildly offensive advertising are more likely to influence consumers to evaluate the brand negatively than angry comments. We further find that the underlying mechanism explaining this effect is the greater perceived appropriateness of humorous comments than angry comments.