Social functioning ability and consumer behavior

This research explores how the ability to interact with people, i.e., social functioning ability, impacts consumers' behavior in socially crowded shopping environments. Additionally, we attempted to manipulate short-term social functioning ability.

The main focus of this research is to examine how individuals with different levels of social functioning ability react to varying degrees of social crowdedness in different consumption environments. Our findings indicate that consumers who are less proficient at socially interacting with people are more sensitive to socially crowded shopping environments compared to those who are better at social interactions. Furthermore, we discovered that individuals who struggle with social interactions express less preference for social shopping environments. We delve into the underlying theoretical structures that explain these results.

Moreover, our research provides preliminary evidence supporting the plausibility of manipulating people's short-term social functioning ability by adjusting their social anxiety levels. Additionally, we attempted to manipulate the amount of social cognitive resources to influence individuals' short-term social functioning ability.