Power and Need-for-Justification: Asymmetrical Effects on Senders and Receivers in Marketing Communications
研究发现权力感对消费者有不对称影响：高权力发送者减少信息搜索和理性论证，使用更简洁语言；而高权力接收者则要求他人提供更多支持。基于正当性需求机制，研究还揭示了边界条件。
Abstract This research reveals how a fundamental and pervasive psychological state, feeling powerful, asymmetrically impacts consumers’ construction of and response to communications. For senders, power reduces consumers’ need-for-justification and lowers the degree of support they seek and use to construct their communications. This lowered degree of support is evidenced by reduced information search, the use of fewer rational-based arguments, and a greater reliance on more concise language. In contrast, for receivers, power increases consumers’ expectations for others to justify their positions. As a result, high-power receivers require a greater degree of support in communications from others. Based on a need-for-justification mechanism, the current work derives and demonstrates theoretically driven boundary conditions (e.g., attenuation when a heightened need-for-justification or support already exists) of this relationship. Together, these results provide new insights into how power influences consumers’ need-for-justification and how this need affects the ways that consumers construct and respond to communications.