Discount now or later? The effect of payment framing on consumer preferences for discount timing in periodic payments
研究发现，当折扣以与订阅价格相同单位（如金额）呈现时，消费者更偏好延迟折扣，因为这会让他们预期未来价格更低；若折扣以不同单位（如百分比）呈现，则偏好立即折扣。
Abstract Consistent with the standard model of time discounting, subscription firms typically offer introductory discounts early in the subscription. However, we demonstrate that consumers are more likely to prefer a delayed discount when the discount is expressed in the same unit as the recurring price (e.g., “$10, $10, $5”). The identical framing leads consumers to perceive the payments as a coherent sequence, making it easier to identify an improving pattern and project it forward, thereby lowering expectations of the post‐promotion price. By contrast, when the discount is framed differently from the recurring price (e.g., “$10, $10, 50% off”), it is perceived as a segregated gain, and consumers revert to the standard preference for immediate benefits. Across four studies, we demonstrate this effect using actual online click‐through behavior (Study 1) and identify the underlying mechanism: the preference for delayed discounts arises from lower future price expectations driven by sequence‐continuation inferences (Study 2). Consistent with this account, the effect disappears when the basis for this inference is removed—either by disclosing the renewal price (Study 3) or by disrupting sequence coherence (Study 4). Four supplementary studies further generalize the findings across product categories and narrative pricing displays and rule out several alternative explanations.