Embarrassment in Consumer Purchase: The Roles of Social Presence and Purchase Familiarity

Two field studies investigate the importance of social presence (real and imagined) and familiarity with the purchase act in producing embarrassment in the context of an embarrassing product purchase. The results indicate that awareness of a social presence during purchase selection and commitment, whether real or imagined, is a motivating factor in creating embarrassment for the consumer. Further, our results show that the more familiar consumers are with an embarrassing product purchase, the less embarrassed they are likely to feel. Familiarity with an embarrassing product purchase is also shown to have implications for the effect of social presence. That is, familiarity with purchase acts as a moderator for the relationship of real social presence and embarrassment by reducing the influence of the social presence. In the context of an imagined social presence, purchase familiarity is shown to reduce the likelihood of imagining. These findings are integrated into a discussion of the theoretical implications and the potential avenues for future research in the area. Copyright 2001 by the University of Chicago.