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Journal of Consumer Research, Inc.

Super Size Me: Product Size as a Signal of Status Author(s): David Dubois, Derek D. Rucker, Adam D. Galinsky Reviewed work(s): Source: Journal of Consumer Research, Vol. 38, No. 6 (April 2012), pp. 1047-1062 Published by: The University of Chicago Press Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/10.1086/661890 . Accessed: 12/03/2012 06:12
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Super Size Me: Product Size as a Signal of Status
DAVID DUBOIS DEREK D. RUCKER ADAM D. GALINSKY
This researchproposes that consumers’ preference for supersized food and drinks may have roots in the status-signaling value of larger options. An initial experiment found that consumers view larger-sized options within a set as having greater status. Because low-power consumers desire status, we manipulated power to test our core propositions. Whether induced in the lab or in the field, states of powerlessness ledindividuals to disproportionately choose larger food options from an assortment. Furthermore, this preference for larger-sized options was enhanced when consumption was public, reversed when the size-to-status relationship was negative (i.e., smaller was equated with greater status), and mediated by consumers’ need for status. This research demonstrates that choosing a product on the basis of itsrelative size allows consumers to signal status, illustrates the consequences of such a choice for consumers’ food consumption, and highlights the central role of a product category’s size-to-status relationship in driving consumer choice.

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ne of the most alarming statistics of food consumption is the 32% rate of obesity within the United States. And obesity is expected to continue itsprecipitous increase so that by 2015, 41% of U.S. adults will be obese, with an astonishing 75% overweight (Wang and Beydoun 2007). These figures are all the more problematic in that the rise in obesity rates has mostly affected vulnerable populations, such as lower socioeconomic status individuals (McLaren 2007; Puhl, Heuer, and Brownell 2010). Although there are likely multiple contributing culpritsto this disturbing phe-

David Dubois (duboisd@hec.fr) is assistant professor of marketing, HEC Paris, 1 rue de la Liberation, 78351 Jouy-en-Josas cedex, France. Derek ´ D. Rucker (d-rucker@kellogg.northwestern.edu) is associate professor of marketing, Kellogg School of Management, Northwestern University, 2001 Sheridan Road, Evanston, IL 60208. Adam D. Galinsky (agalinsky@kellogg.northwestern.edu) is the Morris and Alice Kaplan Professor of Ethics and Decision in Management, Kellogg School of Management, Northwestern University, 2001 Sheridan Road, Evanston, IL 60208. The authors are grateful to the editor, the associate editor, and the JCR reviewers for their many valuable comments and suggestions. In addition, the authors thank participants in seminars at Northwestern University andthe Ohio State University for their input. Support from the Kellogg School of Management, Northwestern University, is gratefully acknowledged. Baba Shiv served as editor and Pierre Chandon served as associate editor for this article. Electronically published August 17, 2011

nomenon, the food industry has been singled out for the expansion of its food and beverage assortments to include...