Competitive Mindset: Does Scarcity Call for Selfishness?

Scarcity is a prevalent condition that characterizes human existence. Mankind has regularly experienced periods of famine and draught (Chakravarthy and Booth 2004), modern economies often must cope with economic recessions (Griskevicius et al. 2013) and even in resource-rich environments it is common to encounter cues that emphasize the limited nature of products and resources (Cialdini 2009; Gitlin 2007). As a consequence, consumers often think about, worry about and discuss scarcity-related concerns (Twist and Barker 2006). However, in spite of the prevalence of cues and cognitions related to scarcity, little is known about the psychological processes that result when the concept of scarcity is activated in the mind of the consumer, and further what implications those processes might have for decision making (Shah et al., 2011). This research investigates how activating the concept of scarcity affects consumers’ propensity to behave selfishly in subsequent, unrelated tasks. We draw from research in social and evolutionary psychology (Hill et al. 2012; Griskevicius et al. 2013) to predict that when the concept of scarcity is activated, people’s decision making will be guided by a focus on advancing their own welfare, relative to that of others. We argue that this occurs due to an underlying shift towards a competitive mindset. Our theoretical framework also predicts that activating the concept of scarcity can cause people to become more generous with others, but only in settings where the associated benefits to the self are highlighted (e.g., charitable giving in order to gain status, Griskevicius, Tybur, and van den Bergh 2010).