Savoring through Avoidance: Identity-based Strategic Memory Protection

Today marketers are keenly aware that our memories of a consumption experience can greatly impact whether we will consume a product or experience again in the future. Yet, there is very little consumer research about how memories of identity-related experiences will impact consumers’ future identity-related consumption choices. We build on the idea of strategic memory protection (Zauberman et al. 2008) and propose that consumers will protect identity-relevant memories to help reinforce that identity. The protection of identity-related memories is likely due to the critical role of identity in consumer self-conception. Salient experiences related to one’s romantic identity or friend identity are almost by definition special and valued. Moreover, consumers tend to revisit these memories when the relevant identity is activated, as in “interactions with important others (e.g., friends or loved ones) or momentous events (e.g., graduations, child birth)” (Wildschut et al. 2006). Thus, it should hold that we do not just protect special memories but we protect the memories experienced with special people. One method consumers use to protect strong identities is to delay new experiences that could potentially weaken the link between memory and identity. Such delays allow consumers to savor the memory and thereby reinforce the identity. Although some consumer research has examined the effect of delayed consumption of products on evaluations of enjoyment through the process of savoring (Chew and Ho 1994; Lovallo and Kahneman 2000; Nowlis et al. 2004), and other research has begun to connect identity and memory (Mercurio and Forehand 2011), the identity reinforcement related motivation and process is important yet understudied (Reed II et al. 2012).