Maintaining the Order : How Does Social Crowding Promote Minimalistic Consumption Behavior

Despite that minimalism come has come to the forefront of contemporary consumer culture, neither its antecedents nor the psychological process that drives the minimalistic consumption behavior has yet been systematically established in extant literature. This study documents a novel effect of social crowding, one common environmental cue, on minimalistic consumption behavior. Across three experimental studies, we suggested that exposing to the social crowding situation motivated consumers to engage in minimalistic consumption as a means of coping with the experience of chaos and maintaining their psychological need for order. Furthermore, we demonstrated that the uncovered effects did not occur when the crowding environment is composed of familiar in-group members. The findings of this study provide some novel sights to current literature as well as implications for corporations seeking to promote the minimalistic consumption by manipulating shopping atmospheric elements