1 BELIEVING IN FIRST MOVER ADVANTAGE

Keh, Guanghua School of Management, for their assistance during the research, and to Wesley J. Hutchinson and Dawn Iacobucci, The Wharton School, for their feedback on an earlier version of this manuscript. 2 BELIEVING IN FIRST MOVER ADVANTAGE This research investigates the origin of first-mover beliefs, arguing that the success of the idea of first mover advantage in the social marketplace of ideas is rooted in cultural beliefs and personal experience that favor “first-ness”. Beliefs in first mover advantage dominate the mainstream media despite mixed evidence in the academic literature (study 1A), and exposure to the business press is associated with increased belief in first mover advantage (study 1B). Indeed, first mover beliefs appear rooted in culture: first mover beliefs are enhanced by priming American culture (study 2A) and are more favorable among American versus Chinese respondents (study 2B). Subsequent experimental work confirms that even naïve subjects exhibit spontaneous beliefs in first mover advantage. Such spontaneous beliefs are as strong as beliefs reported after considering self-generated or presente