1 Effect of Future Choices on Current Preferences

based on dissertation research and the manuscript is currently being revised. Please do not cite without permission. 2 Although consumers in the real world often make a number of similar choices, most consumer research has focused on preferences when each choice is made in isolation. Present research examines the effects of viewing a choice as one of a series of similar choices rather than as an isolated choice. I propose that viewing a choice in the context of similar future choices provides people with a guilt-reducing justification to exert less self-control in the present choice by allowing them to optimistically believe that they will be able to exercise more self-control in future choices. Specifically, the paper shows that (1) in a choice between a relative vice (e.g., a cookie) and a relative virtue (e.g., a plain fat-free yogurt) the choice share of the vice increases when the decision is presented as one of a series of similar future choices than if the same choice is viewed in isolation, and (2) the overall choice share of a vice increases when decisions are seen in connection with similar future choices. Several additional studies are conducted to validate the proposed role of optimistic beliefs and guilt about future choices as well as the mediating role of guilt in the effect of future choices on current preferences. 3 1