Variety-seeking as an emotional coping strategy for chronically indecisive consumers

The present research provides evidence that variety-seeking is a generalized emotional coping strategy for chronically indecisive consumers. Recent research reveals that (1) chronic indecisiveness is associated with increased variety-seeking behavior and (2) chronically indecisive consumers (vs. not) feel more positive after choosing a mix of products. The present research demonstrates that chronically indecisive consumers' increased tendency to seek variety can be further inflated by inducing them to experience negative emotion unrelated to the choice task. This finding is directly at odds with past research that has repeatedly found an increasing effect of positive emotion on variety-seeking behavior. The present research shows that this effect does not hold for chronically indecisive consumers, who variety-seek even more when made to feel negative.