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This paper aims to examine how exposure to sexual images activates the urge to yield to temptation in a subsequent unrelated context.

In Study 1, this paper uses empirical data based on an automobile expo to examine the correlational relationship between sexual imagery and indulgence. In Studies 2 and 3, this study examines the moderating effects of self-construal and gender differences on indulgent consumption, with different dependent measures. Study 4 distinguishes the sexual images into gratuitous sex and romantic love and tests the mediating role of sensation seeking.

For men, an independent self-construal increases indulgent consumption. In contrast, an interdependent self-construal facilitates women’s indulgent consumption. Having an interdependent self-construal has the opposite impact on indulgent consumption for the two genders: sexual images of romantic love attenuate the effect on men but boost the effect on women. Perceived sensation-seeking serves as the underlying mechanism.

This paper contributes to the literature on sex, reward-processing, context effects in marketing and indulgent consumption.

Advertisers, retailers, food courts and restaurants may use sexual imagery to promote more indulgent consumption with gender and self-construal as segmentation variables. Public policymakers and other concerned parties should also raise consumers’ awareness of the priming effect found in this research.

This research advances the literature on sex by demonstrating the priming effects of sexual imagery and further considers the simultaneous impacts of gender and self-construal on consumers’ subsequent indulgent consumption.

Cause‐related marketing (CRM), the practice of donating money to a charity for each consumer purchase, has become an important part of corporate philanthropy. This research seeks to explore two types of product‐cause fit in CRM, and examine whether the selection of consistent‐fit and complementary‐fit causes could be influenced by product type and donation level.

An experiment in conjoint design was conducted based on a computer‐based survey involving 512 choice‐based conjoint interviews.

It is found that consumers are more likely to choose a hedonic product offering a donation with a complementary‐fit cause. In contrast, individuals tend to prefer a utilitarian product with a consistent‐fit cause. Beneficial effects of a complementary‐fit cause are enhanced when the donation level is high.

This paper is one of the first to present comprehensive qualitative analyses of consumer behavior with regard to product‐cause fit with diversity of products and situations. It provides more fruitful results than simple willingness‐to‐buy studies or direct inquires into people's attitudes toward CRM used in previous research, since less socially desired answers are obtained by taking an indirect approach to discovering consumer preferences. The paper raises concerns over the understanding of product‐cause fit and how exactly it works, especially with regard to sponsoring a cause that is complementary to the product image.