Cut me some slack! How perceptions of financial slack influence pain of payment

Abstract

Consumers often experience pain of payment, a tug of negative affect that holds back their spending. While the literature has long viewed pain of payment as self-regulatory in nature, it has left the dynamics of self-regulation that lead to the pain of paying largely unaddressed. In self-regulation, affect arises when people move away from a goal they hold. Thus, understanding the specific goals that people consider when making a payment can help us better predict when pain of payment will arise. We propose that people have a goal to maintain financial slack, and that violating this goal contributes to pain of payment. Thus, people experience more pain of payment when the goal to maintain financial slack is stronger or when it is particularly salient that a purchase entails losing financial slack. Critically, subjective changes in financial slack are not equivalent to objective changes in wealth, altering pain of payment for economically equivalent trades. This research contributes to the existing literature by identifying a novel antecedent to the pain of payment. It additionally expands our understanding of people's preferences between payment systems. Finally, it offers guidance to practitioners who wish to minimize pain of payment among their consumers.