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EMAC 2024 Annual


Socially Safe on Smartphones: How Smartphone Use Reduces Social Risk Taking
(A2024-119738)

Published: May 28, 2024

AUTHORS

Diogo Koch Alves, Bayes Business School; Ana Valenzuela, Baruch College, CUNY

ABSTRACT

Consumers are often faced with decisions that carry a degree of social risk, with uncertain outcomes (i.e., reactions by others) that could impact their social standing. Examples include choosing the ideal outfit to wear to an upcoming party or selecting a gift to give to a friend. Given the prevalence of smartphones in consumer decision making, we investigate the effect of smartphone use on social risk taking. Across seven studies, we find that smartphone use, relative to the use of a PC, results in a lower propensity to make socially risky decisions. We propose that one’s smartphone, by increasing the salience of one’s social relationships, decreases the need for affiliation, and lowers the perceived benefits associated with social risk taking. This effect holds across a variety of consumption and social media scenarios. The findings contribute to the literature on consumer risk taking and consumer-technology interactions and offer practical insights for digital marketing and mobile retailing strategies.