2.8 Spark Creativity

International travel by U.S. consumers has steadily been on the rise in recent years, now surpassing pre-Covid numbers (NTTO, 2024; Rossman & Gage, 2024). However, 23% of U.S. consumers still have not traveled internationally (Wike, Fetterolf, Fagan, & Gubbala, 2023). The goal of universities should be to prepare students to enter the workforce, both domestically and internationally. One way to incorporate international travel benefits with workplace preparedness is through student participation in a study abroad program. Because of this, the goal of this study is to investigate student attitudes and behaviors toward study abroad programs.

This study explores gratitude's effect on narcissism, conspicuous consumption, and compulsive consumption. Though gratitude appears ineffective in mitigating narcissism or conspicuous consumption, it poses promise for attenuating compulsive consumption. Gender nuances in expressing gratitude for recovery warrant exploration. Results suggest gratitude's therapeutic potential value for consumers struggling with compulsive consumption.

Although ample attention has been given to creative ads that fragrance brands deploy to remain competitive, how to craft creative fragrance descriptions, particularly online, remains overlooked. One potential avenue to do so is storytelling, a powerful technique to influence consumers' purchases. Building on the creativity and storytelling literatures, we investigate how and why storytelling can be used to craft creative online fragrance descriptions to enhance purchase intentions. Results from secondary data analysis and experiments indicate that online fragrance descriptions using a storytelling technique (vs. not) are perceived as more novel. However, not all novel stories boost fragrance purchase intentions equally. As compared to stories not focused on how a fragrance smells, the stories involving the properties of scent, the primary evaluative criterion of a fragrance, are more effective, because they evoke more vivid mental images of scent, becoming more meaningful for consumers and resulting in higher purchase intentions.