All Types of Mortality Salience Are Not Equal:
The Effect of Contemplating Natural versus Unnatural Death on
Materialism Behavior
ABSTRACT
Just as nothing can last forever, people die. However, people die in different ways, for
different reasons, and in different situations. While previous research based on Terror
Management Theory (TMT) argues that Mortality Salience drives individuals to make
different behavioral choices than they otherwise would (for example, previous research has
identified Mortality Salience as an antecedent of materialism behavior), these studies have not
differentiated individuals’ behaviors caused by the contemplating of death in different
possible ways (i.e., unnatural death vs. natural death).
Bringing together Terror Management Theory and Just World Belief, the present
research aims to fulfill this gap by proposing that inducing individuals to contemplate bad
ending of life (unnatural death) will increase their materialism behavior. On the contrary,
inducing individuals to contemplate good ending of life (natural death) will decrease their
materialism behavior. Two experiments adopted from previous research on effect of MS on
materialism were designed to test hypotheses (Kasser & Sheldon, 2000). Our measures tapped
two distinct aspects of materialism – making a great deal of money (Study 1) and consuming
many resources (Study 2).
INTRODUCTION
Just as nothing can last forever, people die. However, people die in different ways and
situations. While previous research based on Terror Management Theory (TMT) argues that
individuals with Mortality Salience (MS) are in general inclined to make different behavioral
choices than they otherwise would (e.g., materialism behaviors, Sheldon & McGregor, 2000),
these studies have not differentiated individuals’ behaviors caused by the contemplating death
in different possible ways (i.e., unnatural death vs. natural death). For example, imagining
death in a car accident and imagining passing away in an easy chair may motivate people to
be engaged in different behaviors. The present research aims to fulfill this gap by proposing
that people as consumers tend to perform different behaviors if they are induced to imagine
different type of death. Specifically, inducing individuals to contemplate bad ending of life
(unnatural death) will increase their materialism behavior. On the contrary, inducing
individuals to contemplate good ending of life (natural death) will decrease their materialism
behavior.
THEORETICAL FRAMEWORK
In this section, we first review previous TMT account of materialism and its
shortcomings. Then, we present our arguments for the effects of contemplating different type
of death (i.e., unnatural death vs. natural death) and respective hypotheses.
The TMT Account of Materialism
Previous TMT research argues that MS induces existential anxiety. The anxiety
motivates people to imbue life with meaning and thus, to derive self-esteem from cultural
beliefs about the nature of reality to maintain the feeling of secure and protected. Because the
virtues of materialistic consumption are deeply woven into the very fabric of American (and
now spreading to many other countries) culture, inducing consumers in these cultures to
contemplate death may motivate them to behave acquisitively (Greenberg, Pyszczynski, &
Solomon, 1986). While Greenberg et al. and their followers’ argument appears to be plausible
in some situations, it seems arbitrary to assume that MS will drive individuals to behave the
same way regardless how they imagine their deaths. To predict their disparate behavior that
may be derived from this comparison, the Just World Theory (JWT) comes into play.
JWT, TMT and Materialism
Just World Theory (JWT). People in general have motivation to believe that the world is
fundamentally just (Lerner, 1998). That is, they tend to believe that good people (especially
themselves) get rewarded and bad people (maybe others) get misfortunes. Since JWT is one
of the universal values people hold, MS in general may increase the importance of
maintaining belief that the world is just (Cai, 2010). We argue that, however, individuals
contemplating bad ending and those contemplating good ending may use different methods to
maintain the just world belief.
Bad Ending Contemplators. When induced to imagine their unfortunate ending, people
simultaneously think that since they are obviously good people, they are treated in an unjust
manner. To maintain the just world belief, they may try to enhance their self-esteem by
improving the quality of life and current well-being (As a good person, I live shorter than
others, but with better quality. So that is fair.). As a result, they are more likely to engage in
materialism behavior in order to compensate.
Good Ending Contemplators. When induced to imagine their passing away peacefully,
people may think that since they are obviously good people, they are actually treated in a
fairly just manner. To this extent, they are less motivated to improve the physical quality of
life in order to enhance the self-esteem. Instead, they tend to enhance the self-esteem by
trying to behave in a “good person” manner. This is because people, although believe they are
generally good, do know that they are not morally perfect (Lerner, 1965). As a result, to build
a better image as a “typical good person”, they are motivated to behave according to social
norms (Festinger, 1956). The line of logic is “I will die in a fairly just way, which identifies
that I am a good person. As a result, I should perform like a good person, not a bad one.” To
this extent, good ending contemplators may search their cultural values that are consistent
with this consideration and use these values to direct their behaviors. If we assume that
“squandering wantonly” is perceived as bad habit, then good ending contemplators may try to
keep away with this behavior and thus, become less materialism-oriented.
H1: Inducing individuals to contemplate bad ending of life (unnatural death) will
increase their materialism behavior.
H2: Inducing individuals to contemplate good ending of life (natural death) will decrease
their materialism behavior.
METHODOLOGY
Two experiments adopted from previous research on effect of MS on materialism were
designed to test hypotheses (Kasser & Sheldon, 2000). In Study 1(already done) we asked
college students about their financial expectations projected 15 years in the future (e.g.,
salaries, worth of their homes); in Study 2 (in progress) we ask students to play a
forest-management game and assessed how much they wished to harvest, as well as their
subjective motivations for consuming. Our measures thus tapped two distinct aspects of
materialism – making a great deal of money (Study 1) and consuming many resources (Study
2).
75 undergraduate students participated in Study 1 for credit. Subjects were randomly
assigned to respond to one of two essay questions based on TMT’s MS manipulation
(Greenberg et al., 1990) – Natural Death Contemplating (aging death) and Unnatural Death
(traffic accident). An independent sample T-test showed that Unnatural Death Contemplators,
compared with Natural Death ones, reported significantly higher expectation for Financial
Worth (M = 6.48, 5.71, t(73) = 2.68, p < .01), Pleasure Spending (M = 6.06, 5.16, t(73) = 2.53,
p < .05), and Value of Possessions (M = 5.70, 4.69, t(73) = 2.58, p < .05). The results are
consistent with our prediction.
Study 2 differs from Study 1 in two ways. First, Study 2 has a control condition
(Listening to Music Contemplating) to further confirm the effect identified in Study 1. Second,
Study 2 especially concerns the consuming behavior. Subjects participate in a
forest-management game, a resource dilemma (Sheldon & McGregor, 2000). Subjects are told
to imagine that they own a company that has to bid against three other companies to harvest
timber in a forest. Subjects rate 1) how much they would like to profit more than competitors
(Greed), 2) how much they expect other companies to try to cut large amounts each year
(Fear), and 3) how many acres they would harvest in their Year 1 bid. It is predicted that
Natural Death Contemplators report significantly higher Fear and significantly lower Greed
and Year 1 bid than Unnatural Death Contemplators while the control group report on a
medium level in all three measures (See Table 1).
Table 1: Expected Result of Experiment 2
Good Ending Contemplators Bad Ending Contemplators Control Group
Greed
Low
High
Medium
Fear
High
Low
Medium
Year 1 bid
Low
High
Medium
DISCUSSION
By bringing together Terror Management Theory and Just World Theory, this paper
suggests that contemplating different types of death can drive consumers behave different in
terms of materialism. Specifically, inducing individuals to contemplate bad ending of life
(unnatural death) will increase their materialism behavior. On the other hand, contemplating
good ending of life (natural death) decreases their materialism behavior.This paper
contributes to literature in three ways.
First, it adds to the body of TMT literature on the types of Mortality Salience. This
research introduces a new dimension to classify death into natural and unnatural death and
identifies their disparate effect on materialism behaviors. While previous research generally
treats all types of death contemplation as homogeneous, the present research proposes and
demonstrates that not all kinds of Mortality Salience have identical consequence. Future
research, by the same token, may focus on other dimensions to classify Mortality Salience. To
this extent, this paper extends TMT research into a new frontier.
Second, this paper builds a bridge between two motivation theories in consumer
behavior research: Terror Management Theory and Just World Theory. To the author’s
knowledge, this is the first time that the two motivation theories have ever been brought
together. Thus, the present research provides a possible future research orientation – taking
into consideration other motivational factors in interpreting the effect of Mortality Salience.
Third, this paper contributes to the literature of materialism studies by proposing that
Mortality Salience, a previously identified antecedent of materialism behavior, may actually
decreases materialism behavior, depending on different types of death one contemplates. To
this extent, the present research provides an opportunity for researchers to reinterpret previous
research on this causal relationship.
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