The Goal-Gradient Hypothesis Resurrected: Purchase Acceleration, Illusionary Goal Progress, and Customer Retention

Vol. XLIII (February 2006), 39–58 39 © 2006, American Marketing Association ISSN: 0022-2437 (print), 1547-7193 (electronic) *Ran Kivetz is Sidney Taurel Associate Professor of Business (e-mail: [email protected]), and Oleg Urminsky is a doctoral candidate (e-mail: [email protected]), Graduate School of Business, Columbia University. Yuhuang Zheng is Assistant Professor of Marketing, Graduate School of Business Administration, Fordham University (e-mail: ayuzheng@ fordham.edu). The authors are indebted to David Katz, the manager of Columbia University Café Cappuccino, and to MoodLogic Inc. for their cooperation. The authors are also grateful for helpful comments and suggestions from Pradeep Chintagunta; Sunil Gupta; Raghu Iyengar; Gita Johar; Yifat Kivetz; Rajeev Kohli; Donald Lehmann; Oded Netzer; P.B. Seetharaman; Itamar Simonson; Andrea Vag; participants in seminars at Columbia University, Stanford University, the University of Florida, the University of Pennsylvania, and the Society for Judgment and Decision Making; and the anonymous JMR reviewers. The research reported in this article was supported by the Lang Faculty Research Fellowship in Entrepreneurship. RAN KIVETZ, OLEG URMINSKY, and YUHUANG ZHENG*