Within-domain and across-domain compensation: a systematic review, integrative framework and future research agenda

Abstract

Different from previous studies on the motives of compensatory consumption, this review focuses on the strategies of compensatory consumption. This literature review aims to introduce two main strategies for compensatory consumption, within-domain and across-domain compensation. Within-domain compensation is a consumption strategy to repair a self-discrepancy in a specific domain, while across-domain compensation refers to a consumption strategy that consumers restore their global self-worth by affirming themselves in other important domains yet unrelated to the self-discrepancies. Based on the SPAR-4-SLR protocol to assemble, arrange and assess literature published from 2008 to 2023 Q1, we chose 65 articles to review. In order to gain a deeper understanding of within-domain and across-domain compensation, we systematically review the existing literature in the field and propose a framework based on the ADO models. Lastly, we discuss the various research directions for within-domain and across-domain compensation from the viewpoint of theory, context, characteristics, and methodology according to the TCCM framework. Researchers, marketers, and advertisers can learn about the latest research related to compensatory consumption strategies in this article.

Introduction

“When God closes a door, he will surely open another window.”

Despite our best efforts, we often fail to achieve our dreams due to the ups and downs of life. When we study, we find that our academic performance is not as good as our classmates; when we work, we find that we always make mistakes; sometimes, we struggle to find support from our family and friends. Currently, we can feel a significant discrepancy between reality and ideal. Even if we can directly solve the gap by studying, working, and communicating actively, it takes considerable effort and time to make up for the discrepancy. Conversely, consumption is relatively quick and easy to reduce self-discrepancy perception by purchasing symbolic products, such as pens symbolizing intelligence and handbags symbolizing status. This type of consumption behavior is called compensatory consumption [25, 75]. Compensatory consumption was first described as behavior that compensates consumers for their lack of needs through consumption [32]. As research perspectives have evolved from the need to self-concept, more and more scholars are emphasizing that compensatory consumption is consumer behavior in which consumers find, identify, and purchase products to reduce self-discrepancy [58, 59]. For example, if consumers feel powerless, they prefer products that offer more options, choose large-sized products, and spend more on symbolic products in order to regain their sense of power [23, 41, 75]. As a result, many empirical studies have demonstrated that when consumers feel a discrepancy in a certain domain, people will compensate through consumption in that domain.

However, it should be noted that compensatory consumption behavior and self-discrepancy do not always coincide. For example, it is possible for people experiencing poverty to compensate for the self-discrepancy caused by purchasing luxury goods to demonstrate their wealth [47] or by extensive socializing [6]. In Olaine, a well-known golf town in Switzerland, while the bumper stickers of luxury cars show their golf symbolizing wealth, the bumper stickers of ordinary cars show more about their professional achievements and family relationships because ordinary car owners can keep psychological balance by demonstrating achievements in other domains [30]. The former is called within-domain compensation, which refers to the compensatory consumption behavior of consumers in finding, identifying, and consuming products that mark success in a specific self-discrepancy domain; the latter is called across-domain compensation, which refers to the compensatory consumption behavior of consumers to find, identify, and consume successful products in the important domain of unrelated to self-discrepancy [51, 53].

As opposed to previous literature, this paper emphasizes the importance of focusing on the strategic choice of compensatory consumption for current research rather than the motivation for compensatory consumption [45, 58, 59]. Prior research mostly focused on within-domain compensation, and there are relatively few studies on across-domain compensation. The definition of compensatory consumption strategies is also subject to controversy [43, 45, 59]. It is critical to emphasize the dominant role of within-domain and across-domain compensation in compensatory consumption strategies. Secondly, although the concept of compensatory consumption was proposed earlier, literature based on self-concept has been studied only in recent years [74]. Existing literature lacks specific classifications of domains related to self-concept and manipulation methods of self-discrepancy. Third, according to the current research, some matching relationships exist between the discrepancy domain and the compensation domain. But there is no systematic review that evaluates the interaction between domains and the research mechanism for consumers to choose within-domain compensation or across-domain compensation. Moderating factors affecting consumers' compensatory consumption choices should also be explored. Lastly, as the outcomes of compensatory consumption strategies, compensatory consumption behaviors are generally described as behavioral variables which can be further analyzed. In short, we aim to address the above-mentioned research gaps through a systematic review of the literature [69]. Meanwhile, based on our systematic literature review, we will explore new directions and propose new research questions.

This paper can be structured into five sections. Firstly, we trace the origins of the concepts of within-domain and across-domain compensation, clarify the definition and introduce the process of two strategies, and explain the reasons for highlighting the research on them. In the second section, we introduce the methodology for conducting a systematic literature review and the stages of our research process, including assembling, arranging, and assessing. We then analyze the recent research progress of within-domain and across-domain compensation from a descriptive statistical perspective in section 3. In the fourth section, we present a comprehensive framework for understanding within-domain and across-domain compensation that includes antecedents, decisions, outcomes, and moderators. As a final section, we summarize the possible existing conflicts that should be verified in existing research and suggest the research directions for future research on compensatory consumption strategies.

Conceptual background

Origins of within-domain and across-domain compensation

Considering that within-domain and across-domain compensation are both compensatory consumption strategies, it is logical to start from the concept of compensatory consumption. According to Gronmo [32], compensatory consumption is a form of consumption that compensates for lack of global self-esteem or self-realization. Grunert [33] believed the most basic concept of life was purpose rather than need and tharesource available can fulfill various purposes. Therefore, consumers may use consumption to compensate for a lack of higher-level needs. Using the concept of 'shopping therapy,' Woodruffe [95] described how consumption could be used to rectify temporary perceptional defects. Due to the fact that the defect of perception can be triggered by both higher psychological needs (such as self-esteem and self-realization) and lower psychological needs(such as security, control, and belonging), this view no longer rigidly aligns compensatory consumption with higher psychological needs.

Increasingly, researchers have been examining compensatory consumption behavior in the context of self-concept to explain its essence. Compensatory consumption is considered as a consumer behavior to deal with to self-threat [74]. The threat can arise from the future, or it can already exist. The former will produce proactive compensatory consumption, while the latter will produce reactive compensatory consumption [44]. Most empirical studies focus on reactive compensatory consumption to explain consumers' behavior in response to threats. Consumers can address or mitigate self-concept impairment by purchasing goods with compensatory value. However, in addition to their functional value, goods may have symbolic or emotional significance [58]. Consumers can find, identify and consume products that symbolize self-completion in the threat domain when their self-concept is damaged or threatened [28, 74]. As a matter of fact, this compensatory consumption strategy is within-domain compensation [53].

Meanwhile, when consumers face self-threat, there is also a common coping strategy that restores self-integrity perception by affirming their significant domains unrelated to the threat. Generally, this approach is known as fluid compensation, which refers to the phenomenon where people use their success in one domain to compensate for their failure in another [3]. Fluid compensation is also an important assumption as part of the meaning maintenance theory. Tesser [86] first discussed the maintenance mechanism of self-esteem in both within-domain and across-domain, which is the first time that the concept of within-domain and across-domain is proposed. At the same time, the meaning maintenance theory holds that when the meaning of people in one domain is threatened, they can find meaning in another [36]. Therefore, some scholars have found that self-affirmation could also serve as an indirect means of resolving self-threat when studying compensatory consumption. For example, when a person's self-view is shaken, affirming self-worth unrelated to the view can make consumers less inclined to purchase products that support the view [25]. The consumption of status-related products can decrease when consumers restore their self-integrity perceptions through self-affirmation in other domains unrelated to the specific threat [81]. Accordingly, compensatory consumption behavior may be performed not only in the domain related to self-threat but also in the domain unrelated to self-threat, which is contrary to what has been potentially assumed in most previous studies. In light of these studies and within-domain compensation strategy, it is necessary to ask whether consumers can find, identify and consume products unrelated to self-threat for compensation. This question opened the door to the study of across-domain compensation and the comparative study of within-domain and across-domain compensation. Figure 1 illustrates the development of the concepts of within-domain and across-domain compensation.

Fig. 1

The concept development of within-domain and across-domain compensation

Definitions of within-domain and across-domain compensation

Lisjak et al. [53] first proposed the definitions of within-domain and across-domain compensation. In this definition, both within-domain and across-domain compensation emphasize the associations between consumers and symbolized products signaling strength. Subsequently, the behaviors of within-domain and across-domain compensation were further distinguished, including seeking, identifying and, consuming [51]. Consumption compensation can occur both in threat-related and threat-unrelated domains, and these two strategies effectively restore global self-worth and self-integrity perceptions. Considering that self-discrepancy is increasingly used as a core motivation of compensatory consumption, Wang et al. [90] proposed the definitions of within-domain and across-domain compensation. Table 1 shows the definitions of within-domain and across-domain compensation.

Table 1 Definitions of within-domain and across-domain compensation

Process of within-domain and across-domain compensation

The concept of within-domain and across-domain originated from the study of self-esteem maintenance mechanism, which holds that self is regarded as an organized and hierarchical structure, and the “domain” is some aspect of self [86]. In self-affirmation theory, people maintain their self-concept and image through a whole self-system, whose goal is to perceive self-integrity. The important self-concept or self-image in the self-system is referred to as “domain” or “self-domain,” and an individual's self-concept is composed of various domains [80, 90]. The self-worth of people in a domain depends on their status in this domain. The global self-worth of people depends on their status in their significant domains, and these instantaneous levels of self-worth fluctuate around long-term levels, so people are often aware of self-discrepancies in daily life [90]. Self-discrepancy refers to the gap between one's actual self and ideal self [37]. A recent compensatory consumption review suggests that self-threat is only a source of self-discrepancy, and that self-discrepancy may result from upward social comparison [59]. As a result of perceived self-discrepancy, consumers can engage in compensatory consumption behaviors by seeking out, identifying, and consuming products to maintain self-integrity and restore global self-worth. Due to the flexibility of the self-system, consumers can also repair themselves in various ways [80, 90]. They can choose direct mean, within-domain compensation to reduce the perception of the specific self-discrepancy, or indirect mean, across-domain compensation to restore global self-worth by affirming important domains unrelated to the self-discrepancy. Figure 2 illustrates the process of within-domain and across-domain compensation.

Fig. 2

Process of within-domain and across-domain compensation [30, 59, 80, 90]

Reasons for choosing within-domain and across-domain compensation to study

The literature currently identifies five types of compensatory consumption strategies: direct resolution, symbolic self-completion, dissociation, escapism, and fluid compensation [58, 59], while some compensatory consumption strategies deal with emotions exist as well [2, 54]. However, based on our concept analysis and the subsequent literature retrieval results, compensatory consumption strategies are divided into two main categories: within-domain and across-domain compensation. This section explains from a conceptual perspective why we choose within-domain and across-domain compensation as the categories to study rather than choosing other compensatory consumption behaviors.

In order to gain a deeper understanding of compensatory consumption, we must begin with its core component, 'compensation.' The concept of compensation refers to the fact that when people are inferior in one aspect, they can take positive action in another [1]. Compensation is used in psychology as an alternative method or strategy to reduce self-discrepancy. Even though compensation is one of the alternative means of solving self-discrepancy perception, its purpose is to solve self-discrepancies, not to escape them or deal with the emotions caused by them.

Then, based on the concept of compensation, compensatory consumption is further clarified. As the behavior of obtaining compensation by consumption, compensatory consumption typically involves seeking, identifying, and consuming. In fact, compensatory consumption is driven by the symbolic value of products and activities, whether it represents commitment or progress. Some products or activities have functional value, but their symbolic value is still predominant in the purchase phase, and their functional value is only apparent in the use stage. For example, consumers often quickly apply for a fitness membership card to show their athleticism, but it will take them a long time to start using it for exercise.

Regarding the concept of compensation, escapism, dissociation, and emotional response behavior are not compensatory consumption behaviors since they do not directly address or resolve self-discrepancies. In terms of the concept of compensatory consumption, although Mandel distinguishes between direct solutions and symbolic self-completion as two distinct compensatory consumption strategies, we propose combining the two strategies into within-domain compensation. Using this classification method, we can judge within-domain compensation behavior in terms of whether it reduces discrepancy perception in the domain related to self-discrepancy.

Generally speaking, compensatory consumption is a primarily symbolic behavior used to solve self-discrepancies and is divided into within-domain and across-domain compensation. Our subsequent literature search revealed that most empirical research articles on compensatory consumption deal with within-domain and across-domain compensation and less with other compensatory consumption strategies.

Research methodology

Some reviews have been conducted on compensatory consumption behavior in marketing, but most of them focus primarily on the concept and motivation of compensatory consumption as opposed to the selection of strategies and compensation effects [45, 58, 59]. Meanwhile, comparative studies of compensatory consumption behaviors are becoming increasingly important with the emergence of studies of across-domain compensation. It should be discussed what kind of compensation strategies consumers will typically adopt to compensate for a specific self-discrepancy, what moderators will affect consumers' choice of compensation strategies, and how consumers feel after compensation consumption. Based on the “Scientific Procedures and Basic Principles of Systematic Literature Review”(SPAR-4-SLR) protocol, this study reviews peer-reviewed literature published in international scientific journals since 1988. In marketing and a wide range of scientific fields, the SPAR-4-SLR protocol ensures the scientificity and repeatability of the systematic literature review, thereby improving its credibility [27, 69]. Figure 3 shows the main research process of this review.This systematic review was mainly completed in April 2023.

Fig. 3

Review procedure based on the SPAR-4-SLR protocol

According to the typology of systematic review, this paper belongs to the domain based literature review, and our focus is on developing the research framework. To begin with, we provide an introduction to the concept development, the primary mechanisms, and related structures of compensatory consumption [64, 68, 69]. Based on the ADO model, we construct the research framework for compensatory consumption behavior, organize, encapsulate, and elaborate the antecedents, mechanisms, causes, and effects of compensatory consumption [10, 67]. As a result of carefully considering the theory, context, characteristics, and methods associated with the TCCM framework, we develop future research directions for compensatory consumption [70, 73].

Assembling

During the first stage, the assembling stage, we clarified the research field, proposed specific research questions, and identified the articles' sources and quality [69]. Only peer-reviewed studies published in academic journals were chosen, but not articles from other academic sources (conference proceedings, book chapters). We assessed the quality of the literature by using the latest update of the CABS Academic Journal Guide (CABS AJG)(2021), which is one of the most popular journal rankings focusing on business, and has often been used in previous marketing reviews [27, 69]. In order to acquire literature, we primarily used the Web of Science (WOS) core database, which includes a substantial amount of high-quality literature and avoids predatory journals. We also utilized other databases (such as Scopus, Google Scholar) for the search of literature, as well as marketing and consumer journals(e.g., Journal of Consumer Research, Journal of Consumer Psychology). Search categories are limited to Business, Behavioral Sciences, Economics, Management, Psychology, Psychology Applied, Psychology multidisciplinary, Psychology, Psychology Social, Social interdisciplinary, Sociology. We searched all the literature on compensatory consumption from 1988 to the first quarter of 2023 and found that the literature on within-domain compensation and across-domain compensation mainly began in 2008. The search keywords mainly include:((' Compensatory Consumption' OR 'Compensatory Consumption Strategy' OR ' Self-discrepancy’ OR 'Self-threat' OR 'Within-domain Compensation' OR 'Across-domain Compensation'' OR 'Fluid Compensation'') AND ('Consumer' OR 'Consumer Behaviour' OR 'Consumption' OR 'Marketing' OR 'Consumption Response')).

Arranging

First step in the arranging stage is to organize the literature by the organizing code. In the Excel table, we recorded the general information of articles, and theories, methodologies, antecedents, mechanisms, outcomes, moderators of them. By summarizing this information, we conducted a comprehensive frame of compensatory consumption behavior based on the ADO model [10].

In the purification sub-stage, we first excluded articles not published in ABS AJG journals(n = 129). When searching, some articles were recalled(n = 4), which caused us to exclude them. After reviewing their topic and content, articles that did not address compensatory consumption behavior were excluded(n = 142). Due to the construction of a framework for studying the specific relationship between different domains in compensatory consumption, we only selected quantitative empirical articles and excluded other types of articles(n = 11). Finally, we excluded some articles that study other compensation strategies unrelated to within-domain and across-domain compensation(n = 8). Following the process of purification, a total of 65 articles were subjected to analysis for the purpose of this study (as demonstrated in Table 2).

Table 2 List of scientific articles used in the literature review

Assessing

Evaluation and reporting are two sub-stages of the assessing stage. In the evaluation stage, we conducted content and topic analysis of peer-reviewed papers. In the context of the ADO framework, we identified consumption behavior frame including antecedents, mechanisms, consequences, and moderators with content analysis. Additionally, we propose future research directions for compensatory consumption through the thematic analysis under the framework of the TCCM [35, 73].

The study result we reported can be divided into two main parts. It begins with insights from descriptive statistics, including annual distribution of publication, journal of publication, citations, methods and regions. In the second part, we analyzed the existing studies using the compensatory consumption behavior framework we constructed [73]. We finally concluded the report by proposing directions for future research based on the findings. In order to gain a more intuitive understanding of the results of this review, tables, and charts are compiled.

Insights from descriptive statistics

Annual distribution of publication

Figure 4 shows the number of published articles on within-domain and across-domain compensation strategies annually. As shown in Fig. 4, the study of within-domain and across-domain compensation began in 2008. The number of publications has increased overall, despite some declines or flattening in some years. There were the most publications in 2022 (n = 11), and more than half of the literature was published after 2018. It has been reported that three articles have been published in the first quarter of 2023, indicating that there is a growing interest in within-domain and across-domain compensation, so it is necessary to review the literature on this topic.

Fig. 4

Number of publications from 2008 to the first quarter of 2023

Journal of publication

A list of journals publishing articles about within-domain and across-domain compensation can be found in Fig. 5. On the topic of this study, a total of 65 articles were published in 24 different journals. Among the journals, Journal of Consumer Research (n = 21) published the most, accounting for 32.3% of the articles published, followed by Journal of Consumer Psychology (n = 9), which published 13.8%. Meanwhile, more than three journals were published by Journal of Business Research, Journal of Marketing Research, and Asia Pacific Journal of Marketing and Logistics. A majority of the articles on within-domain and across-domain compensation are published in marketing journals, with a few appearing in psychological journals as well.

Fig. 5

Number of articles published in each journal

Citations

The top 10 most cited articles in Google Scholar are shown in Table 3. Among them, “Desire to Acquire: Powerlessness and Compensatory Consumption” [75] is the most cited article in the compensatory consumption literature, with a total of 1086 citations, followed by “Social Exclusion Causes People to Spend and Consume Strategically in the Service of Affiliation” [60] and “Protecting the self through consumption: Status goods as affirmational commodities” [81]. In terms of average annual citations, the article “Service Robots Rising: How Humanoid Robots Influence Service Experiences and Elicit Compensatory Consumer Responses” [61] has the highest average (124 citations per year). It is noteworthy that half of the 10 most cited articles were published in the Journal of Consumer Research.

Table 3 Top 10 most cited empirical research articles

Methodology

In Fig. 6, it has been found that the majority of research on within-domain and across-domain compensation has been conducted through experimental methods (n = 54, 83.08% of the total articles). Following the manipulation of consumers to feel self-discrepancy in a specific domain, researchers examine consumers' compensatory consumption behaviors, such as product evaluation, purchase intention, and willingness to pay, and verify the mechanisms and moderators involved. Some studies also used mixed methods to enhance validity (n = 6, 9.23% of the total articles), combining experiments, surveys, primary and secondary data, and other methods. Surveys (n = 5, 7.69% of the total articles) were used to investigate how the long-term self-discrepancy perception of consumers affects their compensatory consumption strategies.

Fig. 6

Methodology of the articles

Regions

As illustrated in Table 4, we analyzed the different sources of the sample. As an experimental article contains multiple studies, we analyze the sample sources for each study. Among these studies, many did not specify the sample source (n = 158), and 83 studies were conducted online. Within-domain and across-domain compensation studies are primarily conducted in North America(n = 79), with the United States contributing the most research(n = 70). Asia has also contributed a great deal to this field(n = 44), and China is one of the most significant contributors in Asia(n = 34). Some studies were conducted in European countries(n = 11), while only one study was conducted in South America and Oceania, respectively. An important point to note is that one study was a cross-cultural study consisting of samples from the United States and Mexico [90].

Table 4 Primary regions studied in within-domain and across-domain compensation

Framework

Compensatory consumption research is interdisciplinary, primarily focusing on marketing and social psychology, which is considered one of the specific research directions in consumer behavior research. Although there is an extensive literature on compensatory consumption [45, 58, 59], more attention is paid to the concept and motivation of compensatory consumption and relatively few studies have been conducted on the specific strategies and on the effects of self-repair after compensatory consumption. Consequently, current research conducts a framework for understanding the type of self-domain segmentation, the specific mechanism consumers use to select compensatory consumption strategies when they face self-discrepancy, the factors affecting their choice of consumption strategies, and the impact of compensatory consumption strategies on consumers, which can be shown in Fig. 7.

This framework consists of four categories. The first examines the discrepancy domains and compensation domains in compensatory consumption studies and introduces the various methods for manipulating self-discrepancies. The second category explores what compensatory consumption strategies could be adopted to address a self-discrepancy and which symbolic domains can be compensated for consumption. Thirdly, it is important to consider the factors that affect their choices of compensation strategies. The last category examines compensation consumption behaviors. With the help of this framework, we conducted a review of domain-based research on the topic.

Fig. 7

A conceptual framework of within-domain and across-domain compensation

Discrepancy domain and compensation domain (Antecedents and interaction factors)

Self-domains collection

In accordance with the definition and interpretation of "domain" in existing research [30, 80, 90], we collect all self-domains in the current research. For the purpose of studying the correlation between specific self-discrepancy and compensatory consumption behaviors, we have labeled the domain that triggers people's perception of self-discrepancy as the discrepancy domain, and the domain that people use to reduce self-discrepancy through symbolic means as the compensation domain. When choosing within-domain compensation, the compensation domain will match or be related to the discrepancy domain; however, with across-domain compensation, the compensation domain is unrelated to the discrepancy domain, and thus important to one's overall self-worth, though unrelated to the discrepancy domain. There is significance in noting that the same category of self-domains encompasses related domains (e.g. power and status) as well as unrelated domains (e.g. athleticism and academic competence).

According to our inductive findings, discrepancy domains are primarily concentrated in sense of control(n = 35), power(n = 33), social relationship(n = 31), intelligence(n = 17), economic status(n = 17), academic competence(n = 16), freedom(n = 15), competence(n = 14), appearance(n = 11) and professional competence(n = 8). Status(n = 46), sense of control(n = 37), social relationship(n = 26), variety(n = 21), intelligence(n = 11), competence(n = 10), ethics(n = 8), brand(n = 7), appearance(n = 6), and athleticism(n = 6) make up the majority of compensation domains.

Discrepancy domain manipulation

Table 5 summarizes the manipulation means of the discrepancy domain of compensatory consumption into eight categories. The most common manipulation is situational memorization (n = 67). In this manipulation, participants are asked to retell or write about their experiences of underperformance resulting in self-discrepancy perception in a particular domain. As opposed to recalling actual experiences, situational imagination(n = 37) manipulation requires participants to imagine a situation in which consumers feel a sense of self-discrepancy in a specific domain. Participating in the test methods is often used to manipulate self-discrepancies in competence or intelligence(n = 27). When participants participate in a test or virtual game, researchers deliberately provide negative feedback that activates self-discrepancies. Also, there is the social comparison method(n = 26), in which participants are obliged to compare themselves with others who succeed in a certain domain. This manipulation promotes the perception of a discrepancy between the actual self and the ideal self. Additionally, a method of getting relevant information(n = 22) is to ask participants to read articles or news related to a specific domain. When they read that most people in this domain have defects, their self-discrepancy perceptions are activated.

Table 5 Manipulation of self-discrepancies and the number of studies using them

Meanwhile, some researchers manipulate consumers' perceptions in a particular domain by setting specific situations(n = 24). For example, participants' sense of power is manipulated by their relative position with the researchers [26]. As a means of manipulation, directly viewing an advertisement(n = 9) can also lead consumers to perceive self-discrepancy in a domain. The two manipulation methods are often in accordance with real life circumstances, which enhances experiment's validity. Furthermore, the participants are also able to describe an aspect(n = 4) in a specific self-domain where they feel unsatisfied in order to generate a perception of self-discrepancy.

Lastly, there are a few indirect or covert manipulation methods. Writing articles with nondominant hands(n = 3) is one way to reduce their confidence in a certain field, which increases self-discrepancy perception [25]. Participants can also activate self-discrepancies by describing their ideal level in a specific domain(n = 3). Self-discrepancy perceptions in a domain can be also activated by organizing sentences with given words related to the specific self-discrepancy(n = 2).

Compensatory consumption strategies(Decisions)

Based on our collection results of the discrepancy domain and the compensation domain, we preliminarily explore the connection and matching mechanisms between the discrepancy domain and the compensation domain. To begin with, we discuss the strategic choices of the most common domains in these studies (e.g., sense of control, power, etc.). The second step involves summarizing existing relationships' domains and analyzing the associated compensation mechanisms. Finally, an analysis of selection rules for within-domain compensation and cross-domain compensation strategies is carried out from the perspective of the discrepancy domain and compensation domain. The results of our analysis of compensatory consumption strategies are shown in Table 6.

Table 6 Review of empirical research on within-domain and across-domain compensation

Sense of control

In the study of compensatory consumption, self-control appears to be the most common discrepancy domain. Sense of control refers to the belief that a person can accomplish desired outcomes, avoid undesired outcomes, and reach goals. A person who feels out of control will actively try to regain control [8, 13]. For example, consumers tend to choose structured products when they feel self-discrepancy in their sense of control since maintaining order and structure relieves anxiety [19]. The tendency for consumers to choose utilitarian products also occurs when they have a low sense of control, as practical products represent the ability to solve problems and control the environment more than hedonic products do [13]. Products requiring high effort will also be chosen when consumers lack a sense of control since these products provide them with a greater sense of control [20]; Consumers with a low sense of control will also choose the leading brands, enhance their personal agency through their connection to the leading brands, and then regain their sense of control [5]. Furthermore, consumers will also exhibit self-regulation behavior and variety-seeking behavior when their sense of control is low [40, 89]. According to the current literature review, the compensation strategy of sense of control is entirely within-domain.

Social relationship

A social relationship represents one of the most basic needs of human beings. People are strongly motivated to establish contact with others due to the fact that they depend on groups for survival and safety [4]. Consumers often take action to strengthen social connections or increase their sense of belonging when there is a discrepancy in a social relationship. For example, compared with people who are not socially excluded, those who are socially excluded prefer nostalgic and divisible products since these products better satisfy personal belonging needs [55, 62, 97]. Alternatively, consumers may adopt across-domain compensation strategies when they perceive self-discrepancies in their social relationships. Social exclusion can be divided into two categories: rejection and neglect. It's found that when consumers are rejected, they tend to choose within-domain compensation, making donations and other pro-social behaviors; consumers who are ignored by others will feel the discrepancy in their sense of efficacy, and then adopt the way of across-domain compensation and carry out conspicuous consumption [49].

Power

The study of power threat was the starting point for compensatory consumption research from the perspective of self-threat. Power is a person's ability to control both own and others' resources and outcomes. When consumers feel threatened due to the loss of control of their own or others' behaviors or outcomes, they often take action to reduce their threats of power [41, 75]. Status is a signal of power, and people with higher status tend to be more powerful [23, 74]. Thus, when people feel powerless, they often purchase products symbolizing status to compensate for the discrepancy in power [23, 26, 75]. However, creativity can also compensate holistic thinkers when they watch advertisements related to the powerless [90].

Competence

Competence differs from intelligence, emphasizing a relationship between the abilities of people and the successful completion of specific tasks. Competence perceptions are based on specific tasks that need to be accomplished. People may perceive their competence in a particular aspect and their overall competence. It has been observed that compensatory consumption has been studied in many aspects of competence, including academic competence, professional competence, sociability, and athleticism. While some studies focus on compensating within their sub-domains, more studies examine compensating across sub-domains. Compared with professionally successful students, consumers are more likely to choose products symbolizing social relationships, family relationships, and other domains out of profession [30, 51, 90]. Consumers are more willing to pay more for sports products when they recall the trough of their academic careers [30].

Intelligence

The concept of intelligence is a general mental capability that includes reasoning, planning, solving problems, thinking abstractly, comprehending complex ideas, and learning quickly [31]. In terms of self-concept, intelligence is one of the most important elements. So consumers can choose either within-domain compensation or across-domain compensation when they perceive a discrepancy in intelligence. As an example, consumers tend to purchase products related to intelligence after writing articles related to their intelligence with their non-dominant hands. Customers who participate in virtual perception games and receive feedback with low scores are willing to spend more on intelligence-related products [25]. Conversely, when consumers perceive a discrepancy in intelligence, they are also likely to actively choose products that represent status or ethics [18, 87].

Freedom

Freedom refers to the state of not being restrained in specific behaviors or attitudes. People threatened or limited in their freedom often take measures to restore it [8]; they are more motivated to acquire freedom and its associated products to generate within-domain compensation. For example, consumers will choose more types of products or make more unique choices when their spatial perception is limited [50]. Physical confinement, triggered by restricted movement, threatens individual freedom, leading people to prefer advertisements that signal scarcity-reduction over control-restoration [57]. However, when people are exposed to social crowding, they will also pursue a sense of order, leading to minimalism in consumption [29].

Appearance

An unattractive appearance can negatively impact people's self-esteem, making it a concern for consumers. The most direct path to improving appearance defects is for consumers to buy and use products that enhance their appearance. In the process of purchasing clothes, when consumers need a larger size than they anticipated, they will prefer to purchase non-sized, appearance-enhancing products. In addition, consumers are also able to affirm their achievements in other domains to restore their global self-worth [16, 82]. When consumers are exposed to idealized advertising models, their self-esteem levels decline, but they will be wiser in their consumption decisions later to realize across-domain compensation.

Identity

Consumers may choose within-domain or across-domain compensation when one of their identities is threatened. When individuals read articles about society and values deteriorating, they will also be drawn to nostalgic communal products to maintain their collective identity [34]. Immigrants who feel threatened by their ethnic identity are more likely to purchase and use ethnic symbols [11]. Interestingly, there is a finding that consumers tend to seek across-domain compensation for exposure to humanoid service robots, a phenomenon emerging as grotesque robots pose a threat to our identity as human beings [61].

Status

According to the perspective of compensatory domains, status, and variety are common compensatory domains, excluding the domain already discussed. Status refers to people's beliefs about their position in the hierarchy [22]. Consumers with lower status are strongly motivated to improve their status [65]. In spite of the fact that power and status are two related domains, power often appears only in the discrepancy domain. In contrast, status often appears in the compensation domain because status products are more common than power products. As noted in the research, status is generally associated with social status, although some studies focus on economic status, which refers to one's financial standing in relation to others [98]. Self-discrepancies in consumers' perception of economic status can lead to either within-domain or across-domain compensation.

Variety

Variety means the tendency to seek diversity in the products and services [98]. Considering that having choices can enhance one’s autonomy and personal agency, variety-seeking may serve as another symbolic means of satisfying people’s basic control needs [40, 92]. In other words, when people feel self-discrepancy in domains related to their basic control needs (e.g., sense of control, power, freedom, economic status), people want to address their perception of self-discrepancy through variety-seeking behavior [40, 50, 57, 92, 98].

Others

In addition, consumers will adopt different compensatory consumption strategies when they perceive self-discrepancies in knowledge, brand, time, creativity, age, health, religion, and other domains [7, 25, 42, 43, 52, 63, 72, 84]. Some studies also explore across-domain compensation from meaning maintenance theory [85, 88]. Some studies show that self-discrepancies are not manipulated in specific domains, but compensatory consumption was examined at the level of global self-perception; thus, compensatory consumption by such discrepancies is classified as within-domain consumption.

In conclusion, following the analysis of within-domain and across-domain compensation strategies in different self-domains, we summarize some basic characteristics of compensation strategy selection. Consumers’ self-discrepancy in power, status, control, and social relationships is normally repaired through within-domain compensation rather than across-domain compensation. Nevertheless, the self-discrepancy in intelligence, competence, appearance, and other domains can be reduced by within-domain compensation or across-domain compensation. Consumers often choose across-domain compensation when they feel professional ability. It is also common for consumers to choose across-domain compensation when the professional competence is not as expected. In terms of the compensation domain, some compensatory domains that can compensate for multiple discrepancy domains. Status can compensate for a wide variety of domains, whereas variety can reduce discrepancies only in those domains related to basic control needs.

Compensatory consumption behavior(Outcomes)

According to research on compensatory consumption behavior, most research on within-domain and across-domain compensation focuses on testing consumers' products preference(n = 58). In order to explore consumer compensatory consumption strategies, consumers make choices among the products provided. Secondly, consumers are also provided with a product that symbolizes a specific domain after experiencing self-discrepancy in some studies, which is used to test their purchase intentions(n = 33), willingness to pay(n = 23), and purchase likelihood(n = 14). Several studies have also tested the number of product types(n = 18) consumers choose to study variety-seeking behavior in compensation consumption. A few studies have been conducted on other consumer behaviors such as product attitude, product use, brand choices, advertising attitude, and so on. It is important to note that more than 95 percent of the dependent variables are related to consumers' material consumption, while the dependent variables of experiential consumption are very few.

Factors influencing the choice of strategies

Consumers who are motivated by self-verification are more likely to choose within-domain compensation as a way to maintain a stable self-concept; on the other hand, consumers motivated by self-enhancement are committed to improving their global self-worth, so they will not consider whether the product is related to the discrepancy domain, so across-domain compensation is more likely to be chosen [7]. Furthermore, self-esteem affects consumers' motivations and strategic choices of compensatory consumption. It has been found that consumers with high self-esteem prefer to compensate for appearance discrepancies by participating in interpersonal communication activities, while consumers with low self-esteem tend to enhance personal attractiveness [66]. Goor et al. [30] found that consumers' motivated trade-off beliefs that success in one domain will result in sacrifice or failure in another, encourage them to choose across-domain compensation.

The objective of compensatory consumption is to restore self-worth and maintain self-integrity. Therefore, consumers should evaluate the possibilities of self-repair by within-domain compensation and choose the appropriate strategy. Thus, when consumers believe that the attainability of status in the discrepancy domain is high, the specific discrepancy can be effectively resolved, so they are more inclined to choose within-domain compensation rather than across-domain compensation [30]. Alternatively, consumers may also choose across-domain compensation if they are aware of the poor performance of the source (such as the people they are comparing with) in other domains because compensation in other domains can demonstrate their own advantages [30, 90].

Depending on the compensation environment, consumers will select different compensation behaviors. By using within-compensation products, consumers can reduce discrepancies in the private environment after experiencing discrepancies. Consumers tend to choose across-domain compensation in public environments since across-domain compensation conceals true self-discrepancy [7]. In public environments, if consumers continue to adopt within-domain compensations, they may expose their disadvantages to others, resulting in others questioning their competence in the discrepancy domain [53, 100].

Research gaps and future research directions

The field of research on within-domain and across-domain compensation is in its infancy, and many questions remain unanswered. As a result of the systematic reviews, we identify knowledge gaps in the existing literature and propose new research directions in the future based on the TCCM model. Table 7 provides a summary of the future research directions based on these themes.

Table 7 Future research directions within-domain and across-domain compensation

Theory

As a first point, although the concepts of within-domain compensation and across-domain compensation are clear, the division of domains and the definition of different domains need to be further explored. It is necessary to establish the specific definitions of domains and judge the relationship between each domain. Because some domains are hierarchical [82], it is also possible to further analyze which specific domains constitute them. As an example of how researchers can identify domains for research, Goor et al. [30] have performed exploratory research that guides how to do so. On Quora, researchers collected all responses to the question “How do you overcome the envy of someone at your age who is more successful?” and selected responses related to self-discrepancy. According to users' answers, when people are compared to more successful peers (the discrepancy domain is often professional competence or economic status), social relationships are selected as the most compensation domains.

Secondly, The mechanism behind the compensatory consumption mechanism needs to be further extended and expanded. At present, the concept of domain mainly appears in self-worth theory and self-affirmation theory [16, 83].The main principle of within-domain compensation is symbolic self-completion theory [28], while the mechanism behind across-domain compensation consumption is fluid compensation [3, 36]. Therefore, in the future theoretical research, the framework of compensatory consumption should be built on the basis of domain. At the same time, we should also pay attention to explanation of other theories such as self-esteem maintenance mechanism in compensatory consumption [86], and also analyze the influence of other self-concepts such as self-concept clarity,self-efficacy on compensatory consumption strategies.

Thirdly, it is essential to identify which strategies are compensatory consumption strategies. Our previous conceptual background explained why we chose within-domain and across-domain compensation as our research topic, and here we clarify the existing conflicts again. The first conflict is that, considering compensatory consumption as a means of solving self-discrepancy, do escapism, dissociation, and emotional coping strategies belong to compensatory strategies? The second question is whether consumers' behavior in buying, using, or sharing products with functional value is considered compensatory consumption or adaptive consumption [43, 59]. The third issue is the difference in the role of symbolic completed products and merely symbolic products in the compensatory consumption behavior.

As a consequence of the study of compensatory consumption strategies, a comparative study of the effects of within-domain and across-domain compensation has also begun to appear. Within-domain compensation has been found to cause rumination, which impedes self-repair in some domains, leading to worse effects than across-domain compensation [51, 77]. However, there are few studies on the compensatory consumption effect, especially comparative studies of within-domain and across-domain compensation. Future research should investigate the psychological state of self-repair achieved by the two compensation strategies, the evaluation and attitude of compensated consumers towards the product, and the sustainability of both compensation strategies.

Context

The majority of self-discrepancy manipulation methods rely on situational recall and situational imagination. Even though these are traditional psychological manipulation methods, most are based on consumers' self-reports and lack actual marketing context. As such, a situation more representative of real life should be set up to allow consumers to experience self-discrepancy. Additionally, the effect of self-repair is influenced by the connection between self-threat and the product, which is manipulated by advertising slogans. There is no doubt that advertising language significantly impacts compensatory consumption strategies and effects. It may be worth utilizing advertising slogans to directly manipulate consumers' self-discrepancy perceptions in the future, as this is more in line with the specific marketing situation.

It can be seen from the sample of the literature that most of the subjects are from the same country or region. Therefore, a comparative analysis of samples from multiple countries is needed, which is related to cross-cultural research. By avoiding applying the concept of one culture to multiple cultures, cross-cultural research can improve the reliability and effectiveness of research. To better understand consumers in different countries, it's necessary to conduct more studies on consumers' compensatory consumption under different social and cultural conditions [90].

As a result of the current process of searching and refining the existing literature, most studies focus on the common consumption scenario in daily life. With the continuous application of meta-universes and artificial intelligence technology in the commercial sector, compensatory consumption should be studied in more situations. These include whether compensatory consumption behaviors exist in the virtual world and whether there are mutual compensations between the virtual and the real world. Artificial intelligence, on the other hand, poses a significant threat to human identity due to its rapid development. It has been found that artificial intelligence robots can also arouse consumers' sense of threat to their human identity, thereby triggering compensatory consumption behavior [61]. Follow-up research will also gradually enrich and expand a series of compensatory issues arising from AI development's threat to human.

Characteristics

In terms of characteristics, we analyze the future research directions for within-domain and across-domain compensation from the perspective of antecedents, decisions, consequences, and moderating factors. By combing and refining authoritative journals' empirical research, we have found some similarities and differences between within-domain and across-domain compensation. The decision process of the two compensation strategies should be further studied. In some cases, we can find discrepancy domains that can be repaired by compensatory consumption in multiple compensation domains, or compensatory domains that can repair many discrepancy domains. However, some discrepancy domains that can only be repaired by a specific compensatory domain, which is of interest to researchers.

Regarding specific behaviors of within-domain and across-domain compensation, most studies have focused on product preference, purchase intentions, willingness to pay, and other aspects of material consumption. As a matter of fact, more and more people today are choosing experiential consumption more often. Experienced purchases will exist in individual memories in the form of memory [9], causing consumers to recall and think constantly. Compared with material consumption, consumers choosing experiential consumption may recall their most exciting experiences. However, they also have the opportunity to think about their self-discrepancy constantly. While most current research finds that experiential purchases are associated with positive consequences, we also believe that experience may have negative consequences in compensatory consumption. Follow-up studies on compensatory consumption should consider setting dependent variables related to experiential consumption, and comparing between material consumption and experiential consumption.

Although many empirical studies examine factors that affect consumers' involvement in compensatory consumption, few studies examine factors that affect consumers' choice of compensatory strategy [7, 30]. The factors affecting consumers' decisions affecting compensation strategies should be further supplemented. As a first step, it would be helpful to examine how factors related to consumers' self-concept (such as self-concept clarity, power distance belief, and self-monitoring) influence their choice of within-domain or across-domain compensation. Second, we seek to identify factors that influence consumers' judgment of the difficulty of achieving self-repair goals through two strategies. In addition, the contribution of social and cultural factors to the choice of compensatory consumption strategies cannot be underestimated. Finally, existing studies have found that the environment of consumers' compensation or consumption affects their strategic choices [53, 100], but it is yet to be determined whether environmental factors of self-discrepancy influence consumers' strategic choices.

Methodology

The literature review examined 65 studies related to within-domain and across-domain compensation. It can be evident from the Fig. 6 that most empirical studies use experimental designs. It suggests that current research lacks survey and secondary data methods. Mixed data collection methods should be combined in future research to obtain a more representative and diverse sample. A number of the most recent methods, such as sentiment analysis and social media analysis, have been used to capture and analyze consumers' psychological mechanism and emotional changes during the compensating consumption process [27]. Additionally, market research, consumer evaluation websites, and social media can provide valuable data on compensatory consumption, such as records of customer purchases, returns, complaints, comments, and feedback. Using this secondary data can serve as a better guide to natural consumer behavior and trends.

Most data collection methods used in experiments are based on laboratory tests and online questionnaires. These two methods have disadvantages that prevent experiments from fully reflecting the situation's reality. Therefore, more experiments should be carried out as field experiments. A real-life scene can be built to examine their choices and behaviors in compensatory consumption; on the other hand, Internet A/B experiments can be carried out to get, test, and optimize specific business metrics, resulting in more accurate and larger data sets [90]. Both approaches can significantly increase the external validity of compensatory consumption research.

In addition, most empirical studies on within-domain and across-domain compensation apply manipulation methods to activate consumers' self-discrepancy perceptions, which essentially capture consumers' self-discrepancy in the short term. There is a need for research on consumers' self-discrepancy over the long term. Few studies have considered compensatory consumption's repairing effect at different consumption stages, such as decision-making, purchase, and use [55]. In this regard, it is important to measure repeatedly the perceptions of self-discrepancies and the global self-worth among consumers at different consumption levels. Generally, more longitudinal research should be conducted on within-domain and across-domain compensation based on different periods [73].

Conclusion

With the increasing external threats and social competition in recent years, people constantly perceive more self-discrepancy; therefore, the strategic choice of compensatory consumption has gained increasing attention recently. We systematically review the two strategies of compensatory consumption: within-domain and across-domain compensation. The research on within-domain and across-domain compensation is still at the starting stage, and many topics will be discussed in the future. Through this article, we hope that researchers will find more interaction between the discrepancy and the compensation domain and will have the opportunity to conduct experiments relating to compensatory consumption; marketers and advertisers can make sense of consumers and adopt appropriate marketing strategies. As a final recommendation, we encourage consumers to adopt various compensation strategies in this world filled with heightened threats. In fact, they are gods themselves, who can open either doors or windows.