Emotional Ability Similarity

What it measures

A four-item scale measuring the degree to which a consumer perceives themselves as emotionally similar to another person or target group — specifically in terms of shared emotional reactions, emotional response styles, and emotional understanding. Items tap similarity in how things make them feel emotionally, emotional style, understanding of each other's feelings, and overall emotional similarity. Developed for research on consumer-cause identification and prosocial behaviour.

Representative items

• We are similar to each other in terms of the things that make us feel emotional.
• We share a similar emotional style.
• We are emotionally similar to each other.

Citation

Du, Shuili and Lingying Hu (2021). How consumer-cause identification motivates consumers to take action for cause-related marketing: The mediating role of perceived social influence. Journal of Marketing, 85(1), 99–117.