Theses and Dissertations

Especially during the current COVID-19 pandemic and age of social unrest in the United States, there has been an increasing need for comfort, yet the idea of comfort is quite vague and rarely elaborated upon. To simplify the idea of comfort and communicate the ideas around it effectively, I am defining comfort as a subset of escapism in which a person escapes to reduce or alleviate feelings of grief or distress. As companies rush to comfort their customers in this current state of uncertainty, marketers are pressed to identify people’s insecurities and comfort them without coming off as insensitive or trite. Current comfort marketing focuses on inspiring nostalgia in its customers, having them recall previous positive experiences or feelings to comfort them. Nostalgic marketing techniques may ease mild grief in some cases, but using them to alleviate severe distress probably will not be as effective, and has contributed to several seemingly out-of-touch “COVID-19 era” commercials.<br/>When addressing comfort, marketers should understand the type and hierarchy of comfort that they are catering to. Not all comforts are equal, in that some comforts make us feel better than others and some do not comfort us at all. A better understanding of how and why comforts change among different individuals, and possibly being able to predict the comfort preference based on a product or service, will help marketers market their goods and services more effectively. By diversifying and specializing comfort marketing using this hierarchical method, marketers will be able to more significantly reach their customers during “uncertain times.”

Graduating from college is an important time of life transitions and career development for undergraduates and their future. Future self-identification, the connection between an individual’s current and future self, can negatively predict depression and utilize self-control as a mechanism to achieve later academic goals. Investigating an individual’s future self- identification, depression scores, and behavioral outcomes in the face of the COVID-19 pandemic can help optimize college graduate success in an uncertain world. The present study aimed to (1) determine if earlier future self-identification moderated the changes between later outcomes (e.g., depression, perceived alcohol consumption, and academic and career goals) from pre-COVID-19 to during COVID-19, (2) investigate if psychological resources (e.g., self-control and emotion regulation) had any intermediary effects between earlier future self-identification and later depression and behavioral outcomes during the pandemic, and (3) test for any moderation effects of future self-identification on the relationship between available psychological resources before COVID-19 and during COVID-19. The present research demonstrated that students with greater earlier future self-identification were less likely to change their academic and career goals and were less likely to experience symptoms of depression during the pandemic. Additionally, self-control was demonstrated as an intermediary factor between earlier future self-identification and later academic and career goal changes. These findings may help college graduates develop resilience in other stressful situations.

As the COVID-19 pandemic took the world by storm, the hotel industry struggled to remain afloat. Many resorted to innovative solutions to maintain their business and jobs. As the hotel industry grappled with ideas that could keep their business afloat, an idea called EasyHub was born. EasyHub is a hypothetical mobile device application that bridges the user and a paired SMART device or an entire ecosystem of SMART devices. While the design for EasyHub was initially intended to help hotels increase their accessibility, it soon became apparent that EasyHub could potentially be a product of much greater market value. As the idea of EasyHub became more developed, the COVID-19 pandemic was beginning to subdue, and the hotel industry was on the mend. Assuming that EasyHub is found useful, it could theoretically boost demand to businesses that use them. Many hotels already utilize SMART devices to some degree making them prime targets for EasyHub. This research paper seeks to determine if EasyHub can aid hotels’ recovery from the pandemic-induced recession by increasing revenue. Surveys were conducted among hoteliers and a general audience to determine the impact of EasyHub on guests’ decisions to stay at a hotel. The results indicate that EasyHub would not be a significant factor in guests’ decision-making of hotels; however, this may be due to a lack of clarity about the product, as many respondents expressed a desire for more information. Further development and testing of EasyHub is necessary before a market analysis and its full potential can be assessed.