EXPRESS: We Succeeded Together, Now What: Relationship Power and Sequential Decisions in Couples' Joint Goal Pursuits

Research has demonstrated that after making high goal progress consumers feel liberated to engage in goal-inconsistent behaviors. But what happens after consumers make high progress in the context of joint goal pursuit? We examine how jointly-made progress towards a joint goal pursued by couples affects subsequent individually-made goal-relevant decisions. Across five experiments with both lab-created couples and married participants and financial data from a couples' money management mobile app, we show that after making high progress on a joint goal (vs. low or no progress), higher relationship power partners are more likely to disengage from the joint goal to pursue personal concerns (e.g., indulge themselves or pursue individual goals), whereas lower relationship power partners do not disengage from the joint goal and continue engaging in goal-consistent actions that maintain its pursuit. We elucidate the underlying mechanism, providing evidence that the joint goal progress boosts the relational self-concept of high (but not low) relationship power partners and this drives the effects. Importantly, we demonstrate the effectiveness of two theory-grounded and easily implementable interventions which promote goal-consistent behaviors among high relationship power consumers in the context of joint savings goals.