Walking through a store, some shoppers look at a product and immediately know whether they want it, while others need to pick it up, squeeze it, turn it around or run their fingers across the material before making a decision. Someone buying a sweater may rub the fabric between their fingers, a furniture shopper may sit on a chair, and a person choosing a phone may hold it to judge its weight and feel. At first, this may seem like ordinary product evaluation. But consumer psychology suggests that touch can do something more than provide information about texture, weight or quality. Physical contact can also influence how connected people feel to an object. Research on haptic perception, psychological ownership and the endowment effect suggests that touching a product may sometimes make it feel psychologically closer to being “mine,” even before the purchase has actually happened.
