The role of brand in overcoming consumer resistance to autonomous vehicles

Abstract Consumer resistance is a major barrier to diffusing radical innovation into mainstream markets. While recent studies have highlighted the influence that brands might have on innovation adoption decisions, surprisingly little is understood about the role of brands in overcoming consumer resistance to radical innovation such as Artificial Intelligence (AI) technology. To address this, we investigate consumer resistance to AI‐powered technology in the context of autonomous vehicles. Specifically, this study builds on the self‐brand connection and brand concept literature to examine: (1) the mechanism through which self‐brand connection influences radical innovation adoption by mitigating consumer resistance; (2) how this mechanism is moderated by the brand concept (conservation vs. openness); and (3) how brands can effectively overcome consumer resistance through marketing communications. By means of three empirical studies, we find that self‐brand connections are positively associated with intentions to adopt radical innovation and that this effect is mediated by reduced risk barriers (Study 1). We further demonstrate that the influence of self‐brand connection is much lower for conservation brands than for openness brands (Study 2). Finally, we show that conservation brands can leverage consumers' self‐brand connection when they effectively enhance their innovation capabilities through marketing communications (Study 3).