“I want to be beautiful and rich”: Consumer culture ideals internalization and their influence on fashion consumption

ABSTRACT

Within the US culture, two consumer culture ideals – namely, the body perfect and the material good life – are dominant. This study addressed the question – how are these two consumer culture ideals internalized? And, how an individual’s degree of internalization of these consumer culture ideals influence one’s fashion consumption behavior? By building on the Tripartite Influence Model, a widely used empirical model in body-image research, a research model was proposed. Data were drawn from self-reported online survey by respondents located in the US (N = 472). The proposed model was tested using structural equation modeling. All but one proposed hypotheses were supported, which explained 20% of the variance for fashion involvement construct (p <.001). Findings of the study revealed that sociocultural factors (i.e. parents, peers, and mass media) contribute to an individual’s degree of cultural ideals internalization, which in turn influences one’s level of body satisfaction and fashion consumption behavior. The findings of the study would be of interest to several entities, including social advertisers and marketers, media activists, and body image educators, among others, which are also discussed.

现代消费文化是由身材完美和物质美好两种理想支配的。大众媒体充斥着对这两种理想的描述, 通常是结合在一起描述的。只有近几年, 这两种文化理想对个人的影响才得以探索。例如, 研究发现, 身材完美和物质美好生活理想的内在化 (即认知上的信仰购买) 对个人的幸福是有害的。例如, 发现, 冰岛男性和女性在两种文化理想的内化和扰乱身体形象的行为 (如过度节食) 之间存在积极关系。因此, 本研究探讨身材完美与物质美好生活理想对消费行为的影响, 特别是时尚消费行为。此外, 这项研究还考察了可能有助于这些文化理想内在化的潜在社会文化背景。

基于有关身材满意度, 物质主义和时尚参与的文献, 提出了一个由10个假设组成的假设研究模型。为了测试该模型, 我们通过亚马逊Mechanical Turk (AMT) 从600多名美国男性和女性成人参与者中收集了数据。采用扫描电镜 (SEM) 对假设的研究模型进行了检验。总共10个假设中有9个得到了收集到的数据的支持。此外, 为了减少调查项目的数量, 还进行了预测试。在预测中, 通过AMT招募了170多名美国男性和女性成人参与者。本研究的发现表明, 所提出的假设研究模型在性别之间均有效。 研究还发现, 父母, 同龄人和大众传媒都有助于文化理想的内化, 而文化理想内化又通过两种中介机制影响个体的身材满意度, 即外表内化和外表比较。此外, 研究还发现, 个人的身材满意度与时尚投入之间存在正相关关系。发现了一些与性别差异有关的细微差别。本研究首次探讨文化理想内化对个体外貌消费行为的影响。身体形象象文献中广泛使用的理论模型包括三方影响模型 (TIM), 以了解饮食病理之外的消费问题。TIM被扩展到包括物质主义结构。总之, 本研究的模型解释了终端结构 (即时尚参与) 约20%的方差 (p<0.0001) 。此外, 还讨论了基于本研究及其发现的含义, 局限性和未来方向。例如, 本研究的结果将有助于开展社会营销活动。

KEYWORDS:

• Cultural ideals
• TIM
• fashion involvement
• materialism
• body satisfaction

关键词:

• 文化理想
• 三方影响模型
• 时尚参与
• 物质主义
• 身材满意度

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Notes

1. Consistent with previous studies (e.g. Annunziata et al., 2012), the terms – body image and body satisfaction are used as synonyms.