Public Self-consciousness And Luxury Consumption Attitude Research

This article explores Chinese consumers’attitude toward luxury goods and proposes segmentation based on attitudes. A comparison is conducted between the Chinese segments and the segments in western context. Public self-consciousness is identified as a key factor influencing the attitude in the two cultural contexts. A quantitative research is conducted to test the correlation between public self-consciousness and affective attitude as well as cognitive attitude respectively. Then a comparison analysis is done between China and Italy.Exploring the attitude of Chinese luxury consumer has been gaining importance with the development of the luxury market in China. With the open and development policy taking effect, China has been experiencing a relentless surge in luxury consumption. Those who benefited most from the opening up policy became the first generation of luxury consumers in China. Since the first wave of luxury brands opened their franchises in China, the world has been amazed at the ever growing purchasing power of the "nouveau riche". China has become a strategic market for most luxury brands, who kept increasing their investment to open more boutiques and augment market exposure.In order to measure the attitude of Chinese luxury consumers, we adapted the scale developed by Dubois, Czellar and Laurent in 2005. The attitude scale was composed of three categories of items:knowledge-related themes, affect-related themes and behavior-related themes. However, the research was conducted in a western context. Therefore, some adaptation was made in order to make it applicable to Chinese consumers and suitable for the particular student sample.Self-consciousness refers to the degree to which individuals habitually focus upon themselves. The Self-Consciousness Scale is composed of three factors:public self-consciousness, private self-consciousness and social anxiety. Our study will only focus on public self-consciousness. Public self-consciousness is the awareness of the self as a social and public object. It is recommended that PuSC be considered as a segmentation variable for socially consumed products and also an identifier of individuals who might choose products for their ability to create an impression. In order to measure the public self-consciousness of Chinese and Italian consumers, a PuSC scale is extracted from Self-Consciousness Scale (SCS), which is the most popular self-awareness instrument used in psychological research.The seven cultural value orientation model, developed by Schwartz, was a popular tool to explain various human activities from a social economic view. China and Italy are located at the distinctively different positions. China is on the bottom right corner, at the core of Hierarchy and close to Mastery and Affective Autonomy cultures, while Italy is in a completely different position, close to Egalitarianism, Harmony and Intellectual Autonomy. We are able to develop hypothesis based on the cultural difference.Independent sample T-test was used to compare the Public self-consciousness index of Chinese and Italian respondents. The T-test shows that Chinese respondents are significantly higher than Italian respondents in Public Self-consciousness level. With Confucianism as the dominant culture, Chinese people highly value their relationship with others and how they are perceived among a social group. The perceived self plays a more important role than the real self in social life. Chinese people are more sensitive than Italians to the impressions called for or likely to be rewarded in social situations. Luxury consumption is a representative behavior in which Chinese and Italian consumers show different motives and mentality.We proceed with the research to test the correlation between public self-consciousness and affective attitude as well as cognitive attitude. The result shows that in general, people with high public self-consciousness tend to have more affection for luxury goods. However, PuSC is not a critical determinant. It only exerts limited impact on people’s attitude toward luxury goods. On the other hand, there exists significant positive correlation between public self-consciousness and knowledge of luxury goods among Italian consumers while the correlation is weak among Chinese respondents. The result signifies that high public self-consciousness might serve as a motivator for knowledge learning in Italy. However, it does not encourage knowledge learning as much as nurturing affection in China.The factor analysis and cluster analysis are employed in the segmentation study of Chinese luxury consumers. Five key components are identified from the 16 measurement items of Dubois-Laurent scale, namely hedonism,exclusiveness, distance, sophistication and conspicuousness. Based on these five components, we cluster Chinese consumers into three segments."Indulgent" consumer:People with the "indulgent" attitude show greatest passion for luxury. They strongly believe that "luxury makes life more beautiful" and luxury makes them dream. They show strong interest in luxury and acquire certain amount of knowledge on luxury. They enjoy the pleasure and comfort brought by luxury, more than its symbolic values as a status differentiator, as they have a very negative opinion on "luxury is flashy""Advocate" consumer:They share the passion for luxury goods as "indulgent" consumers. However, the pleasure of their luxury experience comes more from an interpersonal perspective than from an individual perspective. As shown in the "conspicuousness" score, they mostly agree that "luxury is flashy", indicating that they perceive conspicuousness as a basic feature of luxury goods and they are purchasing luxury for its symbolism value. They don’t have as much knowledge as "indulgent" consumers and they tend to perceive luxury as flamboyant and up in the air, compared to a more down-to-earth attitude of "indulgent" consumers. "Advocate" consumers are the main target of luxury marketing. Compared to "indulgent" consumers who are relatively mature and stable buyers, "advocate" consumers show huge growth potential."Distant" consumer:only account for 20% of the sample. Compared to "indulgent" and "advocate" consumers, people with "distant" attitude have much lower affection for luxury. They don’t fantasize about luxury and consider luxury as far from real life. They will "not feel at ease in a luxury shop" and know very little about luxury world. Though they agree that "luxury makes life more beautiful", they still perceive luxury as something mysterious and out of reach. They do not crave for personal hedonistic pleasure nor the symbolic values presented to others. They might hold positive opinion about luxury, but they are unwilling to get involved in any emotional or behavioral commitment.Finally the article compares the luxury consumer segments of China and Western Europe and draws the conclusion.