Pride of Ownership: An Identity-Based Model

Pride of ownership is explored in a series of depth interviews utilizing a new “surfacing” methodology. Pride of ownership is linked to a brand’s or product’s ability to help consumers construct five major aspects of identity: cultivating personal taste, achieving nondependence and adulthood, achieving social status, building close relationships, and connecting to groups. These five implicit identity goals are ordered based on the extent to which each aspect of identity is part of the independent self (i.e., personal taste) or the interdependent self (i.e., social roles and connecting to groups). We introduce the terms independent pride and interdependent pride to refer to pride that helps construct the independent and interdependent aspects of the self, respectively. In addition, this research uncovers several ways that consumer’s pride of ownership changes over time. Conclusions are drawn for further theory-building and for managers.