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Individual Differences in the Pursuit of Self‐Uniqueness Through Consumption
Author(s) -
Lynn Michael,
Harris Judy
Publication year - 1997
Publication title -
journal of applied social psychology
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.822
H-Index - 111
eISSN - 1559-1816
pISSN - 0021-9029
DOI - 10.1111/j.1559-1816.1997.tb01629.x
Subject(s) - uniqueness , normative , consumption (sociology) , psychology , latent variable , social psychology , sociology , computer science , political science , law , social science , artificial intelligence
In this paper, we report an original study of the relationships between self‐attributed need for uniqueness and several consumer dispositions. The results indicate that the self‐attributed need for uniqueness is related to consumers' desires for scarce, innovative, and customized products and to consumers' preferences for unusual shopping venues, but not to consumers' susceptibilities to normative influence. Moreover, we find that these relationships are mediated by a latent variable reflecting individual differences in the tendency to pursue uniqueness through consumption. The theoretical and practical implications of these results are discussed along with directions for future research.