1

Consumers Need for Prestige: Scale Development

Stefan Hampel, Larissa Hammon and Hajo Hippner

Abstract

Introduction
The need for prestige is deeply anchored in everyday social life. Given the centrality of consumer products in every moment of the day, they present a valuable tool in the social communication system. As individuals may fulfill their need for prestige in a variety of ways, they are likely to vary in the tendency to gain prestige through consumer goods and behavior. This study is an initial effort to develop and validate a scale that measures individual differences in the need for prestige. It draws on past research on symbolic consumer behavior (e.g. Grubb and Grathwohl 1967; Solomon 1983; Richins 1994) and status consumption (e.g. Eastman, Goldsmith, and Flynn 1999; Clark, Zboja, and Goldsmith 2007) and is in line with consumer research on the important influence of intrapersonal and interpersonal needs (Burns 1993), e.g. need for touch (NFT) (Peck and Childers 2003), and need for uniqueness (NFU) (e.g. Tian, Bearden, and Hunter 2001; Lynn and Harris 1997). Even though the prestige appeal is widely used in marketing, to date no explicitly defined research approach has been developed. Drawing on the misleading, interchangeably use of the terms prestige, status, and luxury in literature, it has to be emphasized that prestige refers to the degree of esteem accorded to individuals, groups, or entities (Henrich and Gil-White 2001). This involves the product of the internalization of objective reality, i.e. a morally positive, outstanding human achievement, and symbolic reality, i.e. the interpretation of socially shared symbols, in social interactions (Czellar 2002; Dittmar 1992). In contrast, status relates to a position in social hierarchy and luxury is rather associated with the self-indulging refined lifestyle of the affluent which includes some kind of negative connotation (Dubois and Czellar 2002; Colarelli and Dettmann 2003; Vigneron and Johnson 1999).

________________________ *Stefan Hampel, Larissa Hammon and Hajo Hippner, University of Bayreuth, Germany

2 Conceptual Definition We define Consumers Need for Prestige (CNFP) as the tendency to engage in conspicuous consumer behavior that confers or symbolizes prestige both to the individual and to the surrounding reference group, in order to gain the extrinsic, social reward prestige. It is assumed that consumers are likely to vary in the tendency to gain prestige through consumer goods, referring to different kind of product categories, brands, services, versions, or styles. As goods are used as symbolic communication devices, it is not the functional utility people desire, but rather the symbolic benefits these goods provide, i.e. the esteem or admiration of others. It is supposed that the CNFP explains stable patterns of individual behavior. The CNFP construct subsumes the following three factors: The Impression-Oriented Factor. The concern for desired prestigious public appearances leads people to expressive self-presentation. By regulating and controlling information about oneself, individuals are able to create/project a prestigious self-identity towards others. They want to be unique, but unique within the societal norms. This implies them being acutely aware of the level of prestige associated with a given product or brand within their social nexus. As many prestigious goods are also consumed in private, prestigeseeking behavior is assumed to be an enduring, cross-situationally consistent personality trait. This is contrary to the self-monitoring theory which highlights the variability of selfpresentational tactics depending on situational cues (Gangestad and Synder 2000). The Social Approval Factor. An individual will only engage in expressive selfpresentational tactics, if his/her conduct will lead to the desired end-state prestige. This implies the belief of others using person schemata which are organized around possessions and possession-related traits, e.g. style, expertise (Hunt, Kernan, and Mitchell 1996; Richins and Dawson 1992). Therefore, the prestige-driven behavior has to be significant (i.e. visible, variable and personalizable) and to involve a socially shared meaning of prestige (Holman 1981; Dittmar 1992). Individuals with a common history of enculturation should be able to predict the behavior of others in that culture (Solomon 1983). The Impressible Factor. Prestige-seekers tend to judge a persons worth, i.e. form impressions and make judgments, on the basis of external, material appearances to the extent that inner, nonmaterial qualities are likely to be trivialized (Hunt, Kernan, and Mitchell 1996).

Scale Development, Assessment of the Scale Reliability and Validity Based on the results of a continued word association method to the stimulus prestige and in line with the conceptual definition of the CNFP, a pool of 29 items was generated. After assessing content validity, the remained 21-item scale was queried on a seven-point Likert-scale via an online survey (N = 493). The procedure of assessing scale reliability and validity is conducted in accordance with previous applications for scale development (cp. NFU and NFT). Varimax-rotated exploratory factor analysis resulted in 12 items loading on the Impression-Oriented Factor, six items on the Social Approval Factor, and three items on the Impressible Factor. The scale was evaluated through a number of reliability and validity criteria of first and second generation (e.g. Cronbachs , ITTC, explained variance, factor reliability, indicator reliability, RMSEA, NFI, GFI). Evidence of convergent validity and discriminant validity between the three factors as well as with conceptually distinct scales (NFU scale (Tian, Bearden, and Hunter 2001), Materialism Scale (Richins and Dawson 1992)) are provided. The assessment of nomological validity included the framework of psychological needs and the model of the formation of prestige judgments and revealed satisfactory results (Burns 1993; Czellar 2002).

Conclusion The primary goal of this research was to develop and validate a measurement scale of individual differences in the aspiration of prestige through consumption. The results indicate that CNFP is composed of three dimensions: the Impression-Oriented Factor, the Social Approval Factor, and the Impressible Factor. Consumers with a high need for prestige appeared to have a strong concern for their appearance and image in line with a strong emphasis on person schemata based on commercial goods. The emerged 21-item CNFP-scale was found to be reliable and to meet the criterion of content, convergent, discriminant, and nomological validity. This paper constitutes an exploratory investigation of the latent construct Consumers Need for Prestige. The CNFP-scale should be used as an intervening variable in different prestige-related consumer research contexts. Replications and further refinements would additionally support our initial findings. References Burns, David J. (1993), Adoption Decision Making Process: A Pilot Study of Effects of Psychological Needs, Journal of Business and Psychology, 8 (2), 199213. Clark, Ronald A., James J. Zboja, and Ronald E. Goldsmith, (2007), Status consumption and role-relaxed consumption: A tale of two retail consumers, Journal of Retailing and Consumer Services, 14 (1), 4559. Colarelli, Stephen M. and Joseph R. Dettmann, (2003), Intuitive evolutionary perspectives in marketing practices, Psychology & Marketing, 20 (9), 837865. Czellar, Sandor (2002), An exploratory inquiry on the antecedents of prestige judgments, Society for Consumer Psychology 2002 Conference Proceedings, USA, 118131. Dittmar, Helga (1992). The social psychology of material possessions: To have is to be. Hemel Hempstead: Harvester Wheatsheaf. Dubois, Bernard and Sandor Czellar (2002), Prestige Brands or Luxury Brands? An Exploratory Inquiry on Consumer Perceptions. European Marketing Academy 31th Conference Proceedings. Braga, Portugal. Eastman, Jacqueline K.; Ronald E. Goldsmith,and Leisa Reinecke Flynn (1999), Status consumption in consumer behavior: Scale development and validation, Journal of Marketing Theory and Practice, 7 (3), 4152. Gangestad, Steven W. and Mark Synder (2000), Self-Monitoring: Appraisal and Reappraisal, Psychological Bulletin, 126 (4), 530555. Grubb, Edward L. and Harrison L. Grathwohl (1967), Consumer Self-Concept, Symbolism and Market Behavior: A Theoretical Approach, Journal of Marketing, 31 (4), 2227. Henrich, Joseph and Francisco J. Gil-White (2001), The evolution of prestige. Freely conferred deference as a mechanism for enhancing the benefits of cultural transmission. Evolution and Human Behaviour, 22 (1), 165196. Holman, Rebecca H. (1981), Apparel as Communication, in Elizabeth C. Hirschman and Morris B. Holbrook (Eds.) Symbolic Consumer Behavior Association for Consumer Research, 715.

4 Hunt, James M., Jerome B. Kernan, and Deborah J. Mitchell (1996), Materialism As Social Cognition: People, Possessions, and Perceptions, Journal of Consumer Psychology, 5 (1), 6583. Lynn, Michael and Judy Harris (1997), The Desire for Unique Consumer Products: A New Individual Differences Scale, Psychology & Marketing, 14 (6), 601616. Peck, Joann and Terry L. Childers (2003), Individual Differences in Haptic Information Processing: The Need for Touch Scale, Journal of Consumer Research, 30 (4), 430442. Richins, Marsha L. (1994), Valuing Things: The Public and Private Meanings of Possessions, Journal of Consumer Research, 21 (3), 504521. Richins, Marsha L. and Scott Dawson (1992), A Consumer Values Orientation for Materialism and Its Measurement: Scale Development and Validation, Journal of Consumer Research, 19 (3), 303316. Solomon, Michael R. (1983), The Role of Products as Social Stimuli: A Symbolic Interactionism Perspective, Journal of Consumer Research, 10 (2), 319329. Tian, Kelly Tepper, William O. Bearden, and Gary L. Hunter (2001), Consumers' Need for Uniqueness: Scale Development and Validation, Journal of Consumer Research, 28 (1), 5066. Vigneron, Franck and Lester W. Johnson (1999), A Review and a Conceptual Framework of Prestige-Seeking Consumer Behaviour, Academy of Marketing Science Review, 23 (1), 115. Wong, Nancy Y. and Aaron Ahuvia (1998), Personal Taste and Family Face: Luxury Consumption in Confucian and Western Societies, Psychology & Marketing, 15 (5), 423441.