Brand love: conceptualisation and measurement Noel Albert, Wesford Grenoble and University of Grenoble Dwight Merunka, University

Paul Czanne Aix-Marseille and Euromed Marseille School of Management Pierre Valette-Florence, University of Grenoble Abstract We develop and test a new brand love scale made of seven first order dimensions (Intimacy, Dream, Duration, Memories, Uniqueness, Idealization and Pleasure) and two second order dimensions (Affection and Passion). The two second order dimensions are notably consistent with interpersonal love studies in social psychology and neuroscience. Scales reliability and validity are satisfactory. Finally, the brand love scale is linked to two dependent constructs (loyalty and positive word-of-mouth). Results indicate that brand passion influences positive word of mouth and that brand affection determines brand loyalty. This demonstrates nomological validity and furnishes interesting managerial implications. Brand love: conceptualization and measurement Consumerss love of products and brands is a recent yet quite popular research topic (Ahuvia, Batra et Bagozzi, 2007) and the brand love construct itself has drawn a lot of attention (Ahuvia, 1993, 2005; Albert, Valette-Florence and Merunka, 2008; Caroll and Ahuvia, 2006; Fournier, 1998; Thomson, MacInnis and Park, 2005; Whang et alii, 2004). The first investigations concerning the brand love construct deal with its definition and its conceptualization (Ahuvia, 1993). More recent research aims at measuring the feeling of love a consumer might hold for a brand (Caroll and Ahuvia, 2006). This leads to a better understanding of the brand love construct and to more managerial relevance. However, few brand scales have been developed and fully tested. This manuscript focuses on the measurement of the brand love construct. We show conceptual limitations in consumer love scales and develop, test and validate a new scale to measure the feeling of love toward a brand. This scale leads to a better understanding of consumer brand relationships. This article is composed of two parts. In the first section, we review and discuss two brand love measurement scales currently available in a marketing context. In the second part of the manuscript we present the stages of the construction of the new love scale, from exploratory studies to uncovering the dimensionality of the brand love scale and presenting its reliability and validity. I Measurements of the feeling of love towards a brand Caroll and Ahuvia (2006) propose a brand love scale composed of ten items determining a unique dimension. The items are: (1) this is a wonderful brand, (2) this brand makes me feel good, (3) this brand is totally awesome, (4) I have neutral feelings about this brand (reversecoded item), (5) this brand makes me very happy, (6) I love this brand, (7) I have no particular feelings about this brand (reverse-coded item), (8) this brand is a pure delight, (9) I am passionate about this brand, (10) I am very attached to this brand. The important question concerning this scale is its claimed unidimensionality. Firstly, in the interpersonal love literature, love is generally presented as a multidimensional construct (Hatfield, 1988; Sternberg, 1986). Secondly, the nature of the items enables to question its unidimensionality

since some items seem to carry different meanings (passion, happiness, attachment, well being, etc.) which probably favors multidimensionality. The second scale in marketing which may be used to measure a love feeling towards brands is that of Thomson et al. (2005). However, while the authors label the construct to be measured as Emotional Attachment, we contend that the proposed scale deals more with the love construct than the attachment construct. In particular, the conceptualisation of attachment integrates here the dimension of passion whereas the attachment component of a love relationship does not include the passion dimension (Hatfield, 1988; Baumeister et al., 1999; Fisher, 2006). With Passion being one dimension out of three (the two others being Affection and Connection), and with the inclusion of the item Loved which belongs to the Affection dimension, we believe that the construct studied and measured by Thomson et al. (2005) is very close to that of Love. From a conceptual standpoint, the two dimensions, Affection and Connection are considered as a unique dimension in the interpersonal love literature. Affection is also called intimacy (Hatfield, 1988) or attachment (Fisher, 2006). Connection is generally considered as an element defining affection or intimacy. For example Sternberg (1997, p.315) defines intimacy as (...) feelings of closeness, connectedness, and bondedness in loving relationships. Recent findings on interpersonal love from neurosciences (Fisher, 2006) and social psychology (Hatfield, 1988) point to a feeling of love composed of two dimensions: affection and passion. There is no mention of a connection dimension. II Methodology and Results The scale construction is first detailed following procedures recommended by Churchill (1979). We then present the structure of the scale and its reliability and validity tests. Finally, we focus on the nomological and predictive validity of the love scale. 2.1 Scale construction We first present the procedures used to generate the items of the love scale. Data collection procedures and data collected for scale development are then introduced. 2.1.1. Item generation Two exploratory studies are conducted in order to understand the brand love construct and generate the items for the scale. Seventeen structured interviews are conducted with 7 women and 10 men aged 19 to 59. During these interviews the word love is explicitely mentionned in order to help understanding the brand love prototype (Ahuvia, 1993, 2005). However, this procedure may also impose a pre-established model of interpersonal love on the respondents. Therefore, we conducted an internet survey using projective methods and not mentioning the word love. Nineteen pictures are chosen to represent brand consumer relationships and among the 19 images, three symbolize the feeling of love. We used different open-ended questions to understand brand consumer relationships without using the word love (e.g.: Why did you choose this image to represent your relationship with the brand?, Is the brand special for you? If yes, please explain why?). The exploratory dimensions obtained are confronted to the intersponal literature in order to retain only true dimensions of love and avoid selecting antecedents or consequences. This should enable to avoid conceptual limitations. 2.1.2. Data collection for scale development

For scale construction purposes, we integrated two categories of items: (1) items identified in our two exploratory studies and (2) items used in three interpersonal love scales. We select items from the Passionate Love Scale (Hatfield and Sprecher, 1986), the Triangular Theory Love Scale (Sternberg, 1997), and the Romantic Love Scale (Rubin, 1970) which are largely referred to in the love literature. A total of 107 items are used to construct the instrument. Respondents used a 10 points Likert scale, ranging from 1 (does not apply at all) to 10 (totally applies), to describe the extent to which the items could apply to the brand they chose for the survey. Consumers were asked to choose their prefered brand and were therefore free to choose the brand they really love. No product categories were imposed to the participants. Six different versions of the questionnaire were administered: 4 versions on the Internet and 2 paper versions with order of items randomized. 825 questionnaires were analyzed (64.2% women; 66.3% less than 30 years of age; 43% are students, 23% executives, 17.8% employees). 2.2 The Model 2.2.1. Exploratory and confirmatory analyses We eliminated items with small loadings or with cross loadings on two or more factors. The final set of items retained (22 items) compose a seven-factor solution. In order to check for validity, we conducted a series of CFA using structural equation modeling. Goodness of fit are satisfactory (RMSEA = 0.08, GFI=0.91, AGFI= 0.89). The structure uncovered for the brand love feeling is easy to understand and seems to offer a good description of the concept. The first factor indicates that the consumer considers the brand as unique and/or special (Uniqueness). The second factor highlights the pleasure given by the brand to the consumer (Pleasure). Items from interpersonal love compose the third factor which underlines the proximity between the consumer and its brand (Intimacy). The fourth factor (Idealization) is also composed of interpersonal items. The long relationship between the consumer and the brand constitutes the fifth factor (Duration). The sixth factor represents important persons or events for the consumer and symbolized by the brand (Memories). Finally, the seventh factor translates the fact that the brand is present in the consumers mind (Dream). The correlations between the factors are positive and significant. Because of the presence of interpersonal items in the scale, the feeling of love towards a brand is highly similar to an interpersonal love feeling as Whang et al. (2004) demonstrated. Results also indicate the presence of two second order dimensions. The first second order dimension is linked with five first order factors (duration, dream, memories, intimacy and uniqueness). This factor is named Affection. The second factor is linked with the last two dimensions (idealization and pleasure). This second order factor is named Passion. This second order solution is notably interesting with respect to the interpersonal love literature since Affection and Passion are present in numerous love theories (Hatfield, 1988; Sternberg, 1986; Rubin, 1970; Fisher, 2006). 2.2.2. Reliability, convergent validity and discriminant validity Scales reliability is good as shown through the Joreskog coefficients (see Table 1). Six of the seven factors have a reliability coefficient superior to 0.7 and one factor has a reliability coefficient of 0.672 which can be judged satisfactory. For convergent validity, bootstrap analyses are used to compute the variance shared between each factor and its indicators (Fornell and Larcker (1981). Results from Table 1 indicate good convergent validity for 5 of the 7 factors. Factors 4 and 5 exhibit lower convergent validities (respectively 0.451 and

0.446) but this is still satisfactory, mainly due to the fact that the respective loadings are greater or equal to 0.63. All t tests are superior to 2, which confirms the good convergent validity of the scale. The discriminant validity is tested by comparing the chi-square from a constrained model (factors correlations constrained to one) to the chi-square from a free model (correlations between factors are free) (Bagozzi and Yi, 1991). The chi-square difference between the constrained model and the free model demonstrates discriminant validity. We present in Table 1 the main empirical results.
Factor Uniqueness Items This brand is special This brand is unique By buying this brand, I take pleasure Discovering new product from this brand is a pure pleasure I take a real pleasure in using this brand I am always happy to use this brand I have a warm and comfortable relationship with this brand I feel emotionally close to this brand I value this brand greatly in my life There is something almost magical about my relationship with this brand. There is nothing more important to me than my relationship with this brand I idealize this brand This brand corresponds to an ideal for me (I feel that) this brand accompagny me for many years I use this brand for a long time I have not changed of brand since a long time This brand reminds me someone important to me This brand reminds me memories, moments of my past (childhood, adolescence, a meeting, ...) I associate this brand with some important events of my life I dream of that brand since a long time This brand is a childhood dream I dream (or I have dream) to possess this brand Loadings (t test > 2) 0.703 0.720 0.845 0.718 0.612 0.741 0.752 0.694 0.736 0.675 0.631 0.697 0.682 0.694 0.670 0.638 0.825 0.723 0.891 0.682 0.721 0.796 0.771 0.530 Reliability Rho of Jreskog 0.672 Convergent validity (% of shared variance) 0.506

Pleasure

0.822

0.538

Intimacy

Idealization

0,767

0,451

Duration

0.707

0.446

Memories

0.856

0.666

Dream

0,778

0,540

Table 1: Loadings, Reliability and Convergent validity of the brand love scale 2.3. Nomological Validity The love feeling is linked to different behaviors, emotions or feelings in the interpersonal relationship literature. In a consumption context, research has demonstrated that brand love has a positive and direct influence on consumer behavior (Caroll and Ahuvia, 2006; Thomson et al., 2005; Bauer et al., 2007). We measure other constructs usually considered as outputs of love and test the relationship between the brand love scale uncovered and the constructs of brand loyalty and positive word of mouth. The measurement of these constructs are ad hoc measurements since we use items about brand loyalty and word of mouth identified in our exploraroty studies. Caroll and Ahuvia (2006) demonstrate a positive link between brand love and positive word of mouth. Bauer et al. (2007) also demonstrate that brand passion influences word of mouth.

Consumers who feel passion for the brand are expected to have a positive word of mouth about it. Concerning loyalty, Caroll and Ahuvia (2006) and Thomson et al. (2005) demonstrate that brand love has a positive effect on brand loyalty and in an interpersonal context, loyalty is linked to affection (Fehr, 1988). Consumers who feel affection for the brand are expected to be loyal to this brand. Results support these relationships. Passion is strongly linked to positive word of mouth (0.908) while affection is strongly linked to brand loyalty (0.707). Relationships between the two second order factors (Passion and Affection) and the two outcome variables are given in Figure 1.
Passion
0.199 0.707 0.560 0.908

Loyalty

Affection
0.150

Positive Word of Mouth

Figure 1: Test of the nomological validity (path coefficient) Discussion Consumers may experience a real feeling of love toward some brands as demonstrated in numerous research findings. Concerning the measurement of the love construct, two brand love scales have been developed but are subject to conceptual limitations according the definition of love. We propose a valid scale enabling measurement of the feeling of love towards a brand. The solution obtained is composed of 22 items, 7 first order dimensions (Uniqueness, Pleasure, Intimacy, Idealization, Duration, Dream and Memories) and 2 second order factors (Passion and Affection). This solution seems similar to findings on interpersonal love in social psychology and neuroscience. Our findings confirm that love towards a brand is highly similar to interpersonal love. Statistical analysis confirms the reliability, validity and the quality of the structure of the proposed model. Finally, the brand love scale predicts two positive behaviors, namely positive word of mouth and loyalty. Given the very limited number of studies on the subject of brand love, we encourage future research in the area. Both antecedents and consequences of brand love need further exploration. What creates brand love? Are some consumers more love prone than others? Are there specific antecedents and consequences of brand affection and brand passion? Another interesting issue is the level of analysis to which the brand love concept may apply. Cultural variations may also affect the concept and measurement of love towards a brand. We believe that this concept is in its preliminary phases of development. Much research is yet needed to better understand, measure and assess the importance of the brand love construct.

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