Research On The Effect Of Reference Groups And Social Identity On Consumers' Brand Switching Intention

The thesis examines the effect of consistency of brand image with membership reference groups/dissociative reference groups on consumers'brand switching intention. Membership reference groups are groups to which an individual currently belongs, such as a family, a peer group, one's gender group. Dissociative reference groups are those groups an individual wishes to avoid being associated with. The consistency of brand image with membership reference groups can retain more target consumers for corporations, while the consistency of brand image with dissociative reference groups can lead to more customers defection.As a result of improper marketing tactics, it appears that target consumers based on corporation's marketing positioning are not consistent with the actual purchasing consumers to a great extent. When lots of individuals from dissociative reference groups begin to purchase the brand, target consumer will perceive the consistency of brand image with dissociative reference groups. Unfortunately, In this situation, brand switching intention of target consumers will be increased. Corporations should realize why target consumers switch brands, and take actions to stem customer defection and maintain corporation's long-term profits. What is the intrinsic reason of target consumers'brand switching behavior? Under what conditions does the trouble occur more seriously? Therefore, we need to have an insight into the inner world of consumers and try to explore the psychological mechanism behind behavior. It is important to avoid consumers'defection effectively and efficiently by proper precautions.The non-functional attributes of product should not be neglected in modern society. Consumers require more than product's functional utility. People will not buy clothes only for keeping warm; will not buy cars only for replacing walking. They view product's social value as part of reasons of purchase decision. They need emotional consumption to meet their psychological requires. Because individuals would generate psychological groups in mind, consumers perceive classification of groups according to others'and their own purchasing behaviors. The consumers who prefer the same brand are grouped together to form a psychological group which is called brand in-group. According to Tajfel and Turner's social identity theory, individuals would structure their self-identity on the basis of member qualification of a certain group. Consumers label themselves as a member of a certain brand in-group because of their own consumption of this brand. And this helps them to build their self-identity.Specifically, products which are more symbolic identity show more social nature in consumer behaviors. They make people pay more attention to product's symbolic value beyond functional value. Besides, consumer's personality also can influence their behavior. The consumers who think much of face-saving care more about others'opinions than those who think less of face-saving. The Chinese face-saving can divided into two aspects. One is "desire to gain face", while the other is "fear of losing face". When consumers who show more fear of losing face perceive the consistency of brand image with dissociative reference groups, they will represent higher brand switching intention than others.The thesis mainly adopts the experimental method to test hypotheses. According to the result of experiments in this thesis, the relationship between consistency of brand image with membership reference groups/dissociative reference groups and consumers' brand switching intention is mediated by social identity of brand in-group. At the same time, this relationship is moderated by product category with respect to symbolic identity and consumer personality about "fear of losing face". Finally, the thesis presents a few practical methods about how to decrease consumers'brand switching intention according to the result of this research.