The Research On Wedding Consumption Based On Symbolic Consumption Theory

China is in the period of social transformation, along with the rapid economic growth, the urban youth are more and more impacted by the diversification of values. Compared with their parents, this generation is more care about individuality, freedom and fashion. The urban youth are faced to the high-pressure and fast-paced city life; they chose to consume to get the recognition and realization of self-worth. This paper studies the consumption associated with the wedding of Chinese urban youth, focus on the consumer behavior, consumer psychology and the consumer attitudes. Through the study we found that Chinese weddings are important events that display a person or a family’s wealth and prestige, there are more and more symbolic consumption in Chinese weddings, and showing the following new features:The first is the consumer psychology is gradually become more and more rational, people consider with their actual economic situation in the selection of wedding goods and services. Secondly, symbolic consumption and emotional consumption are more obvious in wedding consumption, the urban youth in the wedding consumption is not only pursuit of the personality, fashion, taste and texture, but also willing to express their feelings and emotion. Thirdly, with the improvement of living standard, the Chinese weddings are more market-oriented and consumers love to see this happen, because the market-oriented is brings the convenience to consumers. But the market-oriented is also brings the confusion that increased the consumers’sense of insecurity, they are worried about the "consumer trap" and the "hidden rules" in the market. Women’s voice is increase in Chinese youth’s wedding consumption is another feature. Women’s self-consciousness is not only get the attention by themselves but also get the respect of the men. There are more than60%of men are most care about their wives’opinion in the process of planning a wedding. On the choice of wedding ceremony, the traditional Chinese wedding is still the first choice of urban youth, but its dominance is under challenge of Western-style wedding and personalized wedding. Modern young people gradually tend to consider their wedding as a celebration of life, as long as they can get their happiness and satisfaction from the wedding, the form of the ceremony is no longer a limit to these young people. They can do whatever they want in their big-day.In this study, a different concept of consumption, income levels and educational attainment are personal factors that influence on urban youth’s wedding consumption. Individual consumption concept will be directly reflected in his consumption behavior, a person who is hold the frugal consumption concept is also show a conservative behavior in wedding consumption, these people focus on the cost of products and do not want spend too much on a wedding. Secondly, the individual income level and education level are also important reasons that affect on the Chengdu youth’s wedding consumption. There is a huge difference between the low-income group and the high-income group in the concept of consumption, the high-income group is more concerned about the brand and their tendency of symbol consumption is more obvious. At the same time, the consumer behavior of highly educated people is more rational than the lowly educated, and the highly educated people’s wedding consumer mindset is more open. In addition, the family’s support is the main source of wedding consumption for many urban youth rather than their personal savings, expenditure for weddings are too great to the youth, so their parents often spend years accumulating sufficient money for their wedding.The wedding is so important for the vast majority of newlyweds; it is the door which leading to a happy marriage and it is the beginning of a happy life. A beautiful wedding is the symbol of newlyweds’expectations of the future life. It is true that different people have different affordability and different consumer attitudes, but the connotation of a wedding is more important no matter it is a "lavish wedding" or a "simple wedding". People should be based on the actual situation of their own, carefully prepare for a festive, lively, sophisticated wedding.In short, the expenditure of a wedding can not represent the happiness index of the marriage. The wedding is only a ritual after all, the form of wedding is secondary, but the meaning and significance of wedding are important.These are some of personal views about the urban youth’s wedding consumption. Of course, because of the limitations of the author’s capability and experience, this paper still has plenty of room for improvement. Some conclusions in this article still need further study.