How Consumers' Relative Deprivation Influences Uniqueness Seeking Behavior

China has made remarkable achievements in macroeconomic development and improvements of the quality of social public services.However,while people's material and cultural living standards have improved significantly,people's satisfaction and happiness have not increased significantly,and their mentality is not balanced.One of the most important reasons is the widening gap between the rich and the poor in society and the prominent problem of the sense of relative deprivation.The research on relative deprivation in China started relatively late,and mostly focused on mental health.There were few studies on the impacts of specific areas.Relative deprivation also has an important impact on individual behavior,including deviant behavior,avoidance behavior and achievement behavior.It can be said that the effect of relative deprivation on individual behavior involves all aspects.Relative deprivation,as a psychological trait,has been paid more and more attention in the field of marketing.Scholars have studied how it changes consumers'consumption behaviors.Because the sense of relative deprivation is a negative psychology for people,in order to offset this negative emotion,people generally reduce it through consumption behavior.This study explores the characteristics of the relatively deprived consumers'consumption behaviors,the factors affecting them,and the internal psychological mechanism.Specifically,is relative deprivation a key factor influencing consumers'needs for uniqueness and subsequent behavioral responses?In the condition of economic disadvantage or advantage,what kind of coping style and follow-up behavior will consumers use?The psychological mechanism between them is the problem to be discussed in this study.The research route of this study is,firstly,to sort out the results of relative deprivation in the field of consumer psychology and put forward a new hypothesis,that is,the psychological mechanism of relative deprivation influencing consumers'needs for uniqueness,social adaptation and uniqueness-seeking behaviors.Secondly,in view of these problems,the SEM is constructed,and the boundary condition is discussed.So the previous theoretical studies in these areas are integrated and supplemented,and the direction of future in-depth researches is put forward to provide references for future researchers.Three studies—two questionnaires and one operational experiment were conducted to test the hypothesis.Study 1 explores the relationship among relative deprivation,consumers'needs for uniqueness and uniqueness-seeking behaviors.On the basis of sorting out the current theoretical achievements and practical experience of relative deprivation,consumers'needs for uniqueness and uniqueness-seeking behaviors,we use the translated subjective economic well-being questionnaire,the brief version of consumers'needs for uniqueness scale,and the uniqueness-seeking behaviors questionnaire,recruiting 320Chinese youth.The differences in demographic variables of relative deprivation,consumers'needs for uniqueness and uniqueness-seeking behaviors were analyzed.The mediating model of relative deprivation and uniqueness-seeking behaviors with consumers'needs for uniqueness as the mediating variable is constructed.Study 2 further studies the relationship among relative deprivation,consumers'needs for uniqueness and uniqueness-seeking behaviors and social adaptation mode on the basis of study 1,and explores the psychological mechanism of relative deprivation affecting uniqueness-seeking behaviors—The mediating role of consumers'needs for uniqueness and social adaptation mode.We use the questionnaires in study 1and the social adaptation mode questionnaire,recruiting 318 Chinese youth.The mediating model of relative deprivation and uniqueness-seeking behaviors with social adaptation mode as the mediating variable is constructed.A chain mediation model of relative deprivation and uniqueness seeking behavior based on consumers'needs for uniqueness and social adaptation mode is constructed.Study 3 further explores the boundary condition under which the consumer's relative deprivation affects the uniqueness-seeking behaviors,based on Study 1 and Study 2.85 Chinese young people were selected as subjects,and 2(relative deprivation,relative advantage)*2(good comments,bad comments)between-subjects was used as the design.Binary logistic regression was used to examine the effect of acceptance of unique products on the pursuit of unique behaviors of relative deprivers.The results showed that:(1)there was no significant difference in the demographic analysis of relative deprivation,consumers'needs for uniqueness and uniqueness-seeking behaviors;(2)relative deprivation significantly positively predicts consumers'needs for uniqueness(?=0.30,p<.001);consumers'needs for uniqueness positively predicts consumer's uniqueness-seeking behaviors(?=0.79,p<.001);(3)consumers'needs for uniqueness play a completely mediating role in the relationship between relative deprivation and uniqueness-seeking behaviors,with an effect value of 0.24;(4)relative deprivation significantly positively predicts innovation in social adaptation mode(?=0.33,p<.001),innovation significantly positively predicts uniqueness-seeking behaviors(?=0.62,p<.001),innovation plays a complete mediating role in the relationship between relative deprivation and uniqueness-seeking behaviors,with an effect value of 0.21,(5)relative deprivation significantly positively predicts rebellion in social adaptation mode(?=0.27).(p<.001),rebellion significantly positively predicts uniqueness-seeking behaviors(?=0.46,p<.001),the effect of relative deprivation on uniqueness-seeking behaviors was partially mediated by rebellion,the total effect value of the mediation model was 0.28,and the value of mediation effect was 0.43.(6)both consumers'needs for uniqueness and innovation in social adaptation mode mediates the effect of relative deprivation on uniqueness-seeking behaviors.The total indirect effect is 0.73,of which the path effect is 0.45 through consumers'needs for uniqueness,0.09 through innovation and 0.18 through consumers'needs for uniqueness and innovation.In the chain mediation model,the direct effect of relative deprivation on uniqueness-seeking behaviors is not significant,(7)the main effect of relative deprivation is significant(B=2.21,OR=9.16,p<.05),the main effect of comments is not significant(B=1.22,OR=3.38,p>.05),and the interaction effect of relative deprivation and comments is significant(B=-3.98,OR=0.02,p<.001).Although individuals with high relative deprivation have significantly higher acceptance of unique products than those with low relative deprivation in good comments condition,their acceptance of unique products in bad comments condition is significantly lower than those with low relative deprivation(Wald?~2(1)=12.47,p<.001).In conclusion,we draw the following conclusions:(1)Relative deprivation promotes the consumers'needs for uniqueness.(2)Relative deprivation promotes individuals to form innovative and rebellious mode of social adaptation.(3)Consumers'needs for uniqueness promotes individuals to form innovative and rebellious mode of social adaptation.(4)Innovation and rebellion in social adaptation mode promotes consumers'uniqueness-seeking behaviors.(5)Consumers'needs for uniqueness promotes their uniqueness-seeking behaviors.(6)Consumers'needs for uniqueness mediate the relationship between relative deprivation and uniqueness-seeking behaviors.(7)Innovation and rebellion in social adaptation mode mediate the relationship between relative deprivation and uniqueness-seeking behaviors.(8)Consumers'needs for uniqueness and innovation in social adaptation mode play a chain mediating role between relative deprivation and uniqueness-seeking behaviors.(9)Relatively deprived individuals'preference for unique products is more significant when unique products are given good comments.