The Influence Of Embarrassment On Conspicuous Consumption: The Role Of Self-esteem And Self-affirmation

With the rapid development of economy and the consumption ability of the people had been continuously enhanced.The demand for high-end,brand-name,luxury goods and other high-quality goods had been increasing.Nowadays,conspicuous consumption could not be simply regarded as vanity,conspicuous behavior,it also had met the psychological needs of consumers and the sense of belonging and even positive role to promote the development of national economy.This study used questionnaire survey to explore the impact of embarrassment and level of self-esteem on conspicuous consumption,as well as whether self-esteem can reduce the conspicuous consumption under embarrassment.40 students from Hohai University took part in the trial experiment as subjects.The measuring tools were affective priming writing tasks and embarrassment priming self-evaluation scale.One-way Two-Level between-group design was adopted for this study,with emotion(embarrassment priming vs emotion control)as the independent variable,and emotion self-evaluation score as the dependent variable.It was found that there existed a significant difference in the emotion self-evaluation score,which showed that recalling and experiencing embarrassment in the writing tasks could indicating that memory and writing embarrassment can effectively serve as priming to make the subjects feel embarrassed.147 students from Nanjing Normal University participated in Experiment 1 as subjects.The tools for measurements included Rosenborg self-esteem scale,affective priming writing tasks,and tendency test for conspicuous consumption in virtual situation.Independent variables were emotion groups and self-esteem level,and level of conspicuous consumption as the dependent variable(the gap of conspicuous consumption against ordinary consumption).A 2(emotion-priming group vs emotion-control group)×2(high self-esteem vs low-self-esteem)between group design was adopted in this experiment.The findings revealed that the level of conspicuous consumption foe the affective priming group was significantly higher than that of the control group;level of conspicuous consumption of the high self-esteem group was significantly higher than that of the low self-esteem group;no significant difference was found in the interaction between embarrassment emotion and the high/low self-esteem groups in terms of conspicuous consumption.130 students from Nanjing Normal University participated in Experiment 2 as subjects.The tools for measurements included Rosenberg self-esteem scale,emotion priming writing tasks,self-affirmation intervention,and tendency test for conspicuous consumption in virtual situation.Independent variables were self-affirmation intervention grouping and level of self-esteem,with the level of conspicuous consumption as the dependent variable.A 2(self-affirmation intervention group vs non-intervention group)x2(high self-esteem vs low-self-esteem)between group design was adopted in this experiment.The findings revealed no significant difference in the main effect of intervention and grouping;while the interaction between intervention condition and the high/low self-esteem groups showed a significant difference.As is revealed in the simple effect analysis,in the non-intervention group,the level of conspicuous consumption for the high self-esteem group was significantly higher than that of the low self-esteem group;while in the intervention group no significant difference was observed.One interpretation was that the intervention of self-affirmation mediated the behaviors of the low self-esteem subjects,and making their conspicuous consumption significantly increased.The findings are the followings:firstly,compared to the control group,subjects(consumers)who felt embarrassed demonstrated more conspicuous consumptions;secondly,whether embarrassed or not,high self-esteem subjects(consumers)tended to demonstrate more conspicuous consumptions than that of the low self-esteem consumers.Third,self-affirmative intervention could help to increase the conspicuous consumption behaviors for the low self-esteem group.