Marketing Chapter 9 Consumer Culture Learning Objectives After Studying This Students Should Able

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Chapter 9

Consumer Culture

Learning Objectives

After studying this chapter, students should be able to accomplish the following objectives.

9-1 Understand how culture provides the true meaning of objects and activities.

9-3 Define acculturation and enculturation.

9-5 Discuss current emerging consumer markets and learn to scan for opportunities.

Lecture Example

The use of pop culture in selling products is hardly a novel concept. Pepsi’s latest campaign

featuring the hip-hop artist Nicki Minaj is in line with the trend that rolled out ads such as “The

Choice of a New Generation” in the 1980s and “You got the Right One, Baby” in the 1990s.

Minaj will feature in Pepsi’s “Live for Now” campaign. The campaign indicates a renewed focus

on marketing, a drive probably initiated by Wall Street, and focuses on improving beverage sales

Lecture Outline with PowerPoint® Slides

LO 9-1: Understand how culture provides the true meaning of objects and activities.

I. Culture and Meaning are Inseparable

No matter where one gets married, a wedding typically involves an elaborate celebration. The

way consumers find mates, however, is not so universal. In Western cultures, romantic marriage

rules are ingrained so strongly that other concepts come across as strange, unusual, or even

illegal. Consumers in other cultures often do not have much say in exactly whom they marry.

Arab and Eastern consumers often end up getting married based on arrangements between

families. Culture drives differences in the customs associated with weddings, marriages and the

family life that follows.

A. What is Culture? [Instructor PPT Slide 3]

In all cases, what a person consumes helps determine acceptance by other consumers in

society. The consumption act itself generally has no absolute meaning, only meaning relative

to the environment in which the act takes place. Culture, therefore, embodies meaning.

Culture ultimately determines what consumption behaviors are acceptable. Exhibit 9.1 lists

some consumption behaviors that vary in meaning, value, and acceptability from culture to

culture. [Instructor PPT Slide 5]

Q: What is consumer culture?

B. Culture, Meaning, and Value [Instructor PPT Slide 3]

Today’s marketplace is truly global. Consumers can easily interact with marketers from all

parts of the world both virtually through the Internet and in person. Without culture,

consumers would have little guidance as to the appropriate actions in many common

consumer situations. These functions shape the value of consumer activities and include:

• Giving meaning to objects: Consider how much culture defines the meaning of

furniture, religious objects, and everyday items like food and drink. For instance,

• Giving meaning to activities: Consider, for example, the role of things as simple as

tipping, recreational activities and even washing (hygiene). A daily shower still is not a

universally accepted norm.

C. Cultural Norms [Instructor PPT Slide 4]

Culture, meaning, and value are very closely intertwined. For this reason, culture determines

things that are socially rewarding (valuable) or socially unrewarding (not valuable).The term

D. Cultural Sanctions [Instructor PPT Slide 4

What happens to a consumer who performs an act inconsistent with cultural norms?

Unfortunately, the consumer is likely to experience a cultural sanction. A cultural sanction

refers to the penalties associated with performing a nongratifying or culturally inconsistent

Q: Ask students to explain cultural norms and cultural sanctions with an example.

Popular Culture

Popular culture captures cultural trends and shapes norms and sanctions within society.

Pop icons such as Miley Cyrus and Justin Bieber help determine acceptable style for many

groups of admirers who desire to fit in with today’s popular culture.

Role Expectations [Instructor PPT Slide 6]

Every consumer plays various roles within society. Culture expects people to play these

roles in a culturally rewarding fashion. Role expectations are the specific expectations that

are associated with each type of person. One’s sex, one’s occupation, one’s social class,

one’s age: All are relevant bases for forming societal role expectations. Role expectations

climatic conditions.

B. Dimensions of Cultural Values [Instructor PPT Slide 8]

Although conflicting views exist on what exactly are the best dimensions to describe

differences in cultural values, the most widely applied dimensions are those developed by

Geert Hofstede. This theory of value-based differences in cultures is based on multiple

dimensions, with each representing an identifiable core societal value aspect. Core societal

values (CSVs), or cultural values, represent a commonly agreed upon consensus about the

Individualism

The first CSV dimension contrasts cultures based on relative amounts of individualism and

collectivism. Individualism as a CSV means the extent to which people expect each other

to take responsibility for themselves and their immediate family. Highly individualistic

societies place high value on self-reliance, individual initiative, and personal achievement.

Masculinity

The masculinity CSV dimension captures societal distinctions based on mannerisms

typically associated with Western male traits such as valuing assertiveness and control

over traditional feminine traits such as caring, conciliation, and community. Femininity

represents the opposite end of the scale, but in this case, the term does not refer to the

prominence that women have within a society. In a culture with low masculinity, men also

tend to share some feminine traits.

Power Distance

Power distance is the extent to which people accept as fact the principle of the division of

authority and privilege among different groups within society. Low-power distance nations

Uncertainty Avoidance

Uncertainty avoidance is just what the term implies. A culture high in uncertainty

avoidance is uncomfortable with things that are ambiguous or unknown. Consumers high in

uncertainty avoidance prefer the known, avoid taking risks, and like life to be structured and

routine.

Long-Term Orientation

Long-term orientation reflects values consistent with Confucian philosophy and a

prioritization of future rewards over short-term benefits. High long-term orientation means

that a consumer value thriftiness, pragmatism, and perseverance as well as the maintenance of

long-term relationships.

Renquing is the idea that when someone does a good deed for a person, that person is

expected to return that good deed. In fact, the expectation of reciprocation at some point in

the future fosters long-term relationships, since individuals are forever trying to balance

the renquing score with each other.

Q: What is the difference between high-power distance nations and low-power distance

nations?

students and teachers. The nations with low-power distance tend to be more egalitarian.

Indulgence-Restraint

Indulgent cultures value immediate gratification particularly for natural human needs

associated with fun and enjoyment. Low scores on indulgent are associated with restraint.

C. The CSV Scoreboard [Instructor PPT Slide 9]

A CSV scoreboard can be put together using historical CSV dimension scores found in many

resources, including the Hofstede website (www.geert-hofstede.com). The CSV scores for a

given country can be essential information for marketers wishing to appeal to consumers in

another country.

BRIC

CSV Leaders

Among all nations with CSV scores, Austria has the lowest power distance scores and

Malaysia has the highest. The United States has relatively low power distance with only 15

nations reporting lower scores.

D. Cultural Distance [Instructor PPT Slide 10]

How should a company decide where it should expand internationally? In other words, where

will it be successful? Two approaches can be considered. First, perhaps the most intuitive

LO 9-3: Define acculturation and enculturation.

III. How Is Culture Learned?

Culture is a learned process. Socialization involves learning through observation and the active

processing of information about lived, everyday experience. The process takes place in a

sequence something like this:

Social interaction ⤅ Modeling ⤅ Reinforcement

As consumers interact they begin to model (meaning enact) behaviors learned or seen.

Reinforcement occurs through the process of rewarding reactions or sanctions.

A. Enculturation [Instructor PPT Slide 11]

B. Acculturation [Instructor PPT Slide 11]

Acculturation is the process by which consumers come to learn a culture other than their

natural, native culture—that is, the culture to which one may adapt when exposed to a new set

of CSVs. When a consumer becomes acculturated, chances are that old beliefs have been

replaced by new beliefs.

• Consumer ethnocentrism is a belief among consumers that their ethnic group is

superior to others and that the products that come from their native land are superior to

other products.

Exhibit 9.7 summarizes factors that either inhibit or encourage consumer acculturation.

[Instructor PPT Slide 12]

C. Quartet of Institutions [Instructor PPT Slide 13]

A quartet of institutions are largely responsible for communicating CSVs through both

formal and informal processes. The four institutions comprising the quartet are (see Exhibit

9.7):

• Family

• School

Many consumers, particularly young consumers, spend a lot of time interacting with media

ranging from magazines, television, and radio to web-based social networks and sites like

Instagram, Tumblr and Habbo. Here, they observe behavior (sometimes acted out in fiction),

receive information about celebrities and pop culture, and exchange ideas, likes, and thoughts

with both real and virtual acquaintances.

Culture and Policy-Related Consumer Communication

Differences in CSVs may have public policy implications as well. A study of teen

consumers in countries including Italy, Austria, Slovenia, Uzbekistan, Russia, and the

United States found that antismoking ads were not equally effective. The results suggest

Modeling [Instructor PPT Slide 14]

Shaping

Shaping is a socialization process by which consumers’ behaviors slowly adapt to a culture

through a series of rewards and sanctions. The CSV profile of a culture can influence the

effectiveness of cultural shaping. Consumers from highly individualistic societies may not

alter their behavior so readily just to fit in. In collectivistic cultures, complaining can be a

sign of disrespect and may be looked at as inappropriate for minor inconveniences.

LO 9-4: List fundamental elements of verbal and nonverbal communication.

IV. Fundamental Elements of Communication

A. Verbal Communication [Instructor PPT Slide 15]

Verbal communication refers to the transfer of information through the literal spoken or

written word. Consumers will have difficulty finding value in things they cannot understand.

Marketers have long wrestled with the problem of translating advertisements, research

Translation Equivalence [Instructor PPT Slide 15]

Bilingual speakers often may think of more than one way to try to express the meaning of

something from one language in another. In some cases, words exist in one language that

have no precise equivalent in another. In other instances, even when the same word may

exist, people in other cultures do not use the word the same way. Thus, interpretation

errors and blunders occur unless one takes great care.

Metric Equivalence [Instructor PPT Slide 16]

Metric equivalence refers to using numbers to represent quantities the same way across

cultures. Metric equivalence is necessary to draw basic comparisons about consumers from

different countries concerning important consumer relationships. Comparing average

scores for consumer attitudes from one culture to the next requires another form of

equivalence known as scalar equivalence.

Globish [Instructor PPT Slide 16]

Through history, different languages have emerged as the international language of

business communication. Today most would consider English the language of international

B. Nonverbal Communication [Instructor PPT Slide 17]

Nonverbal communication refers to information passed through some unspoken act—in

other words, communication not involving the literal word. Many nonverbal communication

cues are culturally laden so that the meaning depends on culture. Exhibit 9.10 depicts several

aspects of nonverbal communication and the way they come together to create effective

communication. High-context cultures emphasize communication through nonverbal

elements. In contrast, low-context cultures, such as Denmark, emphasize the spoken word.

Q: Explain Globish with an example.

fine” can be written as “hee is fain” to simplify the pronunciation for Eastern countries.

Time

Americans typically place a high value on time and timeliness. The high value placed on

timeliness may be due to the importance of individualism and achievement as core values.

Consumers from some other cultures do not value timeliness in the same way.

Mannerisms/Body Language

Body language refers to the nonverbal communication cues signaled by somatic

(uncontrollable biological) responses. These cues can be more telling than words. The

mannerisms that reveal meaning include the following characteristics:

• Facial expressions

• Posture

• Arm/leg position

• Skin conditions

• Voice tone

Space

Etiquette/Manners

Different cultures have different etiquettes for handling various social situations. Etiquette

represents the customary mannerisms consumers use in common social situations. Service

providers need to be sensitive to the various differences in etiquette. When consumers are

unaware or lack concern for the proper etiquette in a given situation, the result can be

awkward and diminish the value of the experience.

Relationships

There are different ways how consumers respond to marketers when they attempt to build

relationships should emphasize the collective preference of different groups rather than the

individual.

Agreement

The indication of agreement depends on the culture. The extent to which a contract binds

varies from place to place.

Symbols

LO 9-5: Discuss current emerging consumer markets and learn to scan for opportunities.

V. Emerging Cultures [Instructor PPT Slide 18]

International marketers traditionally direct most efforts at consumers from developed nations. In

the 1990s and early 2000s, marketing investment in developing nations increased dramatically.

A. BRIC Markets [Instructor PPT Slide 18]

The acronym BRIC stands for Brazil, Russia, India, and China. These four nations were

singled out as having rapidly growing economies. In each market, the large middle classes

emerged as job opportunities followed the emerging consumer cultures. Marketers look for

growing populations, youthfulness, free markets, favorable cultural values, and progrowth

political climates as signs of opportunities to do business.

B. Chindia [Instructor PPT Slide 18]