How Face Influences Consumption - A Comparative Study of American and Chinese Consumers
International Journal of Market Research 49(2):237-256
DOI:10.1177/147078530704900207
Julie Juan Li
Chenting Su
East Asia is fast becoming the world's largest brand-name luxury goods market. This study develops the concept of face and face consumption to explain why Asian consumers possess strong appetites for luxury products despite their relatively low income. This paper distinguishes the concept of face from a closely related construct, prestige, and examines the influence of face on consumer behaviours in the United States and China. Due to the heavy influence of face, Asian consumers believe they must purchase luxury products to enhance, maintain or save face. Accordingly, face consumption has three unique characteristics: conformity, distinctiveness and other-orientation. The results of a cross-cultural survey support the existence of these three subdimensions and show that Chinese consumers are more likely to be influenced by their reference groups than are American consumers. Furthermore, they tend to relate product brands and price to face more heavily than do their US counterparts. In addition, Chinese consumers are more likely to consider the prestige of the products in other-oriented consumption than are their American counterparts.
Results of hypotheses testing
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How face influences consumption
A comparative study of American and
Chinese consumers
East Asia is fast becoming the world's largest brand-name luxury goods market.
This study develops the concept of face and face consumption to explain why
Asian consumers possess strong appetites for luxury products despite their
relatively low income. This paper distinguishes the concept of face from a closely
related construct, prestige, and examines the influence of face on consumer
behaviours in the United States and China. Due to the heavy influence of face,
Asian consumers believe they must purchase luxury products to enhance,
maintain or save face. Accordingly, face consumption has three unique
characteristics: conformity, distinctiveness and other-orientation. The results of a
cross-cultural survey support the existence of these three subdimensions and
show that Chinese consumers are more likely to be influenced by their reference
groups than are American consumers. Furthermore, they tend to relate product
brands and price to face more heavily than do their US counterparts. In addition,
Chinese consumers are more likely to consider the prestige of the products in
other-oriented consumption than are their American counterparts.
With its substantial population and growing economy, East Asia is fast
becoming the world's largest brand-name luxury goods market (Wong &
Ahuvia 1998; Jiang 2005). East Asians have been found to be avaricious
luxury consumers – it is not unusual to see Malaysians spending huge sums
of money on weddings to which the guests arrive in limousines, Chinese
consumers wearing extremely expensive suits and watches, and Japanese
consumers flooding Louis Vuitton showrooms. As Ram (1994) notes,
Asian consumers' demand for luxury products extends beyond watches
and cognac to include a wide range of high-price consumer items, even if
they may not have secured adequate food, clothing and shelter.
International Journal of Market Research Vol. 49 Issue 2
© 2007 The Market Research Society 237
Received (in revised form): 23 February 2006
Li.qxp 16/02/2007 13:46 Page 237
To explain this phenomenon, some researchers (e.g. Brannen 1992)
attempt to conceptualise it as globalised, western-style materialism.
However, materialism alone can hardly explain why Asian consumers
desire luxury products even when they earn a relatively low income (Wong
& Ahuvia 1998). Consumers in Asian and western societies may purchase
the same products but for different reasons; that is, their behaviours may
be heavily shaped by different cultural values. More specifically, Zhou and
Nakamoto (2000) and Zhou and Belk (2004) suggest that the concept of
face, an important cultural value that influences human behaviours
particularly in collectivist cultures (Ting-Toomey 1988), may be one factor
that leads to Asian consumers' strong appetites for luxury products.
Face is 'the positive social value a person effectively claims for himself
by the line others assume he has taken during a particular contact'
(Goffman 1967, p. 5). In recent years, various studies have addressed face
and face-related issues, such as complimenting, compliance gaining,
embarrassment, negotiation, decision making and conflict management
(e.g. Brown & Levinson 1987; Kim 1994; Holtgraves 1997; Leung &
Chan 2003). However, research on how face affects consumer behaviours
is limited, with the few exceptions of Wong and Ahuvia (1998), Joy
(2001), and Bao et al. (2003). How face influences consumption remains
unclear, and its conceptualisation requires further clarification and
investigation.
This study extends our understanding of how face affects consumption
from a cross-cultural perspective. More specifically, we distinguish the
concept of face through a comparison with prestige. To capture the
influence of face on consumption, we advance the construct of face
consumption, operationalise it as a multi-dimensional concept, and test the
difference in face consumption between American and Chinese consumers
empirically. We study these two countries specifically because American
culture is characterised as highly individualist, whereas Chinese culture is
one of the most collectivist (Triandis 1995).
Conceptual development
Culture and face
Culture can be characterised as either individualist (e.g. American and
most western European cultures) or collectivist (e.g. Chinese, Japanese and
most Asian cultures) (Hofstede 1991; Triandis 1998). The basic difference
between individualist and collectivist cultures is that an individualist
culture emphasises 'I-identity' and personal self-esteem enhancement,
whereas a collectivist one pays more attention to 'we-identity' and social
group esteem maintenance (Hofstede 1991; Triandis 1998). More
specifically, Chinese consumers take face into consideration differently
than do American consumers (Ho 1976; Ting-Toomey & Kurogi 1998).
As we mentioned previously, face refers to a claimed sense of favourable
social self-worth that a person wants others to have of her or him in a
relational and network context (Goffman 1967), such that people's need
and concern for self-face, as well as for others' face, influences their
everyday lives (Gao 1998; Joy 2001). The concept of face is not confined
to a specific culture; as social beings, most people have had face-related
experiences such as blushing or feeling embarrassed, awkward, shameful
or proud. On the one hand, people try to maintain or enhance their face.
On the other, when their social poise is threatened or attacked, people try
to save or defend their face. Losing face, saving face and enhancing face
are some of the key elements of face-related issues (Ting-Toomey & Kurogi
1998; Chan et al. 2003).
Whereas face is a universal phenomenon, how people shape its meaning
differs from one culture to another. For example, in China, nearly
everyone confronts face-related issues every day, including greetings,
shopping, invitations, and so forth. In the United States, people seldom
relate their social self-worth to face and may be unfamiliar with the
concept. Hu (1944, p. 45) compares the concept of face in China with
psychological constructs in the United States and finds that face 'stands for
the kind of prestige that is emphasized in [the United States]: a reputation
achieved through getting on in life, through success and ostentation'.
However, though face seems similar to prestige in some ways, its
underlying psychological meaning in China differs considerably from that
of prestige in several aspects.
Group self-face vs individual self-face
In an individualist culture such as the United States, a person is an
independent entity with free will, emotion and a unique personality
(Markus & Kitayama 1991). Decision making is done, or encouraged to
be done, by individuals, and individuals are responsible for their decisions
(Reykowski 1994; Joy 2001). Thus, the individual person represents the
unit of analysis for social behaviour, and prestige, in a face context,
becomes individual self-face.
In contrast, in a collectivist culture such as China, the individual person
is not a complete entity (Sun 1991). For example, a Chinese man views
himself as a son, a brother, a husband and a father but rarely as himself
(Chu 1985). That is, the traditional Chinese self is viewed in the context
of its relations with others. Therefore, face in China not only stands for
prestige for oneself but also for one's family, relatives, friends and even
colleagues (Joy 2001). In other words, face in China means social self-face
for a broad group. As indicated by Ting-Toomey (1988), face is
fundamentally a 'social self' construct in China.
Obligation vs free will
In China, under the pressure of the social relational network, a person
tends to be sensitive to his or her position as above, below or equal to
others (Gao 1998). As a result, Chinese people tend to care a lot about
face. For instance, Chinese parents will emphasise 'Don't make our family
lose face' to encourage their children to behave properly and succeed in
their education (King & Bond 1985). Also, Chinese people are under
strong pressure to meet the expectations of others to maintain their face,
as well as to reciprocate a due regard for the face of others. For example,
in a survey of Chinese businessmen in Hong Kong, face consistently was
noted as an important consideration in professional interactions, and the
fear of losing face formed the basis for the informal system of contracts
and agreements that is common in Chinese business (Redding & Ng
1982). Furthermore, in China, the social self is expected to engage in
optimal role performance, no matter what the personal self may
experience during an interaction (Markus & Kitayama 1991). As Yang
(1981, p. 161) indicates, a Chinese person tends to 'act in accordance with
external expectations or social norms, rather than with internal wishes or
personal integrity, so that he would be able to protect his social self and
function as an integral part of the social network'. Therefore, a Chinese
must maintain or enhance his or her face because of the social aspect of
that face.
Compared with Chinese culture, American culture is more concerned
about 'I-identity' than 'we-identity', and American people tend to be more
worried about self-prestige than social self-face (Triandis 1998). An
individualistic culture like the United States emphasises personal self more
than social self, individual rights over group rights and personal self-
esteem over social self-esteem (Markus & Kitayama 1991). Thus, an
American is more responsible for his or her own face and emphasises
maintaining self-face, or individual prestige, according to his or her will.
Others'-face orientation vs self-face orientation
In China, people pay significant attention to others' face because face has
the same meaning for others. A Chinese behavioural norm like, 'If you
honour me a linear foot, I should in return honour you ten feet', clearly
reveals the relationship between self-face and others' face. In the United
States, however, people care more about personal prestige than others'
prestige. For example, in a conflict resolution study, researchers find that
US subjects tend to use more direct and face-threatening conflict styles,
such as domination, whereas Taiwanese and mainland Chinese
respondents are more likely to use indirect, mutually face-saving conflict
styles, such as connoting either high mutual face or others' face concern
(Cocroft & Ting-Toomey 1994).
From this discussion, we can recognise that face (a pervasive concept in
collectivist cultures) differs significantly from prestige (a concept heavily
studied in individualist cultures). In the next section, we investigate how
this construct influences consumers' behaviours, which we term 'face
consumption'.
Face consumption
As a tradition in Chinese culture, consumption is regarded more as a tool
to serve higher-order social needs than an activity in its own right (Tse
1996). For example, drinking alone is viewed as improper; such a drinker
would be labelled as in the 'ponds of wine'. However, drinking is quite
appropriate to welcome guests or when enjoyed together with friends. In
the latter case, even drinking for a whole night would be considered
proper, and happens frequently in everyday Chinese life.
With the fast economic development in the Great China area, including
mainland China, Hong Kong and Taiwan, Chinese tend to pay more
attention to their face through consumption. As described by Ram (1989),
Rado watches, which were priced US$270–2400 in mainland China, are
owned not only by high officials but also, and mostly, by taxi drivers,
farmers and successful young entrepreneurs (see also Jiang 2005).
Currently, nearly all Chinese administrators and higher officials enjoy a
salary supplement called 'special expenses money', which they use to meet
the demands of face (Gabrenya & Hwang 1996). In a simple example, an
administrator takes his or her subordinates to dinner, which offers the
subordinates face, and gains face by paying the bill, which is actually paid
by the special expenses money. This phenomenon is very prevalent in
Chinese society, which reflects the importance of maintaining face in
personal relationships.
Considering the prevalent and heavy influence of face on consumption
in China, we name this specific consuming behaviour face consumption
and define it as the motivational process by which individuals try to
enhance, maintain or save self-face, as well as show respect to others' face
through the consumption of products. Face consumption has three unique
1. Obligation. As we discussed previously, the Chinese must and have to
maintain or save face because of its social meaning. Therefore, when
consumption becomes a tool to maintain or save face, a Chinese
person will have no choice but to mimic the face consumption of his
or her social group. Otherwise, that person will lose his or her face
among the group and make the group lose face to other groups.
2. Distinctiveness. For face consumption, the products must be either
name brands or more expensive than the products Chinese usually
consume; otherwise, they cannot stand for face. In other words, face
products must be distinctive, whether through brand or high price.
Because face stands for group face and group interests are more
important than personal interests (Ting-Toomey 1988), Chinese
consumers are willing to pay more for face products than they would
for the products they usually consume.
3. Other orientation. Given the importance of face in China, people also
must pay much attention to others' face. Therefore, for face
consumption, the consumer must carefully judge the value of the
products or services when purchasing or consuming with others to
enable the others to feel full of face. Gift giving and dinner parties are
two typical ways to show respect to others' face.
In the literature, a concept similar to face consumption – status and
conspicuous consumption – was first addressed by Veblen (1934) in his
economic theory of the leisure class. He defined conspicuous consumption
as expenditures made not for comfort or use but for purely honorific
purposes to inflate the ego and that occurs primarily to offer an
ostentatious display of wealth. Researchers further have defined status
consumption as the conspicuous consumption of luxury products that
confer and symbolise status both for the consumer and surrounding
significant others and that improve social standing (Eastman et al. 1997).
Status consumption and face consumption are similar in the sense that
(1) face products are also luxury products, which is characteristic of status
products (Eastman et al. 1997), and (2) status seekers want to show off
and increase their distinctive social status through conspicuous
consumption, and some face consumption also intends to show off the
prestige of the group face. However, face consumption also differs from
status consumption in several ways:
• Not all face consumption is intended to show off but instead may be
to maintain or save face.
• Status-seeking consumers are willing to purchase conspicuous or
expensive products whereas face-saving consumers purchase not just
because they are willing to but because they have to.
• Face consumption can be other oriented – that is, designed to show
respect to others' face.
On the basis of the preceding discussion, we classify face consumption
behaviours into the following three categories according to their
characteristics: conformity face consumption; distinctive face consump-
tion; other-oriented face consumption. In next section, we compare these
three types of face consumption for Chinese and American consumers.
Conformity face consumption
Conformity face consumption refers to consuming behaviour that
consumers must have because of social and group pressures. In China,
within the same social class or reference group, people must behave
properly and consume appropriately or they will lose their self-face and
cause their group to lose face (Sun 1991). Chinese also tend to reduce
social distance within their own social class through similar consuming
behaviours (Yang 1981). Conformity in consumption within groups
therefore is quite obvious.
In turn, Chinese consumers are more likely to be influenced by their
group members, who all tend to have similar consuming behaviours. For
example, according to a survey by Tse (1996), 86.1% of a sample of Hong
Kong students agreed that their consumption choices (particularly for
clothing) were influenced by their reference group, compared with 71.3%
of the American students in the sample. Also, only 43.5% of Hong Kong
students said that they would want to behave differently to stand out,
versus 73.6% in the American sample.
Typical examples of conformity face consumption include dinner
parties, weddings and funeral ceremonies. Although many Chinese
complain about the waste of time, money and energy involved in these
behaviours, most engage in them and try to make them appropriate in
comparison with the consumption performed by other members of their
group (i.e. not too simple, not too conspicuous). For everyday
consumption, a typical example might be the purchase of electrical home
appliances such as television and high-fidelity stereo equipment;
sometimes Chinese people feel they have to buy a television because their
relatives, friends or even neighbours have one.
As we discussed previously, due to the influence of the individualist
culture, the degree of the conformity of American consumers, though it
may exist, is not as high as that of Chinese consumers. Therefore:
H1: Chinese consumers are more likely to be influenced by their
reference groups than are American consumers.
Distinctive face consumption
According to H1, Chinese may appear likely to purchase the same style
and colours of clothes, something like a uniform. But this is far from the
case. Chinese society has long encompassed a very strict hierarchical
structure, and Chinese people tend to be very sensitive to their hierarchical
positions in these social structures (Gabrenya & Hwang 1996; Leung &
Chan 2003). For example, the Chinese always greet one another with their
official positions, such as 'Head Li' or 'President Wang'. Thus, the Chinese
behave in ways designed to display, enhance and protect both the face and
the reality of their own and others' positions.
With rapid economic growth in China, consumption has become one of
the easiest ways to show distinctive face. People try to purchase different
products to distinguish one group or social class from another. As a result,
higher-priced and name brands function as symbols to demonstrate the
social distance between different groups. Therefore, and unsurprisingly,
name brands (especially foreign name brands) demand a premium price in
Chinese markets.
Typical examples for distinctive face consumption include ostentatious
weddings, gold jewellery, luxury cars, and so forth. This face-enhancing
and face-distinguishing consumption may appear ostentatious and
irrational to westerners, especially when, as Ram (1994) describes,
Chinese consumers demand luxury products even before they have secured
adequate food, clothing and shelter.
In the United States, consumers' concerns about face are not as strong
as those of Chinese consumers; furthermore, in American culture, equality
is believed to be innate. Therefore, though American consumers also
engage in conspicuous consumption, their connection of products to face
and the use of name brands to emphasise their face may not be as strong
as it is for Chinese consumers. Therefore:
H2: Chinese consumers are more likely to relate product brands
to their face than are American consumers.
Other-oriented face consumption
The Chinese also emphasise the need to show respect to others because of
the importance of face for everybody. Thus, the Chinese will carefully
consider face consumption as it relates to others in situations such as gift
giving and dinner parties (Joy 2001). In China, gift giving is a way to start,
maintain and reinforce social relationships, and gifts are often presented to
family members, relatives and friends. These gifts should be expensive
enough to match the income of the givers; generally, the price of the gift is
higher than that of any products the giver consumes. With this ceremony,
those who receive the gifts also receive face from the giver. The receivers
then are expected to reciprocate with gifts of equal or even higher value,
which in turn allows the original gift givers to feel full of face (Chan et al.
2003). A dinner party is a more subtle face-giving and face-maintaining
occasion, in which the host gives face to the guests through the quality of
the food, the proper degree of ostentation and the boisterous atmosphere,
and simultaneously maintains or gains face through the presence of
important guests and the number of guests (Chen 1990). In contrast, in an
individualist culture, consumers probably do not relate the prestige of a
gift or the food at a dinner party to their social status as much as the
Chinese do. Therefore, we propose:
H3: In other-oriented consumption, Chinese consumers are more
likely to consider the prestige of the products than are American
consumers.
To collect data in both the United States and China, we conducted a survey
that included measures of conformity, distinctive and other-oriented face
consumption, as well as demographic information such as age, education,
gender and comparative economic level among peers.
We designed the measures of face consumption specifically for this
study. We developed an initial pool of measurement items based on the
literature review. In-depth interviews were conducted with six American
and six Chinese to help obtain insights into the face consumption concept.
A few questionnaire items were subsequently revised to enhance their clarity.
We then conducted a pre-test among 20 students in China and 20 students
in the US to test the measures. After we deleted some items on the basis of
this pre-test, the final scales exhibited satisfactory reliability and validity.
To measure theoretical constructs cross-nationally, translation
equivalence must be considered (Mullen 1995). Following Mullen's
suggestion, we designed the original survey in English, then had it
translated into Chinese by a bilingual native speaker. The Chinese version
of the questionnaire was then translated back into English by another
bilingual speaker. Discrepancies in the translation were carefully inspected
and corrected to ensure the translation equivalence of the questionnaire.
Self-administered questionnaires were served as data collection vehicles in
both samples.
Two samples of students were utilised for the following reasons. First, the
purpose of this study is to examine the influence of face on consumer
behaviours in two cultures. Face is a culturally embedded concept and face
consumption is a culturally rooted behaviour. As a body of learned
behaviours common to a given human society, culture acts as a template
that shapes behaviour and consciousness within a human society
(Hofstede 1991). Because students are members of one culture sharing a
system of beliefs, values, customs, behaviours and artefacts, they may
serve as surrogates for other groups in the study of culturally-related
concept. Indeed, student samples are widely used in consumer research as
surrogates (cf. Peterson 2001). Empirical evidence also shows that students
may serve as surrogates for adult groups in some consumer research (e.g.
Beltramini 1983).
Second, we focus specifically on younger consumers because they
represent a specialised global market segment for a variety of goods and
services (Moschis & Moore 1979). Furthermore, in China, compared with
older consumers younger people have greater appetites for and consump-
tion experience of western products and therefore share similar
consumption patterns with their American counterparts (Anderson & He
1998). Because students represent an important component of this target
segment, this sample provides direct managerial implications for foreign
companies seeking opportunities in China.
We employed a convenience sampling approach and recruited
respondents from a large state university in the United States and a major
state university in China. This type of sampling procedure has been used
in previous cross-cultural studies because a cross-national study requires a
matched sample of respondents (e.g. Dawar & Parker 1994; Aaker 2000).
In both universities, students from marketing courses were invited to
participate on a voluntary basis. The incentive was a small portion of extra
credit points. Participants were told that the focus of the study was to learn
about the influence of face on consumer behaviours. They were informed
that their responses would be kept strictly confidential and only be used
for academic purposes. A total of 106 American and 114 Chinese full-time
undergraduate students took part in the study. Data in both countries were
collected during the same academic semester to ensure the time
comparability. The demographic characteristics of the sample were similar
for the two data sets. For example, all the Chinese subjects were
undergraduate students, 49.1% were juniors, and all were aged between
18 and 25 years, with a mean of 20.4 years. The American subjects were
also undergraduate students, aged from 19 to 27 years with a mean of
21.1 years, and 72.9% were juniors.
Face consumption is the focal variable in this study. More specifically, we
consider the three subdimensions of face consumption: conformity face
consumption, distinctive face consumption, and other-oriented face
1. Conformity face consumption. We operationalise conformity face
consumption as a person's susceptibility to group members' opinions
during a purchase decision. Subjects indicated their agreement on
three 7-point (1 = strongly agree; 7 = strongly disagree) Likert-scale
items: (1) it is important that others like the products and brands
I buy; (2) it doesn't matter what friends think of different brands or
products before I purchase a product (reversed item); and
(3) sometimes I buy a product because my friends do so.
2. Distinctive face consumption. We operationalise distinctive face
consumption as a person's tendency to purchase name brands to
distinguish his or her status from that of others. For this construct, we
use three 7-point (1 = strongly agree; 7 = strongly disagree) Likert-
scale items: (1) name brand purchase is a good way to distinguish
people from others; (2) what I consume should be consistent with my
social status; and (3) name products and brands purchases can bring
me a sense of prestige.
3. Other-oriented face consumption. Finally, we operationalise other-
oriented face consumption as the subject's consideration of others'
face in his or her consuming behaviours, especially gift giving and
dinner parties. We again measure this construct with three 7-point (1
= strongly agree; 7 = strongly disagree) Likert-scale items: (1) it is
important to have a dinner party in a good restaurant even though I
will pay a lot of money; (2) when buying a gift for others, I always
consider the prestige of the gift; and (3) if I buy a cheap gift for my
friend, both my friend and I will feel we have lost face.
We display the results of the factor and reliability analyses in Table 1.
For both data sets, the principal component factor analysis resulted in a
three-factor solution, in support of our structure. The Cronbach's
reliability coefficient alphas for the US sample fall between 0.711 and
0.800; those for the Chinese sample are between 0.610 and 0.679, lower
than that of the US sample. The lower reliability suggests the difficulty of
scale development in cross-cultural studies. Additional measurement
refinement is needed for further research in this area. However, given the
exploratory nature of this study, the reliability is adequate and acceptable.
Covariate
The focus of this study is to examine the differences in face consumption
between American and Chinese consumers. However, in a cross-cultural
study, economic factors must be controlled to test for the effects of cultural
factors (Dawar & Parker 1994). Therefore, we include financial concern, a
key economic variable, as a covariate in this study. Because we conducted
our study in cross-national contexts, a measure that indicates subjective
financial concerns is more appropriate than a measure of objective finan-
cial status. We developed three 7-point Likert-scale (1 = strongly agree; 7
= strongly disagree) items to measure this construct: (1) I keep myself on a
strict budget; (2) my financial situation is a big concern to me right now;
and (3) at this point in my life, it seems every penny is important.
In Table 2, we summarise the means, standard deviations and Pearson
correlations of the four constructs for both samples. To make the
comparison more intuitive, the construct means are averaged and reverse
coded. Consistent with our discussion of the face concept, the results of
both samples show some support for the validity of its subdimensionality.
First, the correlations among conformity, distinctive and other-oriented
face consumption are positive and significant for both samples, which
suggests they are closely related subdimensions of face consumption.
Second, financial concern is not significantly related to any type of face
consumption, which indicates that the cultural factors (i.e. face
consumption) probably are not influenced by economic factors (e.g.
financial concern).
Table 1 Measurement reliability in two countries
United States China
Factor Cronbach's Factor Cronbach's
Construct loading coefficient loading coefficient
Conformity face consumption 0.777 0.679
OBLI1 0.800 0.723
Distinctive face consumption 0.800 0.669
DIST1 0.842 0.725
Other-oriented face consumption 0.711 0.610
OTHER1 0.770 0.728
Because we compare the means of multiple dependent variables across
different cultural groups, a MANCOVA is appropriate for the analysis.
Before testing H1–H3 we compared financial concern between American
and Chinese samples. Both samples are composed of college students, so
we expect no significant differences in their perceptions of financial
situations; the results of the one-way ANOVA corroborate this prediction
(F(1, 218) = 0.118, p= 0.731).
We next ran a one-way MANCOVA, with financial concern as a
covariate, to test H1–H3. The results show that the covariate effect is not
significant (Wilks' lambda = 0.970, F(3, 215) = 2.224, p= 0.115), but the
differences between the two consumer groups are significant (Wilks'
lambda = 0.460, F(3, 215) = 84.025, p= 0.000.); hence, financial concern
is not the factor that leads to differences in face consumption between
these two countries. We report the results of the test in Table 3.
In H1, we argue that Chinese consumers are more likely to be influenced
by their reference groups than are American consumers. On the con-
formity face consumption scale, Chinese subjects scored 5.345, whereas
Table 2 Means, standard deviations, and correlation matrices in two countries
1. Conformity face consumption 1.000
2. Distinctive face consumption 0.419** 1.000
3. Other-oriented face consumption 0.365** 0.393** 1.000
4. Financial concern –0.112 –0.006 0.024 1.000
Mean 3.148 3.859 4.547 4.469
Standard deviation 1.168 1.304 1.156 1.315
2. Distinctive face consumption 0.189* 1.000
*Significant at the 0.05 level
**Significant at the 0.01 level
American subjects scored 3.148 – a highly significant difference (p<
0.001). Therefore, H1 is supported.
H2 deals with the extent of distinctive face consumption by American
and Chinese consumers. The significance of the F-test (p< 0.001) indicates
that Chinese consumers (mean = 5.243) are more likely to relate product
brands to their face than are American consumers (mean = 3.859), in
support of H2.
With H3, we hypothesise that Chinese consumers are more likely to
consider the prestige of the products than are American consumers during
other-oriented face consumption, such as gift giving or dinner parties. The
results show that the difference in this construct is highly significant (p<
0.001) between the Chinese (mean = 5.544) and American (mean = 4.547)
samples, so H3 is supported.
We distinguish the concept of face from a closely related construct,
prestige, and examine the influence of face on consumer behaviours in the
United States and China. As a social-self construct rooted solidly in
collectivistic cultures, face differs from prestige and influences consumer
behaviours. In addition, face consumption has three unique characteristics:
conformity, distinctiveness and other-orientation. On the basis of a cross-
cultural survey, we find that Chinese consumers are more likely to be
influenced by their reference groups, relate product brands and prices to
their face, and consider the prestige of the products in other-oriented
consumption than are American consumers.
Our findings offer some explanation for the seemingly irrational
phenomenon discussed at the outset of this paper – namely, that Asian
consumers have strong demands for luxury products despite their
relatively lower income level (Ram 1989, 1994; Jiang 2005). Due to the
heavy influence of face, Asian consumers must purchase luxury products
Table 3 Results of hypotheses testing
Construct (n= 106) (n= 114) F(1,217) pvalue
Conformity face consumption 3.148 5.345 237.115 0.000
Distinctive face consumption 3.859 5.243 82.540 0.000
Other-oriented face consumption 4.547 5.544 43.172 0.000
MANCOVA: Wilks' lambda = 0.460, F(3, 215) = 84.025, p= 0.000.
to enhance, maintain or save their face. Therefore, the conceptualisation
of face and face consumption provides a useful way to understand why
Asian consumers, on the one hand, are very thrifty in their everyday life
and consumption but, on the other hand, spend – and sometimes waste –
a large amount of money on luxury consumption.
Our findings also provide some preliminary implications for businesses
that seek to expand to China. A better understanding of the concept of
face in Chinese society can help companies understand what products
Chinese consumers prefer and why they favour them. This study also
provides some implications for product positioning strategies. For
example, companies may want to position their offerings as products that
can give Chinese consumers a sense of face. Furthermore, the brands and
products offered by western companies – whether high-technology (e.g.
personal computers) or low-technology (e.g. cosmetics) – are usually
perceived as name brands by Chinese consumers (Anderson & He 1998).
Because our findings suggest that Chinese consumers tend to relate name
brands to face and thus are willing to pay a higher price for a name-brand
product, western companies might consider adopting a premium pricing
strategy for China. In addition, when devising their advertising or
promotional messages, these companies should take the face concept into
consideration and emphasise the high quality and distinguished social
status of their products. Finally, the results show that Chinese consumers
are more likely to be influenced by their group members in terms of their
face consumption. Therefore, communication strategies such as word of
mouth could be used to attract consumers more effectively.
Our study also offers some implications for market research
practitioners. Because our findings show the heavy influence of face on
Chinese consumers' consumption, market research practitioners should
take face consumption into consideration when they conduct research to
better understand Chinese consumers. For example, market researchers
can identify what type of consumer is likely to demonstrate conformity,
distinctive or other-oriented face consumption. Relating consumer
demographic and psychological profiles to their face consumption patterns
would help classify Chinese consumers into different categories. More
importantly, market researchers can further investigate the specific
purchase behaviour associated with different dimensions of face
consumption. Such an effort would generate fresh insights for us to better
understand Chinese consumers and predict their purchase behaviours.
Similar to most research, this study contains several limitations. First,
our study is limited by the use of student samples, which may raise
questions about the generalisability of our findings. Although students
share many culturally embedded beliefs and behaviours with other groups
in a society, they also possess some idiosyncrasies and may be not
nationally representative. Further research should replicate our study with
non-student subjects to test the generalisability of the findings. Second,
this research provided some evidence that the face consumption construct
is unique from other constructs, though the conceptualisation and
operationalisation of face consumption is quite exploratory. We
acknowledge that more rigorous scale development and refinement is
needed for additional research in this area. For example, further research
is encouraged to employ statistical techniques such as confirmatory factor
analysis and discriminant analysis to fully validate the face consumption
construct. Future research is also welcome to use a broader sample and
follow the more rigorous scale development process to develop a better
measurement of face consumption. Third, we compare face consumption
only between American and Chinese consumers. Because face plays an
important role in collectivist cultures (Ting-Toomey & Kurogi 1998), and
given that more than two-thirds of the world's population lives in
collectivist cultures (Triandis 1995), it would be worthwhile to study face
and face consumption using a worldwide context. Such an effort will
definitely enhance our understanding in this area.
This study is supported by the CityU Start-Up Grant (7200065) from the
City University of Hong Kong.
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Julie Juan Li is Assistant Professor, Department of Marketing, City
University of Hong Kong. Her research interests include interorganisa-
tional relationships, international marketing and trust building.
Chenting Su (PhD Virginia Tech) is Associate Professor at City
University of Hong Kong and Adjunct Professor at Wuhan University, P.R.
China. His research has been published in Journal of Marketing Research,
International Journal of Research in Marketing, Psychology & Marketing,
among others.
Address for correspondence: Julie Juan Li, Assistant Professor, Faculty
of Business, City University of Hong Kong, Kowloon, Hong Kong.
Email: julieli@cityu.edu.hk
... Su and Li (2007) defined face consciousness as a person's consciousness or desire to enhance, maintain and preserve face [1]. Bao (2003) defined face awareness as a desire to improve face, maintain face and avoid losing face when communicating with others [2]. ...
A Study on the Influence of Face Consciousness on Sichuan Wine Purchase Intention: Regulatory Effect of Reference Group Influence
Yan Liu
Yijun Chen
This paper studies the influence of consumers' face awareness on their purchase intention of Sichuan wine, and analyzes the regulatory role of reference groups in face awareness and consumers' purchase intention of Sichuan wine.Through empirical research, it is found that the three dimensions of face awareness, namely consistency, difference and others' orientation, have a positive impact on Sichuan wine purchase intention, and the two dimensions of reference group impact, namely informational impact and normative impact, have a negative regulatory effect on face awareness and consumers' Sichuan wine purchase intention.
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The Oxford Handbook of Emotional Development
Daniel Dukes
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Eric Walle
Karine Viana
This volume concerns emotional development and includes contributions from leading experts in the fields of psychology, neuroscience, sociology, primatology, philosophy, history, cognitive science, computer science, and education. This is the first volume of its kind to include such a multidisciplinary group of experts to consider emotional development, and, as such, provides perhaps the most complete examination yet of how emotions develop and manifest themselves neuronally, intra- and interpersonally, across different cultures and species, and over time. The volume is separated into five sections: macro and micro underpinnings, communication and understanding, interactive contexts, socialization and learning, and morality and prosocial behavior. Each section includes contributions from researchers in at least three disciplines, resulting in a volume that is destined to provoke the interested reader into either purposively and accidentally discovering emotional development from novel and stimulating perspectives. The chapters are written to be concise in their overview and accessible to the researcher or intellectually curious person alike. Thus, the reader can enjoy state-of-the-art critical analysis of emotional development from different standpoints, which, whether dipped into casually or read as a whole, will provide the best view of not only what we know today about emotional development, but also where the future study of emotional development lies.
... In a collectivist culture, consumers tend to place group goals higher than individual goals and they are tendency influenced by others and reference groups (Li and Su, 2007). That means global brand are easier get higher brand loyalty in Chinese market, and recommend by brand loyalty followers have a effective approach to build brand loyalty in Chinese market. ...
Research on brand loyalty of Costa coffee in Chinese marke
Xiaoru Du
Xiaoyu Du
The purpose of this research is to explore how to improve Costa brand loyalty in Chinese market. According to the existing theories, it explained that brand loyalty is a sustainable competiveness for brand to acquired profits. And it also pointed that the advantages of brand loyalty, such as: reduce marketing costs, trade leverage, attract new consumers and respond competitive threats. It also pointed out consumers' satisfaction, brand trust, perceive value, repeat purchase behavior, commitment and involvement all influence brand loyalty. In order to investigate which part is more important for improving brand loyalty of global coffee retail brand in Chinese market and find a way to help it success. This paper adopts secondary research to collect data and use Costa and Starbucks as case to analyze. According to Starbucks highly brand loyalty and successful experience in China, it expressed that understanding local culture and integrating it into their products and services are essential for global coffee retail brand to satisfy consumer' need. At the end of the research, it found that global coffee brand loyalty closely related to consumers 'satisfaction. And Costa need to provide more products choice for Chinese consumer and integrate Chinese flavor into their products will help it get highly brand loyalty then acquired more loyalty consumers.
... Studies found that all Buddhism, Taoism, and Confucianism cultures, the culture of "unity of nature and man, " and the group culture in the Chinese social and cultural context have a positive impact on consumer attitudes and behaviors toward green products (Wang et al., 2018). This is expressed in terms of one's image in the eyes of others and the morality of one's own behavior, as well as the social effects it produces, such as "face" (Juan Li and Su, 2007), and can be obtained through interpersonal interactions that are contextual in nature (Ho, 1976;Qi, 2011). For example, there is often a group effect, whereby others in the group choose to consume vicariously, and then, the likelihood of individuals choosing to consume vicariously is greatly increased. ...
Why is reusable bag consumption easier to say than do?
Dongqing Yan
Cai Xiang
Meiying Xie
Qun Cao
White pollution has become a global problem. China issued a strict plastic ban but fell into an awkward position. Despite the increasing environmental awareness, the positive attitude of consumers toward using reusable bags instead of plastic bags is difficult to reflect on from their behavior. This article bridges this gap by utilizing a consumer behavior framework based on the behavioral reasoning theory (BRT) and the attitude-behavior-context (ABC) model. This framework is tested using structural equation modeling with 481 Chinese consumers. This article confirms that the value has a significant impact on consumer attitudes. Meanwhile, the article reveals the positive influence of "reasons for" in predicting attitudes and the negative influence of "reasons against" in predicting intentions. Reusable bag consumption behavior is a result of multiple pathways working together, which causes the gap between attitudes and behaviors. This article also confirms the moderating role of the Chinese face and the enforcement of the plastic ban in influencing behavior. These findings offer interesting insights for enterprises and governments to solve the problem of plastic consumption.
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Factors Affecting the Parental Intention of Using AVs to Escort Children: An Integrated SEM–Hybrid Choice Model Approach
Yueqi Mao
Qiang Mei
Jing Peng
Pan Luo
Automated vehicle (AVs) technology is advancing at a rapid pace, offering new options for school travel. Parents play a decisive role in the choice of their child's school travel mode. To enable primary and secondary school students to take AVs to and from school, it is necessary to understand the factors that affect parents' intentions toward the new school travel mode. This study has three primary aims: (1) Discovering parents' intentions to escort children by AV and their potential determinants. (2) Constructing the Hybrid Choice Model (HCM) to examine the effects of parents' socioeconomic attributes, psychological factors, and travel attributes on using AVs to escort their children. (3) Raising practical implications to accelerate AV applications in school travel. The findings suggested that knowledge of AVs is the most important factor influencing parental intentions. Perceived usefulness, attitude, and perceived risk had significant effects on parental intentions. The direct effects of public engagement and perceived ease of use on parental intentions were not significant. Finally, this research can provide decision-making support for the government to formulate measures to promote AV application in school travel.
Zero in consumer decision-making: The zero-price effect and the zero-comparison effect
Zhichao YANG
Ting WANG
Vertical line extensions: consumers' preferences for downward and upward extensions
Asia Pac J Market Logist
Miyuri Shirai
Purpose Research on vertical line extensions shows that consumers tend to evaluate upward extensions higher than downward ones. This paper examines the opposite situation. It also investigates the process underlying consumer responses by identifying a moderator and mediators. Design/methodology/approach Two studies were conducted to assess the effect of extension direction (upward vs downward) on consumers' extension evaluations. Study 1 incorporated implicit theories of relationships (the growth belief) as a moderator and inferred motives for launching a vertical line extension as mediators in the effect. Study 2 presented a firm's rationale for undertaking the extension to examine whether it influenced evaluations. Findings Consumers' preferences for downward over upward extensions appeared in markets where the exclusivity of luxury brands had been reduced. However, the resistance to upward extensions was weaker when consumers endorsed stronger growth beliefs in human relationships. Consumers inferred customer- and selling-oriented motives more strongly from downward than upward extensions, enhancing the evaluations. Finally, when presenting a rationale for launching an extension in the launch announcement, customer-oriented reasoning raised the evaluations higher than selling-oriented reasoning but did not elevate the evaluations higher than the announcement showing no reason. Originality/value This study advances the literature on vertical line extensions and shows that consumers' preference for upward over downward extensions is not universal. The opposite pattern exists in markets with a lower distinction between high- and low-end brands. It supports the theoretical notion that responses are driven by the differences in growth belief and in cognitive inferences vis-à-vis motives.
Lüks Tüketim Mallarında İşletmenin Yönetimsel Başarısı: Chanel No.5 Marka Örneği
Canan Tiftik
z Tüketim farklı şekillerde meydana gelse bile her daim için var olan ve olacak bir olgudur. Sanayi devriminin sonrası üretim artmasıyla birlikte insanlar için ihtiyaç dışı dahi olsa tüketim olgusu önemli bir etken haline gelmiştir. Kapitalizm, tüketimi gerek reklamlarla gerek çeşitli pazarlama yöntemleriyle özendirici ve ilgi çekici hale getirmiştir. Markaların yarattıkları çeşitli imajlarla ürünleri tanıtma ve pazarlama potansiyelleri günümüzde önemli bir yer tutmaktadır. Yüksek maliyetlerine karşın pek çok lüks marka tüketim toplumu tarafından tercih edilmekte ve tüketilmektedir. Bu makale çalışmasında, lüks tüketimde önemli bir yer edinen Chanel No.5 markası ele alınmış olup, Chanel No.5 kokusunun lüks tüketimde neden tercih edildiği, tarihçesi ve bu markanın lüks tüketim malları içerisinde yer edinmesini sağlayan işletmenin yönetimsel başarısı incelenmiştir. Abstract Consumption is ever lasting no matter how differently it may occur. The increasing manufacturing since the industrial revolution has made redundant consumptions important. Consumption has gained an allure with capitalism due to various advertising or marketing methods. Brands make labels for their products and their promotion and marketing potentials are important to us these days. Even though they are high in price, many luxury brands are being favored and used by consumers. Chanel No.5 brand which has achieved a very important role in luxury consuming was approached in this study. The reasons of why Chanel No.5 scent is widely prefered in luxury consumption, its background and the administrative success behind making this brand attain a place in luxury market was reviewed.
Impact of Bi-axial Stretching of Rib Knitted Fabric on its EMI Shielding
Sundaramoorthy Palanisamy
Veronika Tunakova
Jana Ornstová
Jiri Militky
The electrically conductive textiles market expands every year because of its broader applications. Especially in electromagnetic shielding applications, textile materials are widely used. There have been many studies on the development and manufacturing of conductive textiles, but there are very few studies related to their deformation performance. In this work, the rib knitted fabric sample is developed with silver-coated polyamide yarn and stretched using the biaxial device. During biaxial extension, the sample is tested for electromagnetic shielding, electrical resistance, and porosity as per the standards. There is a significant change in electromagnetic shielding effectiveness during fabric stretching. The fabric's electrical resistance and porosity were also changed during fabric stretching. The deformation performance knowledge of the conductive fabric is essential for developing samples for wireless strain sensing and motion-detecting applications.
Consumers' preference for brand prominence in the context of identity-based consumption for self versus for others: The role of self-construal
Zhe Zhang
Xinyi Liu
When consumers undertake identity consumption by consuming products or services, their choice can be influenced not only by the brand but also the brand prominence. In order to investigate the relationship between consumers' preference and identity-based consumption demand, this study examines consumers' preference for brand prominence in the context of identity-based consumption for self versus for others based on a comparison and interaction between social groups. The results show that, in the scenario of identity-based consumption for self, when consumers are members of the in-group or the high-level identity salience out-group, self-construal has no significant influence on their preference with respect to brand prominence. However, when consumers are in the low-level identity salience out-group, self-construal significantly affects their preference in this regard. In addition, in the scenario of identity-based consumption for others (i.e. gift-giving) when gift-givers and gift-receivers have the same fashion status, the self-construal of gift-givers does not affect their preference. However, when gift-givers and gift-receivers have different fashion statuses, the self-construal of gift-givers impacts their preference for brand prominence. Specifically, interdependent self-construal consumers are more inclined to choose products according to gift-receivers' preference for brand prominence. Theoretical and managerial implications are discussed, along with future research directions.
Marketing Universals: Consumers' Use of Brand Name, Price, Physical Appearance, and Retailer Reputation as Signals of Product Quality
J MARKETING
Niraj Dawar
Philip M. Parker
Marketing universals are defined as consumer behaviors within a segment and toward a particular product category that are invariant across cultures. Using several definitions of culture and three different criteria for universality, the authors evaluate whether the use of brand, price, retailer reputation, and physical product appearance as signals of quality are marketing universals for consumer electronics products. Using a sample representing 38 nationalities, they find that there are few differences in the use of quality signals across cultures for a high priority segment of consumers. They draw conclusions for the adaptation versus standardization debate and argue that certain behaviors are likely to be universal, whereas others are not. Understanding such differences is essential to designing international marketing strategies.
Politeness: Some Universals in Language Usage
Penelope Brown
Stephen C Levinson
John J. Gumperz
Student Surrogates in Consumer Research
Richard F. Beltramini
The role of "face" in the organizational perceptions of Chinese managers
Gordon Redding
M. Ng
Luxury goods firms find a haven in Asia
J. Ram
Price perceptions: A cross-national study between American and Chinese young consumers
Adv Consum Res
Z. Zhou
K. Nakamoto
This paper examines the influence of cultural factors (i.e., face consideration and risk aversion) and marketing environments upon price perceptions and compares price perceptions between American and Chinese young consumers empirically. The cross-national measurement validity is assessed to make the comparison meaningful. The findings show that, contrast to the common notions about Chinese traditionalism, Chinese young consumers perceive a weaker price-quality relationship than American young, and they are more prestige sensitive, less price conscious, and less coupon prone than their US counterparts, but they are as value conscious as American young consumers.
Collectivism and individualism as dimensions of social change
Janusz Reykowski
The Relationship between Status Consumption and Materialism: A Cross-Cultural Comparison of Chinese, Mexican, and American Student
J Market Theor Pract
Jacqueline K. Eastman
Bill Fredenberger
Stephen Calvert
This paper examines the individual difference variables of materialism (as measured by Richins and Dawson 1992) and status consumption (as measured by Kilsheimer 1993) across three countries (U.S.A., Peoples Republic of China, and Mexico) of college students. The study addresses the reliability of the two constraints as well as the relationship between these two constructs within and between countries. The results suggest that status consumption and materialism are significantly different constructs in all three countries surveyed. Additionally, while there are statistically significant differences in the materialism levels across all three countries, there are no statistically significant differences in the level of status consumption for the American, Chinese, and Mexican consumers surveyed. This suggests that consuming for status has equal importance in all three countries. The implications for international Marketing Managers are suggested.
The Confucian Paradigm of Man: A Sociological View
Ambrose Y.C. King
Michael Harris Bond
The fundamental fact of Confucianism is that it is a secular social theory, the purpose of which is to achieve a harmonious society. This chapter discusses the structural pattern of Chinese attitudes and behavior by analyzing the Confucian paradigm of man. There are different articulations of Confucian theory of society and the individual. Most of the literature depicts Confucianism as a social theory and a social force that tends to mold the Chinese into group-oriented or family-oriented and socially dependent beings. This view has a good deal of sociological truth and has been more or less borne out to date by empirical studies. The Confucian paradigm of man has the theoretical thrust as well as a built-in structural imperative to develop a person into a relation-oriented individual who is not only socially responsive and dependent but is also capable of asserting a self-directed role in constructing a social world. However, this feature of Confucianism has been relatively neglected in theoretical analyses and has been unexplored in empirical research.
Contemporary Chinese Culture: Structure and Emotionality
Aust J Chin Aff
Lung-kee Sun
Channel Relationships Management
Ying Huang
Chun Zhang
National Natural Science Foundation of China (Grant Nos. 71272090 and 71402100) and Program for New Century Excellent Talents in University (Grant No. NCET-13-0909)
Zhimin Zhou
Nan Zhou
Qiyuan Zhang
Brand loyalty and sequential learning theory
September 2006 · Psychology and Marketing
Stephen B. Knouse
Capaldi's Sequential Theory is presented as an alternative learning explanation of brand loyalty. Several hypotheses are derived which predict the effects of delay of reward, intertrial interval, and magnitude of reward upon strength of brand loyalty. To integrate Sequential Theory into the literature of consumer behavior, refinements are proposed, such as requirements for measuring purchasing ... [Show full abstract] behavior, a better definition of reward, and the joining of Sequential Theory to the prevailing cognitive theories in consumer behavior.
Research on the Marketing of Fashion Luxuries in China
January 2011 · Advanced Materials Research
Xiao Yu Liu
Yan Chen
Li Li Zhang
Nowadays the market of fashion luxury is expended in China. Foreign luxury brands have been landing in China in succession and the fashion luxury as an important part of luxury products has also showed a prosperity market. By using of brand theory, the definitions of luxuries and fashion luxuries are given to analyze the characters of fashion luxuries under the premise of a profound understanding ... [Show full abstract] of meaning and role of the brand. The approaches of qualitative are used in combination in this article. The qualitative approach is applied to analyze the market of luxuries in China, the consumers' behaviors and the consumers' psychology. The interview methods are adopted to collect information. The elements of fashion luxuries and the indicators for physical and psychological are analyzed and proposed. On the basis of above researches, the marketing strategies for the development of domestic fashion luxury are raised up. Main points are given in this paper can be applied as a foundation of the fashion luxury market development. It makes helpful suggestions for native luxury brands' designing and for marketing strategy's planning. It is hopeful to provide practical ideas and methods for administrators of fashion luxury brands' management and operation.
Psychological and behavioural drivers of male fashion leadership
June 2014 · Asia Pacific Journal of Marketing and Logistics
Haluk Koksal
Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to identify the factors affecting male fashion leadership behaviour. The study examined the effect of fashion consciousness, fashion knowledge, mood enhancement, decision-making confidence and brand switching as the psychological factors. It also included the influence of behavioural factors such as the information sources, attributes of purchasing fashion ... [Show full abstract] clothing and type of retailers on male fashion leadership. Design/methodology/approach – The data were collected through a structured questionnaire distributed in the main shopping districts of Beirut, Lebanon, during March 2012. Findings – The study uncovered that fashion consciousness, fashion knowledge, confidence in decision making and mood enhancement are to be the most important psychological factors influencing male fashion leadership behaviour. The study also found that frequency of reading fashion magazines is negatively and significantly affecting fashion leadership. Male fashion leaders use colleagues and friends as the main information sources for fashion. The effect of attractiveness, brand name, store image and quality of clothing is positive and significant whilst value for money negatively and significantly influences male fashion leadership. Male fashion leaders mainly shop from specialty shops, chain stores, department stores and the internet. Originality/value – Although there are a handful of studies which examined female fashion leadership, the male fashion leadership concept has not been extensively addressed in the literature. In an attempt to at least partially address this, the study attempts to identify the factors affecting male fashion leadership behaviour in Lebanon.
The effects of counterfeiting on luxury brand buying behavior in terms of brand experience and brand...
Siham Mourad
A large number of studies on counterfeiting explore consumers behavior in the consumption of counterfeit articles. But few of them consider luxury brand consumers and counterfeiting. Our doctoral study attempts to contribute to this field by studying principal aspects of luxury brand buying behavior. Our research aims to identify and measure insensitivity to counterfeiting which is a new concept ... [Show full abstract] developed in this study. Brand experience and relationship brand variables will also be considered. Our study contributes to counterfeiting's researches, and more precisely to researches on consumption of legitimate products. On the other side, the connection with brand experience or the relationships with the luxury brand have not been undertaken in counterfeiting researches which leads us to considerate these two important aspects of the luxury brand. Concerning the methodological facet, we first propose the measure of consumer's reaction toward counterfeiting, namely insensitivity to counterfeiting. Then, we perform a PLS model that includes all concepts studied and specifies complex links between concepts. In a managerial way, we propose to counter counterfeiting by focusing on the luxury brand itself. We suggest for luxury brand managers to choose the appropriate marketing tool. Immersion in brand universe, consumer implication or focusing on opinion leaders, are good ways to enhance consumer's loyalty, despite the presence of counterfeiting.