Assignment -

You are required to post a summary for other students in your group to read.

Purpose of the study - Was to integrate research on assimilation, differentiation, and the meaning of consumption to illustrate how consumers can make choices that simultaneously allow them to conform to desired reference groups on an attribute of choice that signals identity (e.g. brand), while differentiating from in-group members on a uniqueness attribute (e.g. colour) to satisfy needs for uniqueness.

Main Theory(ies) - The main theory for this article is Expectancy Theory - suggests that behaviour is largely pulled by expectations of achieving desirable outcomes - positive incentives - rather than pushed from within.  We choose one product over another because we expect this choice to have more positive consequences for us. (Definition).  Another main theory was Classifying Consumer Needs (specific needs and buying behaviour).  Other theories discussed, but where not the main theories of the article were:  drive theory, motivational direction (needs vs wants), Discrete emotions (Happiness, Envy, Guilt, and embarrassment).

Fours studies were performed to research these two hypotheses:

H1: Affiliation motives will drive preferences on choice dimensions associate with desired social identities.  People will conform on identity-signaling attributes and choose items that strongly signal membership to an in-group

H2: Uniqueness motives will drive preferences at the within-group level.  Higher needs for uniqueness or situations that activate uniqueness motives will lead people to differentiate themselves on uniqueness attributes and choose less popular items among in-group options.

Summary of Previous Research - Previous studies were conducted in isolation or from a one-dimensional perspective, making it difficult to explain the actual consumer behaviour.  Social influences on assimilation and differentiation are documented, but they have mostly been examined in separate research streams.  When individuals are only given the option to select what someone else picked (assimilation) or something different (differentiation), consumers must trade-off between these two motives and only one motive can prevail in any single choice.

Method of Collection Data -

Study 1 - Consisted of two parts:  field data collection and online survey.  54 students participated in the field portion in exchange for $5.  Out of the 54 students, 35 also participated in the online survey and added 28 new participants (Observers) who only participated in the online study.  All of the participants in the online survey received $10 in exchange for their participation.

Field data collection - The study was conducted at a university where they had 10 co-ed eating clubs.  As the students from two of the clubs (referred to as A and B) approached for dinner, the students were asked to participate in the study and a photo was taken of each participant.

Online Survey - Three days later the 63 participants received an online survey.  They were shown photos and asked to indicate whether each photographed person belonged to club A or B.  To minimize the possibility of recognizing people, they blurred out both the face and the background, so they only saw the clothes they were wearing.  They were then shown the same photos but this time they were grouped by club and asked to rate how unique each person's style was to one another (1 = not unique at all; 7 = very unique).

Study 2 - 132 students participated in exchange for financial payment.  Participants were first asked to identify either an in-group or out-group using instructions provided.  They also measured desires for association by asking participants. "How much would you want other people to associate you with this group?" (1 = not at all; 7 = a great deal).  Participants made choices in 10 familiar consumer categories and were asked to imagine they had a general idea about the preferences of people in the group they had specified.

Study 3 - 170 students participated in exchange for financial payment.  They were randomly assigned to a condition in a two (prime; uniqueness vs. control) by two (group type: in-group vs out-group) between subjects design.  Participants specified either an in-group or out-group and rated how much they wanted to be associated with that group.  Half of the participants were primed with uniqueness.  They were asked to look at eight pictures and identify the number of circles and squares in each image.  Exposure to such figures has been shown to increase uniqueness seeking behaviour by making uniqueness motives more accessible.

Study 4 - 163 students participated in exchange for financial payment.  They were randomly assigned to either the product differentiation or brand differentiation prime condition in a two-factor between subjects design.  Participants specified an in-group using the same instructions as previous studies (there was no out-group condition in this study).  They were presented with a sorting task designed to highlight either brands or product types as a point of differentiation within one's in-group.

Studies (Sample) -

Study 1:  Everyday Clothing Choices

They used real everyday choices in a naturalistic setting, to provide preliminary evidence that consumers choices can be simultaneously communicated by both social identity and uniqueness.  This study signaled social identities, allowing observers to accurately categorize individuals into their respective social groups, but also simultaneously conveyed individual desires for uniqueness, allowing choosers to communicate their desires for differentiation.

Study 2:  The Role of Identity-Signaling

Examined how various identity motives influence different levels of consumer choice.  By experimentally manipulating the social group associated with different options (e.g. in-group or out-group) they simultaneously tested how social identity motives and individual desires for distinction combine to drive choices.  They used brands as markers of social meaning and examined whether consumer choice on this dimension was driven by desires to signal particular social identities.  Needs for uniqueness did not influence choice at the brand level, but at the product level they influenced choice among the products from the in-group associated brand.

Study 3:  Manipulating Drives for Distinction

Provided further evidence that uniqueness motives are underlying choice at the within-group level, to manipulate rather than measures them.  They exposed some participants to images that primed uniqueness and used a similar choice task from study 2, in which brands were strong markers for social meaning.  They predicted that identity-signaling motives should again lead people to select options from the brand linked to their in-group (vs out-group).

Study 4:  Manipulating Dimensions for Differentiation

Illustrated desire for differentiation individual to choose less popular relative to others in their in-group.  Consistent with theoretical position about the meaning of choice dimensions, the way they chose was moderated by manipulating which dimension of choice of product or brand and individuals viewed as relevant to signaling and uniqueness.  Priming brands as a signal of social identity and products as a means for in-group differentiation should lead people with higher needs for uniqueness to prefer the less popular product from the group-associated brand.

All of studies demonstrated by using different choice dimensions, individuals were able to simultaneously satisfy motives for both identity-signaling and uniqueness within a single choice.  By studying both groups and at the individual levels of comparison and using multidimensional dependent measures, they show how people do not simply assimilate or differentiate by simultaneously do both on different dimensions of choice.

Major findings -

Study 1 - People's clothing choices successfully communicated their social identities.  Clothing choices also successfully communicated desire for uniqueness.  Observers rated individuals with higher needs for uniqueness as having more unique styles relative to others in their in-group.  This provides further evidence that satisfying one motives need would not come at the expense of another, and that real everyday choices can simultaneously communicate identity at both levels.

Study 2 - Provided further support for the hypotheses about how various identity motives combine to drive consumer choice.  The results suggested that needs for uniqueness still exert an influence on choice, even when psychological contrasts to out-groups can be made.  They also showed that while people with higher needs for uniqueness may be willing to select options that are less linked to their own group, they are unlikely to select options linked with other groups.

Study 3 - By manipulating drives for distinction rather than measuring them, the results underscored the findings of study 2.  People chose in ways that simultaneously allowed them to communicate both social identity and uniqueness.  In this case, brands signaled identity and desires to be associated with particular social identities again drove assimilation at the brand level.  At the same time, activating drives for differentiation, this time through a situational prime, drove differentiation among in-group linked options.

Study 4 - Provided evidence that situational cues or consumption meaning can alter which choice dimensions are better signals of social identity or uniqueness.  The results were consistent with the prior studies, people tended to conform on dimensions they perceived to be a signal of group identity, and differentiated among group-associated options to satisfy desires for uniqueness.  The overall model revealed a significant effect of the prime need for uniqueness and a marginally significant interaction.

Future research to examine the degree to which these motivations exist in various cultural contexts, as well as how they combine the drive choice, may provide insight not only into differentiation itself but also the communication of identity across cultures and the integration of multiple motives more broadly.

Bibliography - Michael R. Solomon, Katherine White and Darren W. Dahl. (2017). Consumer Behaviour: Buying, Having, and Being (7th Canadian edition). Toronto, ON: Pearson.