This study investigated the clothing selections for purchase of preschool and kindergarten‐aged children in a midsized southern city. The theory of consumer socialization provided framework for the study. Seven hundred questionnaires were distributed to parents/ guardians of 3‐, 4‐, 5‐, and 6‐year‐old children at public and private schools and preschools. A total of 314 usable questionnaires were completed by mothers, yielding a 45% response rate. T tests, ANOVA, and frequencies were used to analyze data. The effects of demographic variables were investigated in relation to three consumer socialization constructs. Findings indicated that consumer socialization of children begins at an early age and is related to selected demographic characteristics. Results of this study are important for those involved in the children's wear business, as well as for clothing and retailing educators. © 1993 John Wiley & Sons, Inc.

The purpose of this study was twofold: (1) to apply a choice sets model of retail selection in a specialized apparel category to identify decision styles among consumers, and (2) to profile the decision styles in terms of personal characteristics (shopping attitudes, shopping orientations and motivations and demographics) and desired retailer attributes related to store patronage. The Spiggle & Sewall (1987) choice sets model of retail store selection was applied to the purchase process of a high involvement apparel category (maternity apparel) with a sample of 300 pregnant women. Analysis of the choice sets model for consumers identified six decision styles: narrowers (highest knowledge of stores), shoppers (have the largest choice sets), apathetics (uninvolved shoppers), loyals (low to moderate choice set size), late bloomers (systematically have larger choice set sizes), and the avoiders (extremely low choice sets). The six decision styles were then profiled with a series of shopper and retailer characteristics, with discriminant analysis used to identify the differentiating variables from the set of all variables.

Retailers who can effectively target consumers and reach them -through the appropriate medium have greater chances for success in today's fragmented marketplace. Market segmentation has become an impo&ant tool in identifying target consumers.While demographics have traditionally been used to define consumers, psychographics are now providing marketers with increased understanding of specific consumer groups by describing consumers in terms of how they think and what comprises their interests, activities, and opinions. There continues to be a search for appropriate retail segmentation variables to classify store patrons across situations and competitive environments. November). Fashion and shopping perceprionr, demographics, and media usage of rural and urban women. Paper presented at the meeting of College Professors of Textiles and Clothing, Denver, CO.

No abstract

In-home shopping has become an integral element in today's retailing structure. The purpose of this study was to provide a theoretically based investigation of in-home shopping behaviour by focusing on the differences between urban and rural consumers regarding in-home clothing purchases and identifying the patronage-related factors. With separate samples of rural and urban consumers, a questionnaire assessed three general types of factors thought to affect in-home shopping (personal characteristics. perceptions of shopping options and situational constraints). Descriptive profiles first identified the diflerences between urban vs rural respondents on their catalogue usage and cable shopping frequency. A multivariate test (discriminant analysis) assessed whether differences exirt between the rural and urban subsamples on the basic factors affecting in-home shopping. Findings demonstrated that these two groups differ not only in theirfrequency of in-home shopping, but also in each of the three basic factors influencing this form of patronage. Implications for retailers and further research are provided. 157