Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to examines the positive and negative impact of service provider experiences on the process of identity adjustment and how they can lead to subjective well-being (SWB). Due to increased life expectancies, people are experiencing major life events during aging (e.g. death of a spouse, serious disease and major health problems), events that lead to identity redefinition. Design/methodology/approach – To gain more insight into this issue, a qualitative study was carried out that involved 37 in-depth interviews conducted with aging individuals who had experienced a major life event such as retirement and/or death of spouse. To apprehend the diversity of consumption situations, the authors investigated daily consumption, hedonic consumption and imposed services (e.g. health and funeral services) due to life events. Findings – The findings suggest that service providers influence consumer’s SWB as regards relationships, growth and purpose in life, mastery and independence and self-acceptance. Originality/value – The contribution indicates that services play a role in maintaining and/or creating SWB. By segmentation through social roles and facilitating access to services, providers must take into account the processes of normalcy and abandonment (déprise) among aging consumers in life transitions. They must also ensure that they support consumers with the lowest human capital (skills, level of education, income and social class).

Nursing homes are the quintessential example of vital service captivity. Consumers need vital services when they can no longer fulfil their basic needs on their own and their only choice is to delegate them to the market (e.g. care services for long-term and chronic illnesses, eating assistance at mealtimes). The service is referred to as ‘captive’ because older people are generally unwilling to use it, and when they have to, their options are limited. For elderly consumers, there is ‘no exit possible’, and as such they must integrate the service into their sense of self. The paper aims to (1) identify strategies for coping with vital service captivity and (2) present the identity negotiation mechanisms that lead people to choose one strategy over another. The study was conducted over a 6-month period in three nursing homes. Data collection includes semi-structured interviews, focus groups, participant observations, and micro-interviews with consumers – elderly residents and their families – and nursing home staff. Its main contribution is to highlight that coping with vital service captivity is a differential process. Consumers implement multiple coping strategies simultaneously, and these strategies are linked to three areas: routinization, socialization, and assimilation of a new social status. Moreover, implementing coping strategies means striking a balance between ‘disengagement’ and ‘engagement’ that not only takes into account former life trajectory, future prospects, and social comparisons, but also any changes in physical or cognitive skills and family support. Understanding these coping strategies and identity negotiation mechanisms highlights some unintended consequences on residents’ well-being, such as the importance of standardizing how the service is organized because it provides a stable framework, or the importance given to the well-being of all stakeholders (other consumers, staff) as a result of the community living situation.

Professeur des universités IAE Bretagne Occidentale BrestLaboratoire ICILes auteurs remercient les quatre lecteurs anonymes pour leurs commentaires qui ont permis d'améliorer cet article, ainsi que Joël Brée, rédacteur en chef, pour ses encouragements et suggestions. Ils peuvent être contactés aux adresses électroniques suivantes : RÉSUMÉ Au cours de cet article nous nous intéressons à un phénomène peu connu en marketing et qui suscite pourtant un véritable engouement chez les personnes âgées : la rédaction de l'histoire de vie. Alors que la pratique des « écritures du moi » a fait l'objet de nombreuses recherches en gérontologie, en sociologie et surtout en littérature, aucune recherche marketing n'a porté sur ces comportements spécifiques. L'objet de cet article est d'identifier le concept de récit de vie et de proposer à la communauté académique et managériale une première échelle de mesure des motivations qui le sous-tendent. Deux recueils de données par questionnaires (202 et 508 réponses) ont permis de développer et de valider une échelle de mesure composée de vingt items répartis sur six dimensions (flatter l'ego, réparer l'ego, ne pas être oublié, partager, transmettre et témoigner). Ce papier constitue une contribution au corpus théorique sur les objets spéciaux et la transmission intergénérationnelle. Il montre que la signification d'un objet spécial ne relève pas uniquement des évocations symboliques qui peuvent se perdre ou être dénaturées mais qu'elles peuvent être explicites et inscrites au coeur même de l'objet.Mots clés : Histoire de vie, personne âgée, transmission intergénérationnelle, identité.

The concept of intergenerational transmission has given rise to a heterogenous body of research in consumer behaviour. It has been mobilised in domains as varied as consumer socialisation and heritage disposition. This article proposes an integrative conceptual framework for the intergenerational transmission of consumer behaviour. This framework has emerged from an interpretation of Erikson’s theory of human personality development. Its first contribution is that it links the developmental concerns of the younger and older generations (learning, differentiating, taking care and preserving) around the notion of intergenerational capital. Its second contribution is that it puts forward the concepts of sociocultural, economic, psychological and genetic capital, which serve to enrich and clarify the nature of intergenerational capital. Finally, it opens up new research directions, including a much-needed focus on the central role of the ‘pivot’ generation (the 30–65 age group) and on taking into account the concept of attachment in the study of the effect of inherited psychological resources on the adoption of consumer practices.

This article concerns a relatively unknown phenomenon in marketing that has become, however, extremely popular among older adults: legacy writing. While the writing of "egodocuments" has been the subject of many studies in gerontology, sociology and, above all, literature, research in marketing has yet to examine its specific components. The purpose of this article is to identify the concept of legacy writing and propose an initial scale to the academic and managerial community for measuring the motivations underlying this practice. Two sets of data collected with questionnaires (202 and 508 responses) have been used to develop and confirm the validity of a scale consisting in twenty items, divided into six dimensions (flattering the ego, mending the ego, being remembered, sharing, transmitting, and bearing witness). This research offers a contribution to the theoretical corpus on special objects and intergenerational transmission. It demonstrates that the meaning of a special object is not exclusively restricted to symbolic references that may be lost or denatured, but others that are explicit and inscribed at the very core of the object.