Consumption Coping and Life Transitions: An Integrative Review

The COVID-19 pandemic has significantly influenced our daily and social lives as well as our consumption patterns. This paper focuses on the relationship between the COVID-19 threat and variety-seeking. Based on several theories, including reactance theory and terror management theory, we predict that the perceived threat of COVID-19 will increase the tendency to choose more and different options in multiple choice settings. Firstly, two empirical studies demonstrate that variety-seeking in food and stationery choices is enhanced as people's perceived threat from the disease increases. Study 3 further suggests the boundary conditions of the above pattern in that the type of decision (i.e., multiple option selections across different brands vs. within the same brand) will moderate the impact of the perceived threat on varietyseeking. Specifically, when the decision involved choice across different brands, participants showed higher variety-seeking under high (vs. low) perceived threat. However, the opposite pattern was true when the decision involved choice within the same brand. This research offers a deeper understanding of how variety-seeking can be changed by the perceived threat of COVID-19.

Section: Literature Review and Main Predictionsmentioning

confidence: 76%

Impact of the Perceived Threat of COVID-19 on Variety-Seeking

Kim

2020

“…The study has not separated specific groups such as single parents. The growth of the non-traditional household and life events have emerged as important research issues (Schaninger and Danko, 1993; Yap and Kapitan, 2017). Future research, therefore, could usefully extend the study by examining the relationship between purchasing price and the life cycle of non-traditional households.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Yap and Kapitan (2017) recently examined transition in life (i.e. events such as parenthood) and how they relate to individual consumption.…”

Section: Literature Reviewmentioning

confidence: 99%

Empirical Regularities in Average Price Paid across Different Types of Households

Pare

Trinh

Wright

2017

This research examines the relationship between the average price paid by a household for consumer packaged goods and different types of households. Using panel data that consists of approximately 17,000 households per year, we examine 24 consumer packaged goods categories across 6 years (2005–2010) to understand the way in which average purchasing price varies across five key household types or stages, and to highlight generalizability. We find systematic patterns with respect to average price paid as households pass through key household stages. The changes follow an S-shape pattern across multiple product categories. The average purchasing price declines as households move from the pre-family stage to the young family stage, increases at the older family and post-family stages, and then decreases slightly at the single elderly stage. Overall, the most significant change is from the pre-family stage to the young family stage, followed by the change from the older family stage to the post-family stage. The differences hold across multiple years. The effects, however, are larger for nonfood than for food categories. Our results suggest that in order to broaden the brand customer base, brand managers need to have a product portfolio that includes both low and high price variants as well as presence across different distribution channels to satisfy the need of different types of households.

“…More research is needed to explore the role of consumption in supporting consumers in liminality across a range of different transitions (Pettigrew et al, 2014). In particular, Yap and Kapitan (2017) suggest the need for the type of deeper insights that are generated by qualitative research approaches. Next, we briefly discuss timebanking.…”

Section: Literature Reviewmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…This study is also limited because it only focuses on “sharing-in” within the family (Belk, 2009 p. 275). Recent research calls for deeper understanding into significant life transitions and how consumers cope (Yap and Kapitan, 2017). The purpose of this research is to explore how consumers use sharing to cope with liminality across a range of life transitions.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

The Power of Sharing to Support Consumers through Liminality

Ozanne

2020

Across a lifetime, consumers face many transitions in which they need social support. Difficult transitions are often fraught with challenges, such as transitioning from one social role to another. But social support is particularly important for consumers in liminality when they are caught between social roles failing to transition from an old to a new role. Consumers in liminality benefit if they can draw on social networks for support to help them complete their transition. In this study, we explored how one form of sharing—trading skills and services in an exchange network—provides consumers with important social support helping them to cope and transition into new social roles. Specifically, a sharing exchange network helps consumers draw emotional, cognitive, and material support that enhances their well-being and has some advantages over social support from family and friends.