Journal of Consumer Behaviour, J. Consumer Behav.

10: 216224 (2011) Published online 13 June 2011 in Wiley Online Library (wileyonlinelibrary.com) DOI: 10.1002/cb.364

Conspicuous consumption orientation: Conceptualisation, scale development and validation

HIMADRI ROY CHAUDHURI 1*, S. MAZUMDAR 2 and A. GHOSHAL 3 Institute of Rural Management, Anand (IRMA), Anand 388001, Gujarat, India MBM Department, University of Calcutta, 1, Reformatory Street, Kolkata 700 027, India 3 Department of Applied Psychology, University of Calcutta, 92, APC Road, Kolkata 700 009, India
2 1

ABSTRACT In this paper individual differences in conspicuous tendencies are examined. A new definition of the construct is proposed and, through critical evaluation of the extant literature, the need for a proper scale is posited. Then an extensive exercise is taken up to develop and validate the scale. The 11-item scale is found to be uni-dimensional, to have a factor structure that is generalisable across student and nonstudent samples, and has acceptable internal and testretest reliabilities. The scales validity is attested to by its theoretically tenable relationships with other personality measures. Copyright # 2011 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

INTRODUCTION We live in a society and depend on each other for achieving many of our personal goals. These clearly include all goals that are directly related to our place in society and are only meaningful in a social context. We neither can nor want to live away from society. Our ability to function in a social setting is in turn affected by what others think about us. Consequently, efforts to tout ones success and social position can be thought to be a fundamental human instinct; though over time, what is consumed has changed, the game of display through ownership to impress the neighbours has remained essentially the same, as the winners are awarded with status and honour. In early days of the game, only the elite could participate. With industrialisation, the nouveau rich participated, followed by those having moderate or negligible success. Based on observation, more than a hundred years ago, Thorstein Veblen (1899) proposed that rich American people were spending a significant portion of their time and money on unnecessary and unproductive leisure expenditures and coined the term conspicuous consumption to describe the behaviour. Conspicuous consumption can be described as visible consumption of goods as a mechanism to enhance ones social standing (Grace and Griffin, 2009: p. 15). However, it is more of a general understanding of the phenomenon, which evolved out of observation, than an operational definition (Chaudhuri and Majumdar, 2006). With the increase of the mass consumption phenomenon in societies, where not a thin upper class, but the majority of individuals enjoys the benefits of consumer goods, the Veblenian form of conspicuous consumption (hereafter referred to as CC) may no longer fully explain the process of status attainment, and enhancement. Our everyday experience suggests that the nature of CC is going through a
* Correspondence to: Himadri Roy Chaudhuri, Assistant Professor in Marketing, Institute of Rural Management, Anand (IRMA), Anand 388001, Gujarat, India. E-mail: himadri@irma.ac.in

change, yet it remains largely unanswered by the extant literature (for details see, Chaudhuri and Majumdar, 2006). This calls for a closer investigation of the dynamics of a more contemporary perspective of CC. Moreover, new marketing opportunities can be explored based on these assertions. CC has been long considered as sinful, wasted expense that delivers no value (see Mason, 1981 for details). However, the post-War II era was marked by a far more rapid spread of capital across boundaries, resulting in the establishment of a clear hegemony of capitalistic ideologies. In this stage of capitalism, especially from a period starting from the late 1970s, emphasis was gradually placed on marketing and consuming commodities, but not on producing them and this period has often been related with postmodernism (Baudrillard, 1975, 1981).

THE EVOLVING PARADIGM OF CONSPICUOUSNESS A product may carry polysemic meanings as its creation is not deterministic, and each individual may ascribe different and idiosyncratic cultural meanings to it (Elliott, 1994). The consumer uses these symbolic meanings to construct, maintain and communicate her/his multiple identities. Also according to Belk (1988) an individual can be known by observing what he has. Hence, when an object becomes a possession, having and being are merged together. Possessions assume superlative importance to enable us to know who we are and we deliberately seek, express, confirm and ascertain the sense of being through what we have. Users driven by social values choose products that convey an image congruent with the social image they wish to project (Sheth et al., 1991). Again, scarcity helps provide the individual with a communication route to express his distinction to others (and hence, conspicuous) via the route of need for uniqueness (Snyder, 1992). The perception of scarcity (of an object) and the value implication thereof is a socially shared understanding (Lynn, 1992). Empirical

Copyright # 2011 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

Conspicuous consumption orientation studies have shown that individuals often place a higher economic value on rare or scarce products and perceive scarce products as having more prestige than products which are readily available (Verhallen, 1982). Now what is scarce in a social context? According to Bourdieu (1984), people draw on three different types of resources (economic, social and cultural capital) to compete for status, referred to as symbolic capital (Holt, 1998). Cultural capital consists of a set of socially rare and distinctive tastes, skills, knowledge and practices (Holt, 1998). In the field of consumption, cultural capital influences ones preferences and tastes for particular product categories and/or brands. By adopting abstract interpretations and ascribing complex cultural meaning to products, those with higher taste but less money would aim to compete with those with money but no matching taste. The cultural elite, thus, can make even a mundane or an easily affordable product express and exhibit their exclusive taste, by sophisticated, in-depth appreciation and appropriate communication of these taste-symbols which, by design, remain distinct from status-symbols (for a more detailed theoretical treatment, see Chaudhuri and Majumdar, 2006). Thus a change in the dynamics of conspicuousness can be clearly discerned; previous emphasis on acquisition and exhibition of physical items shifts to experiences and symbolic image in the postmodern phase (Pine et al., 1999; Firat and Venkatesh, 1993). Based on the above discussion, we propose an alternative definition of the conspicuous consumption construct as Conspicuous consumption is a deliberate engagement in symbolic and visible purchase, possession and usage of products and services imbued with scarce economic and cultural capital with the motivation to communicate a distinctive self-image to others. Thus, CC can be regarded as an innate trait level, individualistic variable that motivates consumer to engage in visible forms of consumption in order to exhibit their uniqueness, as expressed through product selection and usage. It cannot be classified as a simple attitudinal variable that only develops or influence certain product preferences in a given situation. However, any attempt to measure the same construct would ideally capture and discriminate between the individuals having differing level of CC. Thus the scale, as derived primarily from the definition of CC, would measure Conspicuous Consumption Orientation (henceforth called CCO). Need for a new scale Despite CC being an important consumer behaviour construct (McCracken, 1987), it is felt that a major problem lies in the area of measuring the construct as a consumers behavioural manifestation. A review of the extant literature does not yield an encouraging result regarding the measurement of the CCO construct. It is important in this context to review the scale developed by Marcoux et al. (1997). This instrument is found to be designed to measure conspicuousness and also has been used in the literature (see OCass and McEwen, 2004).
Copyright # 2011 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

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However, it has some weaknesses in the domains of conceptualisation and development: (1) The measure was developed as part of explaining a marketing issue to study the attitude of Polish consumers towards foreign goods. The objective suggests that the paper studied a specific attitude, and hence may not be appropriate for measuring conspicuousness in general. There is no definition of conspicuousness construct stated in the paper, although the same is deemed necessary for the development of any scale (see Churchill, 1979). Further, in the absence of a definition it remains unclear if the construct is either treated as an attitudinal variable or as a trait component. (2) Another important issue in this direction is the absence of the development history of the scale. Though the a value appears satisfactory (0.87), the validity tests of the instrument using standard methodologies have not been reported. Moreover, the rationale for and the definition of the existence and nature of the five dimensions of the scale have not also been provided. Thus, the appeal of the scale for general use does not seem to be significant. Further, other scales, like the one devised by Moschis (1981), bring out only social visibility; it can best be hypothesised as a construct close to but not substantially similar to conspicuousness especially in the given context. This can be considered, at best, an indirect measure of the construct, and can thus limit the interpretability of the results. On the other hand, Masons (1995) solution of using meansend chains, as a methodology, to measure conspicuousness can be considered qualitative in nature and would pose problems of generalisation over large samples. In short, the measurement status of the CCO construct and its related concepts still remains in a fluid and under-researched state. Moreover, with a measure of conspicuousness, we can learn more as to how it changes with age and gender, and how it may differ across cultures. Such studies may allow some initial insights regarding the effect of marketing practices. Finally, we may also be interested in discovering how conspicuousness can be related to attitudes toward nonmaterial resources such as love, happiness, or other parameters of subjective well-being, etc.

SCALE DEVELOPMENT The fact that the aspects of conspicuousness, as they have evolved in time and space (as explained above), would reside side-by-side and would express themselves in the consumers behaviour. Specially, cultural capital is different from other forms of capital because it can be converted into other forms of capital (Bourdieu 1984), thus these forms being closely correlated with one another. In the field of consumption, cultural capital influences ones preferences and tastes for particular product categories and/or brands and which also requires economic resources to create demand. This means that conspicuousness would be guided by both these factors simultaneously and this is particularly true for the burgeoning Indian urban middle class (with whom the
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H. Roy Chaudhuri et al. validate the consequences of the construct. Sample size determination is guided by guidelines provided by Peter (1979). Study I: item generation, selection and content validity Following standard processes (see Churchill, 1979) three major techniques were used to generate necessary items: (1) A literature survey. (2) Expert opinions. (3) Photo-elicitations. The first two methods are a usual step adopted almost in all scale development processes (Bearden and Netemeyer, 1999). The photo-elicitation step (for more use in consumer behaviour, see McGrath, 1995) makes this a relatively unique approach, which was suggested by Soley (2006) and is principally based on the Thematic Apperception Test (Murray, 1943). Techniques like this, which are modifications of the classical TAT, are often used in marketing research to help uncover not only their internal thoughts and feelings. However, these techniques (the format as used in the present study), may not squarely uncover aspects of personality at a greater depth (which is not our objective) (see Soley for details). Use of qualitative research tools at the initial stages of item generation for scale construction is usually a recommended process (Churchill, 1979). His suggestion of using critical incidents as an exploratory technique would find a close resemblance to the photoelicitation method as has been used here. Still, use of this particular variety is not common, though a closely resembling method has been used by Belk (1984) in his seminal work on the development of the materialism scale. This projective tool was thought of primarily because it was expected that the consumers may not be willing to divulge their spending patterns due to cultural inappropriateness as commonly seen among Asians (Wong and Ahuvia, 1998). The visual material, distributed to ten student respondents, consisted of a Bangla language print advertisement which highlighted the conspicuous use of leather goods. Rhetorically, the advertisement highlights the showoff quality of the brand. However, this brand Sreeleathers is generally perceived to be in the lower end of the local market, yet extremely popular and seen as a value-for-money brand rather than only a cheap alternative. This advertisement was selected particularly because of its assumed closeness to the hypothesised definition of CC as devised by the author. The creative focuses on a lady with a handbag with the headline, Byag to Noye, Najarkarar Chuto, literally meaning Not merely a bag, but an excuse to attract attention. Along with the photocopied material a few questions were posed to the respondents, e.g. If you think the bag is attractive-give a few words qualifying attractiveness?, Why the girl could be so much interested about attracting others? and similar other questions. The questions were designed to elicit the respondents purchase motivations in a conspicuous context in order to view to generate some primary items for the scale, with five questions were designed for the purpose. The process is
J. Consumer Behav. 10: 216224 (2011) DOI: 10.1002/cb

entire testing was done), combines both purchasing power and the taste to appreciate cultural products because of their peculiar social position and developmental backgrounds (Chaudhuri and Majumdar, 2006). It would be more justifiable to have a uni-dimensional scale than a multidimensional one. Hence, dimensionality of the scale is hypothesised to be one. The goal of this research was to produce a short, easy-toadminister instrument that reliably and validly measures individual differences in Conspicuous Consumption Orientation. A uni-dimensional scale provides additional psychometric advantages over multidimensional ones in terms of reliability, validity and interpretability (Gerbing and Anderson, 1988; Bagozzi and Heatherton, 1994). The scale will contain items reflecting the various manifestations of the construct and it can be summed into a single score. Based on the new operational definition of the construct, the scale development process was initiated and it has been divided into multiple stages which are enumerated below, starting with the description of the samples used for the scale: Study description and samples for scale development The empirical data were collected from University students as well as from a heterogeneous respondent group (hereafter referred to as General Consumers), who were located at two major provinces of India. The first sample consisted of students (n 10) who took part in a qualitative study designed for generating preliminary items of the proposed scale (Study I). In Study II, students were recruited as respondents for a Pilot Survey (n 106), which was principally used for testing the scale reliability at the initial level. The data were also used for preliminary item refinement procedures. The next two studies were done involving a student sample (Study III) (n 240) (79% males and 21% females this discrepancy is expected given the fact of lower enrolments of females in technical/professional courses in India) and the General Consumers (n 400) (54.1% male) (Study IV). Data from Study III were used to confirm the reliability and for determining the other necessary scale norms. Initial assessment of the latent structure via CFA and EFA was also done. The heterogeneous General Consumer Survey was used to further validate and generalise the factor structure via CFA. In total 400 respondents were interviewed of which 50 had to be rejected because they provided incomplete and/or unusable questionnaires. The final usable sample size was 350. The selection of this section of the respondents can be justified, apart from its heterogeneity, by their relative social positions; the students do not earn and culturally may have a somewhat limited say on and capability of purchasing different products. Moreover, the literature also recommends this particular method where two or more sample types are selected to cross validate the result (see Bearden and Netemeyer, 1999). The next sample of students (n 250) (Study V) was used to test for the validity and antecedents of the construct. An additional sample of (Study VI) students (n 60) was used to
Copyright # 2011 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

Conspicuous consumption orientation supposed to reflect the consumers purchase motivations (Soley, 2006), thereby making vital contributions to the generation of items for scale development. The respondents answers can be summarised to have generated reactions such as desirability of having acquired an English medium school background,1 awareness of contemporary taste, looking for ways to be unique, etc. These statements were reframed and included in the initial sets of items generated (e.g. Item nos. 15, 24, 28, 31, 35 and 36 in the original item-inventory (Appendix I) are derived from the responses generated by this method). In the scale design, reverse coding was dropped in view of increasing evidences against the efficacy of the method; reverse-worded items exhibit somewhat lower reliability and weaker item-to-total correlations than their positively worded counterparts (Cronbach, 1942; Benson and Hocevar, 1985; Goldsmith and Desborde, 1991; and William and Gable, 1990). The new CCO Scale is proposed to follow a six-point Likert-type summated format. The rationale for a six-point scale can be found in the literature as well: according to the extant literature, midpoints create failure through mid-point piling (Alreck and Settle, 1985), especially when opinions are not firm, thereby attenuating score reliability (Alwin and Krosnick, 1991). Nunnally (1978: p. 522) has also favoured a six-point scale to five or seven-point scales: . . .. (There is) advantage in having an even number of steps rather than an odd number. Recent studies by Weems and Onwuegbuzie (2001) also lend support to these facts. Keeping the findings in mind, we decided upon a response structure without a midpoint, and thereby the scale was finally designed to be a sixpoint Likert-type response format without any reverse coding items. Standard psychometric procedures (Nunnally, 1978) demand generation of a substantial number of items for a successful scale. This scale had no significant predecessors, but a few closely related scales were identified. For this purpose, around 50 other scales were consulted for generation of new items. The initial instrument for testing contained 60 items that prima facie appeared to tap a broad array of behaviours and dispositions hypothesised to be related to the proposed construct. At the next stage, content validity was assessed by consulting with six experts (senior University professors) drawn from diverse yet related areas (Economics, Statistics, Marketing, Psychology, Sociology, Psychometrics). They were consulted for examining the content validity of the proposed scale. At this stage the judges were also provided with the definition of the construct. They were asked to evaluate the items primarily in terms of their relevance but they also checked them for language, readability and general presentation. They allocated statements to a non-applicable category or to the scale itself. Agreement of at least five judges was required for the item to be retained in the proposed scale. This process helped to refine on and check for the quality of the items to be included in the proposed

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CCO Scale. The method was adopted while keeping in mind the depth of general understanding of the experts in the related areas and is deemed necessary at the initial stages of scale development (Bearden and Netemeyer, 1999). Following this, 24 redundant items were dropped, and the language was reformatted; the pool now contained 36 items (see Appendix I). The pool of items exceeds Nunnallys (1978) recommended minimum number of items necessary for subsequent statistical analyses.

Study II: scale purification and item refinement The Pilot Survey (n 106) was conducted to assess the initial estimates of reliability. The next level of scale refinement was taken up primarily by eliminating the items which exhibited low and insignificant corrected item-total correlation (Nunnally, 1978; Tian et al., 2001: p. 54). Although no standard statistical measures exist for this purpose, following usual published standards, we decided on a cut-off of a correlation value of 0.50 (Bearden and Netemeyer, 1999; Netemeyer et al., 2001). The initial estimates of Cronbach a and Split-half measures of reliability of the scales were found to be 0.82 and 0.73, respectively. Once satisfactory values of reliability were achieved, an item-total correlation was run to find out and subsequently eliminate the items that contribute minimally to the core scale value. In the process the number of items in the proposed scale was subsequently reduced to 12 from the initial 36. This method is also followed from published and standardised academic works (Netemeyer et al., 2001). The relevant results indicated that the scale shows decent psychometric properties. The reliability of this scale was assessed with the use of internal consistency and testretest methods. The a value was estimated to be 0.84 while the Guttmann Split-half was found to be 0.72. The Average Measure Intraclass Correlation equals 0.80 and the existence of all positive inter-item covariance indicate a highly reliable scale (Nunnally, 1978). To estimate testretest reliability, a new sample of 50 students completed the scale on two occasions, 8 weeks apart. The correlation between the two sets of scores was found to be 0.80. Thus, the CCO scale displays adequate internal and testretest reliability.

1 In India, English is a language of the culturally and economically elite and is considered as an indicator of the desired state of well-being.

Study III: assessment of scale reliability and scale norms Following inputs from the previous results, this level of the study proceeded toward validation of the proposed scale. The scale was further validated through separate studies using student samples and a General Consumer sample. Students with a cosmopolitan background from the western part of the country were selected randomly (n 240) for the purpose of the study. The relevant results indicated that the scale shows strong psychometric properties. The a value was estimated to be 0.82. Additionally, the estimate of the average measure of Intraclass Correlation equals 0.81 and the existence of all positive inter-item covariates indicates a reliable scale (Nunnally, 1978).
J. Consumer Behav. 10: 216224 (2011) DOI: 10.1002/cb

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H. Roy Chaudhuri et al. RFI 0.9; RMSEA 0.045). A significant chi-square (X2 273.28(44), p < 0.002) could be expected given the number of observed variables (<12) and the number of observations (Hair et al., 2006). These indices indicated that the unidimensionality of the CCO Scale could be generalised across both the student and General Consumer samples. Study IV: tests for validity and response bias Does CCO really exist as a meaningful, distinct construct? In order to answer this question, we validated the scale. In order to construct validate the scale we analysed both the convergent and the discriminant validity measures of the scale using correlation coefficients with various personality correlates using a fresh sample of students (n 250) (Cook and Campbell, 1979; Lynn and Harris, 1997; Kerlinger and Lee, 2000). The results of these analyses are discussed briefly in the following paragraphs: Desire for unique consumer products In general, the consumers tend to show their distinctionorientation through acquisition of goods, services and experiences that a few others possess. These consumers are thus intelligent, perceptive, imaginative, cultured, inquisitive, curious (Judge and Bono, 2000), open to experiences, tolerant and prone to divergent thinking and creativity. Thus, it was posited that CCO was positively correlated to DUCP (Lynn and Harris, 1997), a construct that conceptually measures a similar consumer behaviour phenomenon. A strong correlation (r 0.72, p < 0.01) provided evidence of the convergent validity of the CC scale. Individualism Taking the same logic a little further, we can understand that these consumers would have a strong motivation to exhibit their individualism in terms of their taste, and their wealthcreating abilities. In order to capture the individualistic dimension that has been conceptually built into the definition, Wang and Mowens (1997) Separateness-connectedness scale was used. A moderate relationship of CCO with the Separateness sub scale (r 0.42, p < 0.05) provides evidence for further validity of the CCO scale. The lower value of the correlation coefficient may arise from the fact that Asians or Indians almost always have a lower level of individualism than the Westerners (Wang and Mowen, 1997). Social visibility Classical conspicuousness is characterised by visibility, a phenomenon which has been also considered in our present definition. The Scale of Social Visibility (Moschis, 1981) conceptually measures the same aspect and has been used here for the purpose of validation. A significantly high correlation (r 0.61, p < 0.01) provides a strong evidence of the convergent validity of the CCO Scale. Discriminant validity results In an effort to assess discriminant validity, the CCO Scale was tested against the standard Voluntary simplicity (VS) scale (Shama, 1981). A non-significant relationship was
J. Consumer Behav. 10: 216224 (2011) DOI: 10.1002/cb

EVALUATION OF THE LATENT STRUCTURE: RESULTS OF EFA A principal component and varimax rotation factor analyses were then conducted on the student data. Authors used a 0.4 cut-off for the factor loading (Costello and Osborne, 2005) to select items for the scale. Using this criterion, one item was removed.

The 11-item CCO Scale (Factor Scores) The 11-item Conspicuous Consumption Orientation Scale (figures on the rt. Margin indicate Factor Loading Scores) 1. It says something to people around me when I buy a high priced brand 2. I buy some products because I want to show others that I am wealthy 3. I would be a member in a businessmens posh club 4. Given a chance, I would hang a Hussain painting in drawing my room 5. I would buy an interesting and uncommon version of a product otherwise available with a plain design, to show others that I have an original taste 6. Others wish they could match my eyes for beauty and taste 7. By choosing a product having an exotic look and design, I show my friends that I am different 8. I choose products or brands to create my own style that everybody admires 9. I always buy top-of-the-line products 10. I often try to find a more interesting version of the run-of-the-mill products, because I want to show others that I enjoy being original 11. I show to others that I am sophisticated 12a. I feel by having a piece of a rare antique I can get respect from others
a

0.73 0.56 0.63 0.73 0.81 0.72 0.74 0.72 0.59 0.59 0.55 0.32

Factor Loading <0.4, hence dropped.

The Eigen value was found to be 5.117 and the percentage of variance explained was 52.36. Starting with this instrument, the next stage of refinement using standard statistical procedures was taken up. Confirmatory factor analysis indicated that the singlefactor model fit the student data; the model fit indices achieved the recommended threshold value of 0.90 for goodness-of-fit index (GFI 0.93), adjusted goodness-of-fit index (AGFI 0.90), X2 203.54(44), p ns, CFI 0.91, RFI 0.93 and RMSEA 0.04. This result is expected given the number of variables (<12) and sample size (n 240) (Hair et al., 2006). Study IV: generalisability of the factor structure We assessed the consistency and generalisability of the 11item scales factor structure by administering it to a convenience sample of working/non-working adults spread across a large Indian metropolis (n 350). Analysis indicated that the CCO Scale had a mean of 38.8 and a standard deviation of 11.5 in this sample, and that CCO scores were not related to the respondents age r 0.052, p ns or sex (t 0.852, df 349, p > 0.05). Confirmatory factor analysis indicated that a single-factor model tends to fit the data (GFI 0.92; AGFI 0.93; CFI 0.92;
Copyright # 2011 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

Conspicuous consumption orientation detected (r 0.03, p ns). This is very much expected given the nature of the two constructs, VS focuses on an individual tendency to select a lifestyle intended to minimise his consumption and dependency on material items, whereas in CC we can understand materialism is seen as a central value. For an additional assessment of discriminant validity, the CCO Scale was tested against the Need for Uniqueness Unpopular Choice Counter-Conformity Subscale (Tian et al., 2001). This scale measures differentness of consumers at the cost being disliked/disapproved by the significant others, while in our concept of CCO consumers desire to be different but still admired. A non-significant relationship was expectedly detected (r 0.22, p ns). Test of response bias The potential confounding of responses to the CC scale by social desirability bias was assessed. Such an assessment also seemed warranted because making a distinctive choice in the Indian society, is often difficult, given the chances of deviating from established group norms. This assessment was conducted among students in such a way that the new CCO measure was counterbalanced with a measure of socially desirable responding. A shortened 10-item form of the MarlowCrowne Scale (1960) (Strahan and Gerbasi, 1972) was used. The new CCO Scale did not correlate with the MC Scale (r 0.06, p ns). Study V: assessing predictive validity The CC-orientation is a trait whose intensity varies across individuals. Individual differences in the intensity of this desire may have many causes. The sample respondents (n 250) were the same students who took part in the preceding study. Each of the findings is being discussed below. Self-esteem Following our definition of the construct, it can be argued that rather than seeing conspicuous consumption as a mode of compensatory consumption, it should be seen as a more positive phenomenon, contributing to the well-being of individuals mental health. Drawing from this, the CCO scores were correlated with the Rosenberg Self-Esteem scores. The correlation was found to be significant (r 0.42, p < 0.05). At the next stage, the respondents with higher SE scores were selected the total scores being divided at the median. The scores were found to yield stronger correlation results (r 0.57, p < 0.05). This is very much expected because with CC the individual consumer is making himself visible and distinct from the others. It is only possible when he is confident about his abilities and the judicious of his taste, which are reflected in his higher levels of self-esteem and clear self-concept. SE measures are often argued to be less stable (Shavelson et al., 1976). To avoid this problem, the CC measure was further correlated to the self-concept clarity construct. Both these constructs were found to be strongly correlated (r 0.53, p < 0.01). Our result suggests that, in the case of CC, the phenomenon is not driven by a lack of unclear self-concept, mental insecurity and incompleteness.
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Materialism When correlated to the CCO-score, materialism exhibits a strong and significant relationship (r 0.66, p < 0.01). Consumers see the products as a significant source of satisfaction in life; they form a part of their social identity and, in turn, contribute to a dominant value system. Thus, going beyond considering materialism as a simple personality trait, we see it as a part of a global consumer culture, to which the consumers, especially these consumers would subscribe to. On the other hand, cultural capital encourages the individual to value finer things in life, such as beauty and aesthetics. Their product choice is often unique, reflecting sophisticated taste and the ability to appreciate innovativeness. The CCO Scale, by design, incorporates this character. To validate the same, the scale was correlated with aesthetic response (Holbrook and Zirlin, 1985). The correlation coefficient was high and significant (r 0.62, p < 0.05). Study VI: testing consequences In general, the Conspicuous Consumption Orientation will be reflected in consumers efforts to acquire and possess certain unique goods, services and experiences. But the differences would manifest in terms of exhibiting their unique tastes, which might not be pricey, and thereby communicating their differences with the masses. A study was conducted to test this consequential behaviour among the consumers using Home furnishings as the context. This study was designed with 60 management students. For this purpose 20 pictures of various interior decoration items were collected. The items were purposefully selected in such a way that: (i) Type A items (10), with their surroundings in a typical contemporary dwelling, should look expensive. These mostly included furniture items, e.g. sofa sets, beds and closets. (ii) Type B items (10), typically of middle class interior design accessories, reflect taste but not extravagance. The items included such elements as Dokra Crafts, Madhubani Paintings, Kantha Stitch wall hangings, Miniature style paintings and Rajasthani woodcraft.2 These pictures were mixed and arranged in such way that they do not reflect any pattern and were shown on a computer screen using PPT slides. The respondents were asked to indicate their choices and the probable price they are ready to pay for each item, without any prior information (about the items) being given to the respondents. They were also asked to justify their choices. Results Respondents estimated that the prices and the price quoted for the cultural items (Type B) were lower than the Type A items prices (Mean Price Type B Indian Rs. 325; Mean Price Type A Indian Rs. 8758, with the difference being significant t 68.0, p < 0.05. In spite of the Type B items being less expensive, the respondents wanted them to be used to exhibit their uniqueness. When asked to comment about
2

All are different forms of Indian Folk Art.

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H. Roy Chaudhuri et al. potential lies in adapting this scale across cultures and assessing its ability to capture the said construct in a more diverse context. On the other hand, the scale should prove useful in psychographic segmentation and other marketing surveys because it is a short, valid and easy-to-administer instrument. Through its use, the manager can examine the interaction between conspicuousness and various marketing activities. Managers must understand that in order to maintain and deliver the meanings of conspicuousness, the brand management process should incorporate an image of exclusiveness as well as elements of aesthetics. We encourage marketing and consumer behaviour researchers to use the scale to explore consumer orientation for product-development, pricing, etc. ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS The first Author is grateful to Gautam Banerjee and Late P. K. Roy for their assistance in data analysis. Further he is also indebted to the comments, suggestions, and the assistance of the Editor-JCB, the Journal reviewers and Carol Sonenklar for their help in modifying, refining, expanding and improving upon the previous version of the article in terms of conceptaulisation, design, analysis and presentation.

their reason for choosing these items, the analysis of respondents arguments, coded as support arguments and capable of reflecting consumer attitude, (for more details see Wansink et al., 1994) revealed that 68 per cent of the statements justified the choice for taste, 55 per cent of the responses reflect the respondents desire of showing difference from others and 88 per cent were looking for appreciation and status. This shows that resident meanings are adequately interpreted and is being reflected in their price expectations.

DISCUSSION The primary goal of this research was to develop and validate a measure of individual differences in conspicuous consumption orientation. In addition, the research has been successful in proposing a formal definition of conspicuous consumption construct, which was absent in the extant literature. The 11-item scale was found to be unidimensional, to have a factor structure that was generalisable across student and non-student samples, and showed acceptable internal and testretest reliabilities. The scales validity was attested to by its theoretically intelligible relationships with other personality measures. Thus, the attempt to develop a reliable and valid measure of the conspicuous consumption appears to be successful. Further, on the theoretical side, using this scale, one is able to explore the nature of this construct to a considerable depth by manipulating other related psychological variables. The present effort has been successful in examining and establishing explanatory relationships of CCO with some major measurable personality-related characteristics. As a consequence, it has been made possible to establish the initial conjecture that conspicuousness is not to be seen as a compensatory consumption activity. This assertion can be considered as a major deviation from the established extant literature, which treats conspicuousness as an antidote for mental insecurity and helplessness. Current literature on conspicuous consumption is still relies on the premises of economics and its signalling properties (Katsunori, 2008; Arrow and Dasgupta, 2009). However, recent empirical evidences lend support to the contention forwarded by the present paper that scarcity does favour conspicuous consumption (Heriber and Huettl, 2010). Again the interface between consumption of art objects and conspicuousness, as projected in the research, has also been examined very recently (Mandel, 2009). These research findings also support the robustness of the conceptual underpinning of the present effort. In recent times, such efforts that have incorporated antecedents related to marketing and cross cultural consumer behaviour (Shukla, 2008; Chaudhuri and Majumdar, 2010; Podoshen and Lu, 2011) psychology (Linssen et al., 2011) and even biology for explaining this construct (De Fraja, 2009; Saad and Vongas, 2009). Such findings indicate that more investigations are necessary to comprehend the behavioural of conspicuous consumption, which can yield very interesting insights to this long neglected aspect of consumer behaviour. Future research
Copyright # 2011 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

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H. Roy Chaudhuri et al. APPENDIX I: THE INITIAL 36-ITEM SCALE 20. I often try to find a more interesting version of the runof-the-mill products because want to show others that I enjoy being original. 21. I am ashamed to buy a dress that has a very shoddy look. 22. I wont stop at arguing with my architect because I feel a house can express my refined taste. 23. Wherever possible, I try to find new designs in the products I buy. 24. I feel proud when others say that I have a fine taste. 25. I feel it is necessary to convey my good taste through the products I buy. 26. I show to others that I am sophisticated. 27. I would hang a piece of abstract painting in my drawing room. 28. Even when buying day-to-day items, I see to it that they have a fine and appealing design. 29. I would prefer to take my guests to see an art film, rather than a Bollywood masala film. 30. I know how to select items from a store which are not expensive, yet attract others compliments for their fine design. 31. Others wish they could match my eye for beauty and taste. 32. By choosing a product having an exotic look and design, I show my friends that I am different. 33. I feel by having a rare antique piece I can get respect from others. 34. I choose products or brands to create my own style that everybody admires. 35. I feel that by sending ones children to an English medium school, they can say to others that they are successful. 36. I closely follow the fashion trends and among my friends, I am one of the first to try them.

1. I consider products can be symbols of success. 2. For me buying means showing my prosperity. 3. It says something to people around me when I buy a high priced brand. 4. I would buy certain brands only because they are more expensive. 5. I would always prefer to buy imported items because they are not widely available and are expensive. 6. I buy some products because I want to show others that I am wealthy. 7. I would enjoy buying a designer label because not many can afford it. 8. I feel by using up-market brands I can be more popular with other like-minded successful people. 9. I would be a member in a businessmens posh club. 10. I always buy top-of-the-line products. 11. I often buy the most expensive dress items available. 12. I feel it is easier to get noticed by others when you use a premium product. 13. Given a chance, I would hang a Hussain painting in my drawing room. 14. When I take my guests to a restaurant I generally order the expensive dishes. 15. I think friends would think that I am cheap, when I consistently buy low priced products or brands. 16. If my friends can see me using a brand or a product, I will purchase an expensive version that can make me the centre of attraction. 17. I feel that by buying premium products I can describe to others who I am and what I am. 18. I always look for products of uncommon designs which are hard to find. 19. I buy products that make me appear fashionable to others.

Copyright # 2011 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

J. Consumer Behav. 10: 216224 (2011) DOI: 10.1002/cb