Anti-Commercial Consumer Rebellion: Conceptualisation and Measurement Received: 27Th April, 2005

Anti-commercial consumer rebellion: Conceptualisation and measurement Received: 27th April, 2005

Caroline Graham Austin is a PhD candidate, Marketing, at the Terry College of Business, University of Georgia.

Christopher R. Plouffe is Assistant Professor, Marketing, at the Terry College of Business, University of Georgia.

Cara Peters is Assistant Professor in the Management and Marketing Department at Winthrop University.

Abstract Accounts indicate that consumers are increasingly concerned with the negative impact of business on global economics, politics, cultures and the environment. Many of these consumers point specifically to marketing policies and tactics as the primary impetus behind these negative influences and, perhaps because of this, many have begun to engage in some form of ‘consumer rebellion’. This paper defines and conceptualises ‘anti-commercial consumer rebellion’ (ACR) as open and avowed resistance to institutionalised marketing practices. The paper reports the results of a scale development effort to measure anti-commercial consumer rebellion in the general population. The managerial implications of the ACR scale, study limitations and avenues for future research are discussed.

Keywords: anti-commercial consumer rebellion, resistance to marketing practices, scale development

INTRODUCTION founded on resistance against While all consumers have probably institutionalised social structures. For voiced their dissatisfaction with a example, McKee1 says, ‘Rebellion takes particular business, product or service at the form of renouncing the previous one time or another, anecdotal accounts goals and the social structure which indicate that an increasing number of legitimized it [the system] and then consumers are beginning to rebel more seeking to create a social structure in Dr Cara Peters formally in the marketplace. This which a new set of cultural goals and Assistant Professor of Marketing, rebellion extends beyond traditional institutionalized means are possible’. College of Business, complaining and dissatisfied behaviour, as Anti-commercial consumer rebellion Winthrop University, 427 Thurmond Hall, these individuals seem to be concerned (ACR) is based on similar principles. As Rock Hill, SC 29733, USA with the effects of capitalism and such, ACR is defined here as consumers’ Tel: +1 (803) 323 4280; marketing on global economics, politics, openandavowedresistanceto Fax: +1 (803) 323 3960; e-mail: cultures and the environment. institutionalised marketing practices. [email protected] Sociological definitions of rebellion are Anti-commercial consumer rebellion

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has been associated with various sentiments and behaviours associated with sentiments and behaviours reported in ACR, these accounts and the host of the popular press. More acute forms of others like them underscore an important ACR include disruptive and even violent point which frames the context of this protest behaviours. For example, at the paper: even small acts of rebellion, if 1999 World Trade Organization (WTO) practised by enough people, could meeting in Seattle, protesters specifically ultimately cause firms to sustain damages targeted Nike, the Gap and Starbucks as to their reputations, brands, market share being greedy and insensitive to local and even fixed assets (among other conditions, both in the manufacturing important elements). Given the potential and marketing of their products, and impact of such rebellion, the salience of caused several thousand dollars’ worth of better understanding this phenomenon damage through acts of vandalism aimed seems readily apparent. This paper, at each of these companies.2 Every therefore, attempts to conceptualise and subsequent WTO meeting has met with measure ACR through the development protests along similar lines.3 While most of a scale which could be potentially consumers do not resort to such extreme valuable for managers who are behaviour to protest their displeasure attempting to deal with such phenomena with commercialisation and capitalism, in their industries. It should be noted academic researchers have begun to note that the unit of analysis in this work increasing consumer concern with the remains fixed at the level of the pervasiveness of Westernised commercial individual consumer, acknowledging, as influences on other cultures and ways of the anecdotal accounts confirm, that life — a phenomenon termed rebellion can occur at the individual or ‘McDonaldization’ by Ritzer.4 collective (ie social movement) level. More benign but pervasive examples This paper holds that the topic should of ACR also exist in the popular press. first be approached at the individual level In the USA, in a matter of weeks in to more generally identify the relevant 2003, over 50 million consumers aspects of anti-commercial rebellion to registered one or more of their telephone consumers. Future research should numbers on the national ‘Do Not Call’ examine the construct for specificsocial list in an effort to avoid firms’ movements. telemarketing activities.5,6 While clearly Following a fourfold approach in the not as damaging as the WTO protestors’ conceptualisation and initial empirical behaviour, this case nevertheless illustrates exploration of ACR, this paper develops that an important and widely relied-upon as follows. First, using existing literature channel for marketing communication and anecdotal information as a guide, the has been, for the most part, lost. Hence, ACR dimensions are conceptualised. it seems that ACR potentially spans a Secondly, exploratory work is undertaken continuum of sentiments and behaviours. in the form of principal components (or These range from relatively harmless, factor) analysis on one of two datasets. such as believing that the ubiquity of Thirdly, a confirmatory factor analysis is McDonald’s has had significant, negative performed using the second unique impact on global culture7 or refusing to dataset to validate the findings obtained shop at a megastore, such as Wal-Mart, in the exploratory work. Fourthly, a on principle,8 to expensive, illegal and structural equation model is presented, dangerous behaviours, such as arson.9 which examines the predictive validity of Despite the variance in the potential ACR as it relates to need for uniqueness

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and materialism. The paper concludes by hegemonic commercial ‘clutter’ that highlighting the implications and western free-market economies generate. limitations of this work, suggesting Rumbo found that in general, dissenting directions for future research. voices have few outlets in such economic systems because the media themselves are commercialised, owing THEORETICAL FOUNDATIONS their existences to the continuing support The idea of widespread, endemic of advertising dollars. Furthermore, consumer resistance to the market began marketers routinely co-opt and to take form in 1993 at the Association commodify resistant attitudes and for Consumer Research’s annual meeting, behaviours, incorporating them into new with a special session chaired by Penãloza marketing messages. and Price.10 These authors overviewed Kozinets15 conducted an ethnographic some criticisms of marketing practices investigation into the Burning Man and suggested theoretical bases for such Festival, an experimental community critiques. In the same session, Pollay11 festival held annually in the Black Rock discussed the advent of Adbusters Desert, Nevada. One of the main tenets Magazine, which had published six issues of Burning Man is its ‘no vending’ rule, at that time, and Herrmann12 discussed which extends to a ban on the display of boycotts and buyers’ collectives (eg brand names and logos. Consumers who co-ops and consumer unions). Solidifying attend Burning Man attempt to free the existence of anti-commercial themselves (at least for the week of the consumer rebellion, Dobscha13 observed festival) from the constraints and and interviewed nine women who demands imposed by the ubiquity of believe that marketing practices have led commercial interests. Kozinets finds that to a degradation of the quality of human while it is impossible for consumers to life —‘waste, inefficiency, sickness, and become completely ‘liberated’ from the materialism’. In response, these women marketplace for any significant length of consistently strive to minimise their time, ‘the illumination of contact with consumer culture. As taken-for-granted market logics, the anti-materialists, they resist advertising, flashes of inspiration, and the creatively reuse products, buy or find transformation of individuals and groups second-hand goods and in general use as may be longer lasting’.15 little as possible. Dobscha’s subjects find Finally, Holt16 identified two the asymmetry of the marketplace competing theories that attempt to frame disturbing, and attempt to correct and explain ACR as a ‘full-fledged social perceived imbalances through movement’.Thefirst is Ozanne and significantly reduced consumption and Murray’s17 theory of the ‘reflexively non-traditional buyer behaviour in the defiant consumer’, who sees the marketplace. marketplace and marketing activities as In the span of less than a decade, social constructs rather than immutable many more researchers began to examine forces of nature, and reacts to them as aspects of consumer rebellion. In 2002, what they really are, rather than what Rumbo14 followed up Pollay’soriginal most consumers perceive them to be. examination of Adbusters Magazine, The second is Firat and Venkatesh’s18 finding that the magazine’s readers try to theory of ‘liberatory postmodernism’,in maintain advertising-free psychic space which consumers cobble together for themselves in opposition to the commercial cultural signifiers (ie brands)

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to create new meanings and social codes are designed to be inherently misleading. that are independent of the products’ The average consumer, who has probably original intentions. Holt goes on to test grown up in a mediated environment these theories through a series of exposed to thousands of commercial in-depth interviews, and concludes that messages a week, has learned that anti-commercial consumers, rather than product claims are often distorted.22 being rebellious, are actually conscious Qualitative research on consumer participants in the perpetuation of rebellion shows that consumers believe consumer culture, albeit as that many marketing practices are sleazy, ‘revolutionaries’ whohelptousherin purposely designed to subtly deceive new marketing paradigms.16 consumers.23–25 Hence, the construct Ascanbeseenabove,theliteratureto artifice captures consumer beliefs that date does an excellent job in identifying marketers are constructing a deceitful the existence of ACR as a genuine ‘plot’ and using trickery to trap cultural and social phenomenon with individuals into a consumption-oriented multiple dimensions,19 but this lifestyle. pre-existing research fails to provide a concrete measurement tool for managers who are interested in assessing such Avoidance sentiments and behaviours within the Many environments and distinct consumer population. constituencies are affected by commercial activities. Corporate malfeasance makes international headlines on a regular basis THE DOMAIN OF (eg Enron, WorldCom, Parmalat). At ANTI-COMMERCIAL CONSUMER times, federal, state and local REBELLION governments relax environmental, legal Several themes consistently emerge in and tax standards to accommodate discussions and accounts surrounding businesses, which is often perceived to ACR. Thus, based on previous be at the public’s expense (eg qualitative research, the guiding www.georgialegalwatch.org). Indigenous supposition of this paper is that ACR is cultural values are lost or denigrated as a multi-dimensional higher order globalisation promotes homogeneous, construct.20 Reflection on the anecdotal, primarily westernised, standards and conceptual and qualitative literature has norms around the world.26–28 Research led to the recognition of four common by Dobscha,29 Herrmann30 and Kozinets31 themes. These themes guided the shows that consumer rebellion can development of initial measurement items manifest itself in avoidance behaviours. while also aiding in the identification of By intentionally withdrawing from doing factors during the analysis of the survey business with ‘unethical’ companies, data. Although they reflect rebellion anti-commercial consumer rebels see triggers at the individual level, the themselves as taking a stand, on themes themselves are macroscopic, and principle, to preserve that which they may have points of intersection.21 view as intrinsically valuable.32

Artiﬁce Cynicism Many consumers feel that marketing Across the literature reviewed for this strategies, especially advertising tactics, paper, a recurrent theme was that

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corporations and government work hand particularly egregious in this regard39). in hand to create the powerful Consumers often feel manipulated by phenomenon that is ‘Big Business’.33–35 these commercial activities.40–42 Individual consumers and workers can be Therefore, the construct of manipulation crushed by this ‘machine’ if they try to captures the perceived exploitation of resist its dictates, and perhaps even if consumers by marketers and their they acquiesce. Businesses’ alliances with practices. Anti-commercial consumer public institutions (eg Chick-Fil-A’s rebels believe that marketers have ‘Partners in Education’ programme with shrewdly managed the population to public schools), humanitarian create demand and earn profits. organisations (eg McDonald’swith UNICEF) and nonprofit organisations (eg the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation) POTENTIALLY SIMILAR, YET contribute to this outlook. Through such DIFFERENT, CONSTRUCTS philanthropic activities, businesses can Various studies have tackled several issues gain an edge over their competitors by bordering on ACR. They range from leveraging political contacts to their measurements of frugality,43 socially advantage as well as by ‘sneaking’ into responsible consumption behaviour,44,45 consumers’ hearts.36,37 Many consumers consumer alienation46–48 and consumer are cynical with respect to businesses’ discontent with unethical business real intentions and underlying practices49,50 to anti-advertising motivations regarding broader societal attitudes,51–54 cooperation with ‘green’ wellbeing. Hence, cynicism captures marketing efforts55–58 and consumers’ consumers’ jaded opinions about perceptions regarding their participation marketers and their practices. Put simply, in boycotts.59 Furthermore, in 2002, an consumer rebels doubt the integrity and entire issue of the journal Psychology and distrust the motives of marketers. Marketing was dedicated to the study of anti-consumption attitudes. Each of these papers is extremely micro-focused, Manipulation however, looking at a single facet of the Anti-commercial consumer rebels seem multi-dimensional higher order construct to believe that most people’smentaland of ACR. physical selves have been shaped from While important to the marketing birth by marketing and market forces. literature, there is rationale as to why Loosely regulated, laissez-faire capitalist these existing scales are inappropriate and systems tacitly facilitate businesses’ inadequate for understanding and manipulation of consumers’ thoughts, exploring ACR. Several of these scales feelings and behaviours, implicitly are only tangentially related to the sanctioning less-than-ethical marketing domain of ACR, but, more importantly, tactics in order to generate sales.38 none of these scales captures all that is Anti-commercial consumers recognise inherent in a broadly conceived domain this breakdown in trust between firms of ACR, as outlined in previous and consumers, and believe that qualitative and conceptual studies.60–63 businesses practice self-interest with guile, Furthermore, a simple comparison of the creating new products and then using measures of these existing scales with the marketing tactics to maximise consumer myriad ways in which consumers are demand for these products genuinely disenchanted with marketing (pharmaceutical companies have been practices and their effects on consumer

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culture, as reported in the popular press, eligible to win a $100 cash prize. In shows that there is an untapped domain order to allow for more generalised that marketers need to address. At the findings71 as well as to have an same time, it is acknowledged that additional, distinct respondent group to several of the existing scales mentioned use for validation of the findings, a more above contain a few items that reflect a demographically diverse population was general displeasure with many of the sought as a second sampling frame. marketing practices that underlie the Hence, 1,000 e-mail addresses from the attitudes and behaviours related to ACR. same university were randomly selected from an alumni association database, and recipients of these e-mails were also SCALE DEVELOPMENT offered the chance to win a $100 cash Procedurally, the scale development prize upon the receipt of their completed reported here was greatly facilitated by surveys. Of the initial 1,000 e-mail the examples and guidelines of Richins addresses obtained by the research team, and Dawson,64 Tian et al.65 and Spector66 630 proved valid (ie the e-mail addresses in terms of item generation, and did not elicit ‘bounce-back’ messages Churchill67,68 and Gerbing and when tested). Anderson69 intermsofdataanalysisand The survey design and execution related issues. We closely followed the procedures used were predicated upon steps and prescriptions outlined by these Dillman’s web survey protocol.72 The scholars in developing the scale outlined research team made all efforts to present below. the potential participants with high Considering examples from popular, quality, appealing and easy-to-understand managerial and academic sources, a pool survey materials. For example, each of initial survey questions was generated, e-mail message was personalised and reflecting the four themes of artifice, contained a hyperlink which, when avoidance, cynicism and manipulation. clicked, took the respondent directly to Along with this paper’s authors, two the secure survey website. The e-mail marketing research graduate students system and website were tested on a participated in generating the question smallscaleandwhennosignificant pool based on their own experiences and problems were noted, the first wave of observations of ACR. Discussions among the survey was launched. Survey the research team resulted in an initial completion information was available to pool of 72 marketing-related statements, the research team on a real-time basis, such as, ‘I think marketers are sneaky’. which precluded sending second- or Consumers’ responses to statements were third-wave e-mail reminders to subjects assessed using a 7-point scale, anchored who had already responded to the from ‘strongly disagree’ to ‘strongly survey. One week after the third and agree’ with a midpoint of ‘neither final wave of e-mail messages was sent disagree nor agree’.70 out, all resultant information was For data collection, two distinct downloaded from the website and data groups were recruited. First, the team collection was closed. garnered a sample of 600 undergraduate In general, the response rates to the business students at a large US research online survey were satisfactory (total university. Student participation was N ϭ 336) with normal demographic voluntary, and all students who dispersion across the population. One completed the online survey were area that will be discussed in greater

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Table 1: Exploratory factor analysis: Sub-dimensions of ACR

Factor loading Anti-commercial consumer rebellion: Factor and item 1 2 3 4

Artiﬁce Many marketing practices are questionable 0.643 Product claims are often misleading 0.819 Marketers’ claims about products are often deceptive 0.808 Advertising is deceptive 0.647 Advertisements are often misleading 0.810 Avoidance There are brands I will not buy on principle 0.725 I boycott products made by companies which are unethical 0.822 I disapprove of certain brands because they appear unethical 0.839 I avoid purchasing products from companies that do not 0.815 respect consumers I avoid purchasing products from companies that do not protect 0.835 the environment Cynicism I think that marketers are sneaky 0.601 Marketing has made me cynical 0.766 Marketing has a positive effect on society* 0.600 Sometimes I question the whole notion of marketing 0.780 I am suspicious of marketing 0.748 Manipulation Advertisers will say anything to sell their products 0.585 Marketers want consumers to be more materialistic 0.742 Many companies take advantage of consumers 0.660 Marketing practices are designed to manipulate consumers 0.714 Companies take advantage of consumers 0.753

Note: Only loadings greater than 0.500 are shown. Asterisk indicates reverse-scored item.

detail later in the paper, however, is the factor analysis was conducted, following education level of the survey’s steps recommended by Hair et al.73 respondents. Because the sample Principal components analysis of the data populations were university students and suggested that four factors seemed best at alumni, everyone who responded to the capturing the attitudinal and behavioural questionnaire had at least some college components inherent in ACR. While education. several other alternative factor analyses were performed, comparing slightly different assumptions about the data, only CONSTRUCT VALIDITY: the results for the strongest 20-item FACTOR ANALYSES solution are reported here. The four The undergraduate and alumni data sets, factors contained five items each (a respectively, were used to perform remarkably symmetrical and elegant exploratory and confirmatory factor solution that needed no manipulation to analyses. The data collected were achieve), and matched well with the normally distributed across both original conceptualisation of ACR and respondent groups. Descriptive statistics, were labelled accordingly. Table 1 reports distributional analyses and correlation and the item loadings. covariance matrices are not reported for As the next major step in this reasons of parsimony, but are available to research, a confirmatory factor analysis interested readers by contacting the lead was conducted on the four factors author. identified in the exploratory work, this As the first major task, an exploratory time employing the second, independent

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Table 2: Measurement model (CFA) estimates

Squared Standardised multiple Factor and item estimates t-values correlations

Artiﬁce Many marketing practices are questionable 0.78 10.45 0.60 Product claims are often misleading 0.78 10.55 0.61 Marketers’ claims about products are often deceptive 0.61 7.61 0.37 Advertising is deceptive 0.74 9.72 0.54 Advertisements are often misleading 0.81 11.10 0.65 Avoidance There are brands I will not buy on principle 0.77 10.63 0.60 I boycott products made by companies that are unethical 0.72 9.61 0.52 I disapprove of certain brands because they appear unethical 0.86 12.56 0.74 I avoid purchasing products from companies that do not respect consumers 0.84 12.12 0.71 I avoid purchasing products from companies that do not protect the environment 0.90 13.38 0.80 Cynicism I think that marketers are sneaky 0.71 9.30 0.50 Marketing has made me cynical 0.67 8.68 0.45 Marketing has a positive effect on society* 0.81 11.30 0.66 Sometimes I question the whole notion of marketing 0.77 10.43 0.59 I am suspicious of marketing 0.78 10.70 0.61 Manipulation Advertisers will say anything to sell their products 0.66 8.37 0.43 Marketers want consumers to be more materialistic 0.73 9.58 0.53 Many companies take advantage of consumers 0.81 11.19 0.66 Marketing practices are designed to manipulate consumers 0.73 9.54 0.53 Companies take advantage of consumers 0.84 11.75 0.71

Asterisk indicates reverse-scored item.

dataset (ie the alumni sample, N ϭ 141). scale, complete with hypothesised We c onfirmed the model by restricting relationships between constructs. In this each scale item to load on the factor model, the ACR scale was placed in a specified by the exploratory analysis. simple relational network with two Table 2 shows that the items loaded onto conceptually related constructs — their associated factors at a significant materialism76 and need for uniqueness.77 level. Other statistical indicators show These constructs have been previously that the model fits the ‘real world’ data measured in consumer behaviour set well by explaining where the variance literature, and statistically and in the data comes from, and how conceptually robust surveys, instruments strongly each of the factors influences the that measure materialism and need for overall construct of ACR. These results uniqueness in the general population were guardedly interpreted as providing have been written and tested. The idea some evidence of the convergent validity was to measure how strongly people feel associated with the ACR scale.74,75 each of these states of mind alongside ACR, and to determine whether there is any correlation between the three. In PREDICTIVE VALIDITY: other words, to determine the strength HYPOTHESIS TESTS of the relationships (if any) between As a final step, Figure 1 represents the ACR, materialism and consumers’ need structural equation model estimated as a for uniqueness. preliminary means of validating the ACR The materialism scale captures the

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mat1 H1:-

mat1 Materialism Artifice

mat1 Anti-commercial Avoidance consumer rebellion uniq1 Cynicism

uniq2 Need for Manipulation uniqueness H2:+ uniq3

Note: All error and disturbance terms for this model have been omitted for the sake of clarity and space. Correlations among identified latent variables are also not included.

Figure 1 Hierarchical model for anti-commercial consumer rebellion, materialism and need for uniqueness

value placed on the acquisition of knowledge to rationalise their rebellious material objects78,79 and has three attitudes and behaviour toward marketers sub-dimensions: acquisition centrality, the and the larger marketplace. Kozinets’86 role of acquisition in happiness and the attendees at the Burning Man festival role of possessions in deﬁning success.80 similarly report a desire to escape the Research indicates that materialism is materialism and greed of today’s inversely related to consumer wellbeing. consumer culture as rationalisation for For example, Belk81,82 found that their retreat into the desert. Based on materialism leads to non-generosity, envy, this previous research, it was anticipated greed and overall dissatisfaction with life. that subjects who are very materialistic Furthermore, Richins and Dawson83 (ie scoring higher on Richins and show that materialism has a negative Dawson’s materialism scale) will be less impact on satisfaction in various life likely to participate in ACR (ie scoring domains (eg family, friends, fun, work, low on the ACR scale). etc). To unpack the negative relationship

between materialism and consumer H1: There is a negative correlation wellbeing, Burroughs and Rindfleisch84 between subjects’ levels of use a conflict values approach. These materialism and anti-commercial authors argue that individually oriented consumer rebellion. material values tend to conflict with collectively oriented family and religious The need for uniqueness is defined as an values, and such inconsistency creates a ‘individual’s pursuit of differentness psychological tension that reduces an relative to others that is achieved individual’s overall wellbeing. through the acquisition, utilisation, and Many of Dobscha’s85 consumer rebels disposition of consumer goods for the intuitively recognise the negative impact purpose of developing and enhancing of materialism on life, culture and the one’s personal and social identity’.87 The environment, and they use this need for uniqueness scale has three

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sub-dimensions: creative choice To proceed, the data from both samples counter-conformity, unpopular choice (student and alumni) were pooled, as counter-conformity and avoidance structural equation modelling is relatively similarity.88 Put simply, this scale captures data intensive.92,93 Next, the data from an individual’s desire to be different from the individual survey items were the majority of consumers in the consolidated into factor means in order marketplace. Consumers who desire to make it more manageable for analysis. uniqueness want to create their own In other words, the 18 survey items for personal style, use products that differ materialism were collapsed into three from group norms (even to the point of factor means (determining a single garnering negative social approval) and combined value for each factor: avoid products that are common among acquisition centrality, the role of the masses. According to Tian et al.,89 acquisition in happiness and the role of these attitudes and behaviours cause possessions in defining success), the 31 individuals to place value on those items for need for uniqueness into three material possessions that enhance their factor means (creative choice social difference, thus impacting on their counter-conformity, unpopular choice personal and social identities. counter-conformity and avoidance Holt90 finds in his qualitative study similarity) and the 20 ACR items into of consumer rebellion that his four factor mean values (artifice, informants are not truly rebellious in a avoidance, cynicism and manipulation). pure sociological sense, but rather are This step greatly reduced the number of ‘revolutionaries’ because they variables included in the structural model consciously participate in consumer from 69 (18 ϩ 31 ϩ 20) to 10 culture, although in unique, socially (3 ϩ 3 ϩ 4). These factor mean variables unconventional ways, and assist in were then used to calculate the ushering in new marketing paradigms. relationships between the three constructs This previous research leads to the tested in the structural equation hypothesis that the type of independent model.94–96 thinker who desires to be different The findings for ACR and the ways it from the masses might also recognise, relates to both materialism and need for believe in and practice the principles of uniqueness are encouraging. As with the ACR. Thus, the ‘counter-conformity exploratory factor analysis described motivation’ that underlies a consumer’s earlier, the model was compared with a need for uniqueness91 may also shape competitor, a random chance, or null, that individual’sperceptionofand model. This was done to determine if desire to resist most traditional the model could be used to make more marketing practices and the accurate predictions about consumer homogenising influences of behaviour than would be yielded by western-style capitalism that are simple guessing. After all, why bother embedded in mainstream consumer with a calculator if a dartboard will work culture. This leads to the idea that the just as well? All of the statistical fit need for uniqueness will be positively indices demonstrate that the model relatedtoanindividual’s level of ACR. exceeds the null model for the same variables. Furthermore, the relationships

H2: There is a positive correlation tested between the three higher-order between subjects’ levels of need constructs are also statistically supported for uniqueness and ACR. by the data. In this application, ACR

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Table 3: Cronbach’s alpha values: ACR and comparison constructs

Alpha values Students only Alumni only Pooled sample (N ϭ 195) (N ϭ 141) (N ϭ 336)

Overall ACR 0.891 0.927 0.916 Artiﬁce 0.887 0.896 0.895 Avoidance 0.881 0.865 0.879 Cynicism 0.802 0.857 0.840 Manipulation 0.811 0.870 0.840 Overall NFU 0.953 0.970 0.962 uniq1 0.933 0.958 0.946 uniq2 0.889 0.914 0.900 uniq3 0.939 0.954 0.947 Overall materialism 0.871 0.865 0.876 mat1 0.791 0.782 0.797 mat2 0.745 0.797 0.774 mat3 0.800 0.780 0.805

Abbreviations: ACR; anti-commercial consumer rebellion; NFU, need for uniqueness.

and materialism are negatively correlated, DISCUSSION AND while ACR and need for uniqueness are MANAGERIAL IMPLICATIONS

positively correlated, supporting both H1 In this initial development of the ACR and H2. scale, this paper has built upon the Table 3 shows that the four existing literature and in so doing, it is sub-dimensions of ACR all demonstrate believed that it has added to marketers’ reasonable psychometric properties as ability to distinguish between and among evidenced by their Cronbach’salpha those who are resisting the forces of values,asdothetwocomparison marketing, materialism, constructs, need for uniqueness and commercialisation, and the widely materialism. Path estimates representing pervasive culture of consumption that how each item relates to its respective characterises most first-world societies. factor, as well as t-values for the These independent-thinking, measurement portion of the research anti-commercial consumers might model, are reported for ACR, need for comprise a significant percentage of uniqueness, and materialism in Table 4. shoppers in the postmodern marketplace. As key stakeholders97 at the end of the Table 4: Estimated path values for factor means 98 model commercial value chain, consumers who decide to quietly avoid (or loudly Standardised Factors and items estimates t-values protest) products, brands, manufacturers, stores, service providers or other ACR Artifice 0.95 16.26 enterprises can have a major impact on Avoidance 0.48 6.36 whether or not organisations succeed or Cynicism 0.99 16.06 fail. In the simplest possible terms, Manipulation 0.97 16.70 Need for uniqueness without customers, there is no uniq1 0.96 16.18 commercial enterprise.99,100 Hence, if uniq2 0.83 16.67 uniq3 0.95 16.71 managers can uncover, measure and Materialism moderate (or perhaps, more modestly, mat1 0.99 14.59 mat2 0.76 12.67 mitigate) sources of ACR in their target mat3 0.69 9.28 markets, they may, indirectly, accomplish

Abbreviations: ACR, anti-commercial consumer two desirable goals: becoming more rebellion. ethical in their business practices, while

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achieving greater congruency with as they arise in the marketplace. For emerging customer attitudes. example, businesses need to have crisis While increasing numbers of management teams that respond corporations, such as McDonald’s, have appropriately and quickly to unethical departments solely devoted to corporate business practices, socially irresponsible social responsibility and listening to business behaviours and even consumer consumers’ voices related to ethical rumours. issues,101 others have yet to implement A first potential limitation of this the changes implied by their customers’ preliminary validation of the ACR scale protests, whether those protests are pertains to the sampling frames employed vocalised or silent (eg informal in the survey. Specifically, the samples individual-level boycotts). The marketer’s were convenience samples, which age-old axiom that ‘the customer is potentially limit the generalisability of the always right’ may not always be true, but findings. Furthermore, every person who in today’s corporate arena, where responded to the survey across both ‘customer loyalty’ is more myth than samples had completed at least high reality,102,103 the increasingly resistant school, which is not true of the tendencies exhibited by consumers who population at large. This may imply a identify with ACR are not likely to fade. systemic bias in the results;104 however, As the academic literature and popular in partial defence of the two studied press anecdotes readily illustrate, ACR samples, sociologists, anthropologists and seems to drive real consumption historians have all shown that people decisions and behaviours that can damage who first believe in (and later, actually firm assets and potential profits. participate in) broad-based social Thus, this study’s results suggest that movements are traditionally among the marketing managers have to be both most educated in society.105–107 Hence, it proactive and reactive in ensuring is believed that the sample selection honesty in their business practices in choices were reasonable given the fact order to engage customers in today’s that this work represents an exploratory marketplace. Proactively, the existence of scale development effort. ACR as a construct underscores the A second potential limitation of this importance of practising sound business preliminary validation of the ACR scale ethics and implementing socially relates to the issue of discriminant responsible marketing programmes. validity. As outlined earlier in this paper, Because of the expansive nature of ACR, there are a host of existing scales that marketing managers need to ensure that appear to be at least tangentially related their organisations are creating corporate to ACR. Despite the fact that none of cultures that translate into honest, fair these scales seems to adequately capture exchange with consumers across all the range and depth of sentiments and domains of marketing. Taking the four behaviours associated with such rebellion, P’s as an example, businesses should future research needs to pursue the ensure that they are selling high-quality discriminant validity of ACR, proving products, pricing these products fairly, that it is truly a unique construct that is communicating accurately in their different from any other reported in the advertisements and distributing products marketing literature. through ‘ethical retailers’. Reactively, Despite these limitations, this research marketers must have strategies designed allows for future empirical work to assess to address consumer concerns effectively who, how, when and why consumers

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rebel against certain commercial In conclusion, the empirical results enterprises and marketing practices. A reported in this exploratory work on the logical step in research pertaining to ACR scale seem promising and suggest ACR might be to test the scale that future testing and application in developed here on populations expected other empirical contexts may help to to score at its extremes (eg Green Party further ensure the construct’s validity and members and libertarians; organic farmers reliability. There is significant convergent and hedge fund managers; high-school face validity between these findings, dropouts and MBA candidates). A extant work reported in the literature variation on this approach would be to and popular press coverage of ACR. Due examine ACR cross-culturally and/or to the increasing importance of the topic internationally, looking for interesting in the USA and around the world, this differences within and between diverse study’s scale provides marketing groups of consumers. practitioners with a tool to assess ACR Beyond this, it is proposed that future — a firststeptowardpreventingdamage research in this area be conducted to to a firm’s intangible and tangible assets. determine the antecedents that cultivate Clearly, further exploration of ACR is anti-commercial rebellion among necessary in both specific consumption consumers. Clearly, there are deeper contexts as well as in the marketplace in social and psychological constructs that general. may drive such rebellion. One possible approach is to examine the psychological Acknowledgments and social motivations of extreme All three authors gratefully acknowledge the generous anti-commercial rebels, such as arsonists, financial support of the Coca–Cola Center for Marketing Studies at the University of Georgia. We vandals and hackers. Another approach have benefited immeasurably from the helpful comments would be to examine ACR as a social provided by Robert Vandenberg and Srinivas Reddy on movement, and perhaps as a paradigmatic earlier versions of this paper. Finally, the assistance of Megan Lyle, Jonathan Lepisto, Candace McCain, Jeanne shift in consumer thinking in general. Wagner and Theresa Shen was appreciated during the A final item on the agenda for future conceptualisation and data gathering stages of this research is the examination of rapidly research. growing segments of the consumer population who are clearly engaging in References anti-commercial rebellious behaviours. 1 McKee, J. (1969) ‘Introduction to sociology’,Holt, Rinehart, and Winston, New York, NY. For example, peer-to-peer file sharing 2 Lacayo, R. (1999) ‘Rage against the machine: over the internet has illuminated the fact Despite, and because of, violence, anti-WTO that large numbers of Americans — protesters were heard’, Time, Vol. 154, No. 24, pp. 34–39. some 60 million people, according to 3 Tagliabue, J. (2001) ‘Genoa Summit Meeting, the reporting on the CBS television news protesters: With eye on unequal world wealth, young show 60 Minutes108 — are willing to Europeans converge on Genoa’, New York Times,July 22, p. A14. break fair-use laws. Consumers are 4 Ritzer, G. (1996) ‘The McDonaldization of society: sidestepping traditional distribution An investigation into the changing character of channels in order to freely obtain contemporary social life’, Pine Forge Press, Thousand previously protected (and expensive) Oaks, CA. 5 Goldstein, A. (2003) ‘Do-not-call list supporters rally intellectual property including music, around registry’, Knight Ridder Tribune Business News, movies and software.109,110 It is posited 27th September, p. 1. that anti-commercial sentiments play no 6 Richtel M. (2003) ‘After delays, US prepares to enforce do-not-call list’, New York Times, 11th small part in people’s willingness to October, p. C 2. engage in theft of this sort. 7 Ritzer (1996) op. cit.

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101 Hemphill, T. (1996) ‘Beyond the bottom line: numbers of men and women from both Putting social responsibility to work for your business and the world’, Business and Society,Vol.35, groups responded to the survey. While No.1,pp.123–129. the members of the undergraduate 102 Henry, C. (2000) ‘Is customer loyalty a pernicious sample were primarily young (95.5 per myth?’ Business Horizons,Vol.43,No.4,pp.13–16. cent between the ages 20–29 years, none 103 Reinartz, W. and Kumar, V. (2000) ‘On the profitability of long-life customers in a older than 39 years), this was to be noncontractual setting: An empirical investigation expected. The alumni sample contained and implications for marketing’, Journal of Marketing, excellent age dispersion; despite the Vol. 64, No. 4, pp. 17–35. 104 Peterson, R. (2001) ‘On the use of college students survey having been administered online, in social science research: Insights from a almost one-third (30.4 per cent) of second-order meta-analysis’, Journal of Consumer respondents were Ն50 years of age. Research,Vol.28,No.3,pp.450–461. 105 Fink, L., Leonard, S. and Reid, D. (1996) Among the student population, 12.6 per ‘Intellectuals and public life: Between radicalism and cent had already completed a reform’, Cornell University Press, Ithaca, NY. baccalaureate degree; the remaining 87.4 106 Fraser, S. and Freeman, J. (1997) ‘Audacious per cent were working on their first democracy: Labor, intellectuals, and the social reconstruction of America’, Houghton Mifflin, degree. Of the alumni, 54.5 per cent had Boston, MA. completed a bachelor’sdegree,whilethe 107 Wildemeersch, D., Finger, M. and Jansen, T. (1998) remaining 45.5 per cent had finished ‘Adult education and social responsibility: Reconciling the irreconcilable?’ P. L a n g , N e w Y o r k , graduate or professional school. NY. To impute the few missing data points 108 Stahl, L. (2003) ‘Pirates of the internet’, 60 Minutes, in the data, the expectation maximisation CBS television news documentary (Sunday 2nd 111 November). (EM) procedure described by Enders 109 McGarvey, R. (2002) ‘Long live P2P’, EContent, was followed, using the algorithm Vol. 25, No. 3, pp. 18–25. provided by the PRELIS 2.50 software 110 Roth, D. (2004) ‘Pirates of the net: Catch us if you package. The covariance matrix can’, Fortune, Vol. 149, pp. 64–74. 111 Enders, C. (2001) ‘Aprimeronmaximum generated by the EM algorithm was used likelihood algorithms available for use with missing to create and estimate the structural data’, Structural Equation Modeling,Vol.8,No.1,pp. equation model in LISREL 8.54. In the 128–141. 112 Bentler, P. (1998) ‘Kurtosis, residuals, fitindices’, complete dataset, item means ranged available at: http://www.aime.ua.edu/cgi-bin/ from 2.381 to 5.300; because scale items wa?A1=ind9803&L ϭ semnet, last accessed 30th with maximum discriminant power were September, 2005. 113 Mardia, K. (1970) ‘Measures of multivariate being examined, this range was to be skewness and kurtosis with applications’, Biometrika, expected. Skew and kurtosis <2.0 are Vol. 57, No. 5, pp. 519–530. within acceptable limits and the value for 114 Spector (1992) op. cit. relative multivariate kurtosis was 1.088, 115 Ibid. 112,113 116 Bagozzi, R. and Youjae, Y. (1988) ‘On the which is within normal limits. As all evaluation of structural equation models’, Journal of the data collected comes from a the Academy of Marketing Science,Vol.16,No.1,pp. self-reported perceptual scale with 74–94. 117 Bollen, K. (1984) ‘A new incremental fitindexfor possible values ranging from 1 to 7, general structural equation models’, Sociological there were no outliers. Methods and Research,Vol.17,No.2,pp.303–316. Initial data analysis and exploratory 118 Bollen and Long (1993) op. cit. factor analysis was conducted using SPSS 11.0, while LISREL 8.54 was used for the confirmatory factor analysis. APPENDIX: DEMOGRAPHIC AND Initially, while the 72 items in the STATISTICAL INFORMATION ACR scale were adequately correlated Demographically, neither group contained with each other, the scale was any surprises. Approximately equal considerably longer than desired, so

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following Spector,114 the most weakly data set exhibited, MLE would give the correlated items were culled, and the most unbiased, consistent and efficient overall strength of the scale was tested estimates of the path values selected for and retested until no items could be exploration. deleted that would raise coefficient alpha The findings for ACR and the ways it for the ACR scale. After culling the relates to both materialism and need for weakest items from the scale, the final 48 uniqueness are encouraging. For the items had a coefficient alpha of 0.9565. overall three-construct model captured in After conducting the exploratory factor Figure 1, the minimum fit function analysis, the coefficient alpha was 0.91, Chi-square value is 123.51 (p Յ 0.001, which was considered acceptable.80 df ϭ 31), while the RMSEA value is Exploratory factor loadings were well 0.090 (p Յ 0.001). Other measures of above the 0.35 recommended model are also reasonably robust (ie requirement.115 GFI ϭ 0.94, NFI ϭ 0.90, IFI ϭ 0.93 and Table 2 shows that the items loaded CFI ϭ 0.93).116–118 By contrast, the null onto their associated factors at a significant hypothesis (the independence model with level (t >2.0, p < 0.001). For model fit, 45 df) yields a Chi-square value of the Chi-square value was 259.36 1297.67. All of the fit indices reported (p Յ 0.00, df ϭ 164), with a root mean by LISREL demonstrate that the model, square error of approximation (RMSEA) as tested, acceptably exceeds the of 0.061 (p Յ 0.05), goodness of fitindex independence (null) model for the same (GFI) ϭ 0.85, normed fitindex variables. Furthermore, the hypothesised (NFI) ϭ 0.86, incremental fitindex correlations between constructs are also (IFI) ϭ 0.94 and comparative fitindex supported by the data. In this (CFI) ϭ 0.94. application, ACR and materialism are The calculation method used for the negatively correlated by a value of 0.24 ϭ hierarchical factor model was maximum (t-value 3.79, thus supporting H2), likelihood estimation (MLE) because while ACR and need for uniqueness are with the relatively modest pooled sample positively correlated by a value of 0.22 ϭ ϭ size (ie N 336) and the normalcy this (t-value 3.54, thus supporting H2).

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