Collaborative fashion consumption – A cross-cultural study between Tehran and Berlin

Abstract

Collaborative fashion consumption as a possible path towards more sustainable clothing has taken different forms all around the world. However, it has been differently received in different cultures. Collaborative fashion practices and initiatives have not been deeply studied in the academic literature. Employing a quantitative comparative study between Tehran and Berlin, the theory of planned behavior is tested for the case of collaborative fashion consumption in a cross-cultural context. The Hofstede's national cultural factors are used to explain the differences between two cultures. The results of this study show that attitude, social norms and perceived behavioral control are relevant predictors of the intention to adopt collaborative fashion consumption. The degree of this is found to have a high influence on the actual consumption, while there is no direct influence of perceived behavior control on the collaborative fashion consumption. Moreover, the results show that the predictors of intention towards collaborative fashion consumption are different in two cultures and some of them display significant differences. For instance, in Tehran attitude is found to be the most important factor influencing the intention towards collaborative fashion consumption while in Berlin perceived behavior control is found to be the most important predictor of this intention. Besides, all the elements of the theory of planned behavior, the influence of the intention towards collaborative fashion consumption on actual behavior, and preferences for its different forms differ between Iranian and German culture. Some of these differences can be explained using Hofstede's cultural factors.