Cultural Differences in Coping with Changes in the External Environment: A Case of Behavioural Segmentation of Senior Consumers Based on Their Reaction to the COVID-19 Pandemic

Abstract

A sudden change in the external environment, such as the COVID-19 pandemic meant for the senior customers in CEE, required coping mechanisms to adapt and a significant change in behavioural patterns. The paper presents what were the social and customer behaviour changes among elderly citizens caused by the pandemic and aims to identify regional differences in adapting to these changes. Results from CATI interviews of 5875 participants from Germany, the Czech Republic, and Slovakia, which had been conducted as a part of the international SHARE project bring a deeper understanding of regional differences. Behavioural segmentation done in each of the researched countries shows that the created clusters in each country are different and yet similar in certain aspects. Clusters of “adapters” – seniors with partial behavioural change are found in all three countries, even though they vary in some aspects of behaviour, they have significant commonalities as well. A cluster of “vulnerable” – seniors that had undergone a complete change of behavioural patterns to protect themselves - or a cluster of “resistant” – seniors resisting the change are found only in two of researched countries. Differences in understanding the threat and feeling the need to react in certain ways are found not only between countries but also within cultures. By employing Hofstede´s cultural dimensions score to explain detected differences, the article brings more understanding of how Power Distance, Indulgence, and Individualism could form differences in the usage of coping mechanisms among the elderly. The results bring insight into important aspects of changes in behaviour, which should be understood and mirrored in the business strategies of companies whose actual or potential customers are represented by this population. Implications for Central European audience: The research on behavioural changes among senior consumers due to the Covid-19 pandemic had been done in three countries of CEE – Slovakia, the Czech Republic, and Germany and therefore, the implications are well suitable for the CEE region, yet the generalization to other countries must be done carefully as the results show that created behavioural segments in researched countries indicate cultural differences.Â