Revisiting Sproles and Kendall’s Consumer Styles Inventory (CSI) in the 21st Century: A Case of Australian Consumers Decision-Making Styles in the Context of High and Low-Involvement Purchases

Tahmid Nayeem,Jean Marie-Ipsooching

doi:10.18775/jibrm.1849-8558.2015.72.3001

Abstract

There has been considerable research on the investigation of Consumer Decision-Making Styles (CDMS). However, research designs suggested to date mainly replicate the original study by Sproles and Kendall (1986) proposing eight mental characteristics, the Consumer Styles Inventory (CSI). The research aims to develop this approach further and apply the CSI to different product involvement (e.g., high and low) and compare the relationship between product involvement and consumer decision-making styles. Data were collected from 208 Australian respondents using a self-administered questionnaire. Exploratory and confirmatory factor analysis was conducted on the CSI adapted for high and low involvement purchases. The generalisability of the CSI was tested within this context. Results found significant differences between the two product categories and demonstrated a relationship between products and CDMS and that CDMS are governed by consumers’ perceived product involvement. Furthermore, the original CSI can still be a valuable measure to low involvement purchases; however, it is questionable and requires further modification in relation to high involvement purchases. For instance, the addition of new factors such as “environmental sustainability”, “innovation consciousness”, “corporate social responsibility”, etc. with the original scale would help understand CDMS effectively. The findings of this research will expand the scientific literature on the relationship between product involvement and CDMS. Knowing that Australians are ‘rational’ and ‘quality conscious’ buyers, managers can employ CDMS to analyse consumers’ needs and develop segmented marketing messages and strategies.

Highlights

The investigation of consumer decision-making has a long tradition in marketing and consumer behaviour research (Bauer et al, 2006; Lysonski and Durvasula 2013; Rezaei, 2015)
4.1 High involvement purchase: 4.1.1 Results of exploratory factor analysis (EFA) In the first step of the factor analysis, EFA was conducted on the 45 items of the consumer styles inventory (CSI) using the calibration sample (N = 208) with maximum likelihood extraction and oblique rotation (OBLIMIN)
4.2.1 Results of Confirmatory Factor Analysis (CFA) CFA was conducted for each seven consumer decision-making style factors by running single-factor congeneric models

Summary

Introduction

The investigation of consumer decision-making has a long tradition in marketing and consumer behaviour research (Bauer et al, 2006; Lysonski and Durvasula 2013; Rezaei, 2015). It is useful to identify consumers’ decision-making styles (CDMS), so advertisers and marketers can use such a profile to segment consumers into profitable clusters (Lysonski et al, 1996; Nayeem and Casidy 2015). Consumers’ decision-making styles influence how they negotiate their way through the decisionmaking process; for example, how they approach the information search, evaluation and selection, while shaping their purchase behaviour (Nayeem, 2012). The characteristics of decision-making styles can be useful in profiling an individual’s consumer style in terms of his/her product evaluation and selection process (Canabal 2002; Hanzaee and Aghasibeig 2008). People may have more than one decision-making style, and it may change depending on the product These styles may vary across different product categories (Bauer et al, 2006). With this in mind, Sproles and Kendall (1986) developed a measure (the CSI), which can be used to identify the characteristics of CDMS. (Radder and Pieterson 2006; Hanzaee and Aghasibeig 2008; Azizi and Makkizadeh 2012)

Objectives

Results

Conclusion