Abstract
Conspicuous consumption describes signalling of one’s buying power in order to impress others and secure and/or preserve a favourable place in a social hierarchy. The current study, involving 200 junior and senior high school students from Serbia, examined inclination for lavish spending on brand name clothes in relation to social dominance. Our aim was to examine a predictive relationship between an exploitative interpersonal strategy (marked by Machiavellianism, Leadership, and Ruthless Self−Advancement), and the attitude toward conspicuous consumption. Our respondents with high esteem of power, emanating from the principal position within a group, and prone to Machiavellianism and Ruthless Self−Advancement, had a positive attitude toward conspicuous consumption (an indirect measure of the actual behaviour). Although one’s attitude toward conspicuous consumption is likely to be multifaceted, our findings suggest that a positive attitude towards conspicuous consumption may be an accompanying ingredient of the opportunistic and calculating life strategy. The results indicate that conspicuous consumption is most likely embedded in the social ranking processes.
Highlights
Social competition is an inevitable consequence of group living (West−Eberhard, 1979), and it is considered to be a main form of social interaction (Dunbar, 1998), as well as a main driving force of primate (Bates & Byrne, 2015) and hominid brain evolution (Bailey & Geary, 2009)
The problem of this research is focused on the examination of social ranks dimensions which contribute to the formation of attitudes about conspicuous consumption, as well as on the question of how conspicious consumption depends on individual differences in the context of Machiavellianism and Leadership
This study has demonstrated significant correlations between Machiavellianism and Ruthless Self−Advancement, and between Machiavellianism and Leadership
Summary
Social competition is an inevitable consequence of group living (West−Eberhard, 1979), and it is considered to be a main form of social interaction (Dunbar, 1998), as well as a main driving force of primate (Bates & Byrne, 2015) and hominid brain evolution (Bailey & Geary, 2009). Our aim has been to examine a predictive relationship between an exploitative interpersonal strategy (marked by Machiavellianism, a high esteem of power, and Ruthless Self−Advancement) and the attitude toward conspicuous consumption. In their seminal paper, Zuroff and his associates (2010) have approached social dominance from an evolutionary perspective. The problem of this research is focused on the examination of social ranks dimensions which contribute to the formation of attitudes about conspicuous consumption, as well as on the question of how conspicious consumption depends on individual differences in the context of Machiavellianism and Leadership
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