Abstract
Whatever else we may be in our lives — child, parent, student, worker, lover, jogger or stamp collector — we are all consumers, all of our days. We buy and use goods and services constantly; to eat, to wear, to read, to watch, to play, to travel in; to keep us healthy, to make us wealthy and, if not wise, at least better educated. The act of consumption is therefore an integral and intimate part of our daily existence. And that is true whether we have a lot of money to spend on it or very little.
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Further Reading
Kassarjian, H. and T. Robertson (Eds.), (1991), Handbook of Consumer Behavior, 4th edn. (Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall, 1991). An authoritative account of the most important concepts used in consumer behaviour, with a detailed review of relevant research.
Katona, G. The Powerful Consumer (New York: McGraw-Hill, 1960). A pioneering work on consumer behaviour by one of the first social scientists to combine, in a systematic way, economic and psychological thinking on this topic.
References
Lutz, R., ‘Positivism, rationalism, and pluralism in consumer research: paradigms in paradise’, in T. Srull (ed.), Advances in Consumer Research 16 (Provo, UT: Association for Consumer Research, 1989).
See for example M.B. Holbrook and J. O’Shaughnessy, ‘On the scientific status of consumer research and the need for an interpretive approach to studying consumption behavior’, Journal of Consumer Research, vol. 15 (December 1988), pp. 398–402.
Holbrook, M. and E. Hirschman, ‘The experiential aspects of consumption: Consumer fantasies, feelings, and fun’, Journal of Consumer Research, vol. 9 no. 2 (1982), pp. 132–40.
Wilkie, W. L., Consumer Behavior (New York: John Wiley & Sons, 1994).
Smith, A., On the Wealth of Nations (Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1982).
Drucker, P. F., Management (London: Heinemann, 1974), p. 56, emphasis in original.
Ibid., p. 57, emphasis added.
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© 1997 David A. Statt
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Statt, D.A. (1997). People as Consumers. In: Understanding the Consumer. Palgrave, London. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-349-25438-5_1
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-349-25438-5_1
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