Measuring childhood materialism: Refining and validating Schor's Consumer Involvement Scale

Abstract

This paper examines the measurement of childhood materialism using Schor's (2004) Consumer Involvement Scale. Schor treated consumer involvement empirically as a unidimensional construct, though she suggested that conceptually it may be multidimensional. Using confirmatory factor analysis procedures on data collected from children in the U.S. and U.K., the psychometric superiority of a threefactor structure is established, comprising dissatisfaction, consumer orientation, and brand awareness components. Additional analyses demonstrate distinct associations between each of these components and other constructs, including self-esteem, outside school activities, and child-parent relations. The scale's generalizability across boys

Consumerism and well-being in early adolescence

“…It remains open to speculation whether the variation represents cultural (USA vs. Scotland) or secular (2001Á2002 vs. 2010) differences. Our factor analysis suggested almost identical dimensions to those obtained from previous US and UK samples (Schor 2004, Bottomley et al 2010, with the addition of a fourth factor which we termed 'consumer indifference'. However, it is possible this reflects something else.…”

“…Although measures of possessiveness, non-generosity and envy are generally combined into a single scale, one adult study found that possessiveness had weaker relationships with unhappiness than the other two dimensions (Belk 1984), and another that envy had a stronger relationship with affect than did non-generosity (La Barbera and Gurhan 1997). Similarly, analyses based on one of the measures used in this article found that while 'dissatisfaction' had a strong relationship with depression and anxiety among US 9Á13 year olds (Schor 2004) and with self-esteem among US 11Á15-year-old females (Bottomley et al 2010), relationships between 'consumer orientation' or 'brand awareness' and these measures of well-being were weaker (Schor 2004) or non-existent (Bottomley et al 2010).…”

“…However, it is possible this reflects something else. It included only two items, both of which were shown to have very low loadings on oneand three-factor scale solutions in another study (Bottomley et al 2010). Unlike the other Consumer Involvement Scale items, neither is directly related to 'me'/'I', and previous authors have suggested that one ('When I decide who to be friends with .…”

“…Factor analysis was therefore based on 14 items, conducted on the whole sample and the resulting four-factor scores saved. Since analyses by both Schor (2004) and, more recently by Bottomley et al (2010) of both US and UK samples, had indicated a three-factor structure, additional confirmatory factor analyses were conducted. These indicated that the four-factor model based on 14 items (x 2 0670.6, df 0 71, CFI 00.928) fitted our data significantly better than a three-factor model based on either 14 items (x 2 0844.6, df 074, CFI 0 0.907) or on Schor's original 16 items (x 2 01250.6, df 0101, CFI 00.891) (detailed results available on request).…”

“…We begin by describing scales which measure the concept of consumerism, their associations with well-being, and differences according to gender and socio-economic status (SES). The majority of work on consumerism has focused on adults (Bottomley et al 2010), and a glance at the references for this article shows that most of the literature in this area has been located in consumerism or marketing journals rather than those relating to young people. This is despite the fact that the impact of modern consumer culture is likely to be most marked among young people (Eckersley 2011).…”