What is it about?
Voluntary simplicity is a way of life that rejects the high-consumption, materialistic lifestyles of consumer cultures. This paper examines the differences between Turkish and US consumers who adopt voluntary simplicity lifestyles. The results reveal that several behavioural and demographic characteristics of consumers who adopt the same lifestyle philosophy may vary based on their culture and the conditions of their country.
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Why is it important?
Although motivations behind anti-materialistic movements have been largely discussed in consumer research literature, no study has yet questioned whether voluntary simplicity, as an alternative consumer lifestyle, differs according to the developmental level of countries where simplifiers live. Since every country is endowed with their cultural heritage and countries’ level of development are different, lifestyle research should be conducted on a country-by-country basis.
Perspectives
Writing this article was a great pleasure for me. I personally believe that every researcher should make comprehensive cultural comparisons before making generalizations about the attitudes and behaviours of a specific consumer group. I also believe that this paper helps us understand how socio-economic differences and development levels of countries influence counter movements.
Hakan Cengiz
Karabuk Universitesi
Read the Original
This page is a summary of: Investigating the Demographics and Behavioural Characteristics Associated with Voluntary Simplicity Lifestyles in a Developed and a Developing Country: A Comparison between US and Turkish Simplifiers, Global Business Review, November 2018, SAGE Publications,
DOI: 10.1177/0972150918807084.
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