Low socioeconomic class and consumer complexity expectations for new product technology

Carlos Trujillo, Andrés Barrios, Sonia M. Camacho and José Antonio Rosa

Journal of Business Research, 2010, vol. 63, issue 6, 538-547

Abstract: This research improves the field's understanding of subsistence consumers by investigating how low socioeconomic class relates to expectations of complexity from new products. The study tests a model of the relationship between consumer socioeconomic class, self-esteem, self-assessed capabilities, and knowledge about product domains, and the influence of self-esteem, self-assessed capabilities, and product domain knowledge on consumer expectations of complexity when facing a new product technology. A sample of 266 Colombian consumers representing different socio-economic classes is used to test the model using structural equation modeling. The results show that self-esteem, self-assessed capabilities, and product domain knowledge are predictive of expectations of complexity, with low self-esteem, low capabilities, and low product knowledge leading to higher complexity expectations. Socioeconomic status relates closely to self-esteem, self-assessed capabilities, and product domain knowledge and can be used as a surrogate for the individual-level constructs.

Keywords: Adoption; of; new; product; technology; Complexity; expectation; Subsistence; markets (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2010
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (5)

Downloads: (external link)
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0148-2963(09)00152-0
Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:eee:jbrese:v:63:y:2010:i:6:p:538-547

Access Statistics for this article

Journal of Business Research is currently edited by A. G. Woodside

More articles in Journal of Business Research from Elsevier
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Catherine Liu ().