The multiple, and often conflicting, roles of women today pose significant challenges for marketers and researchers, This paper discusses actual and anticipated changes in women's consumer behavior on the basis of issues raised by studies of women's roles in non-marketing disciplines. Implications for research, marketing strategy, and public policy are discussed.
Change brought about by the continuing evolution in women's roles have affected, and will continue to affect, all aspects of our society. The purpose of this paper is to analyze the actual and anticipated effects of these changing roles on women's consumer behavior. The issues treated herein are those raised by the other five participants in this session. Underlying the multi-disciplinary approach taken in this session is a strong belief that we can better understand and anticipate the effects of women's changing roles on consumer behavior if we make use of knowledge available in the behavioral sciences and economics.
Some of the salient findings about working-class women are:
* Working-class women have been slower than middle-class women in breaking with traditional roles, and have tended to react negatively toward changes which appear to threaten established values.
* For ethnic working-class women, especially, religious institutions tend to reinforce traditional values.
* The working-class woman tends to be part of a tightly-knit social group composed primarily of female kin.
* Although the necessity of working has expanded the social horizons of many working-class women, the traditional female jobs which most of them hold are not intrinsically rewarding.
* These expanded horizons are reflected in the decreasing propensity of working-class women to define family responsibilities, especially child care, as the central focus of their lives. (Peters and Samuels 1976).
* Working class husbands and wives tend to adhere to traditional household roles and to engage in sex-segregated leisure activities, even if wives work.
* Wives' employment is often viewed as threatening by the working class husband whose ability to provide for the family is often the major source of his sense of self-worth (Samuels 1975).
* While feelings of lack of self-worth and competency in dealing with the world outside the home have decreased among working-class women, they have decreased more slowly than have the same feelings among middle-class women. The result is an increasing disparity in feelings of self worth and self-confidence between the two social class groupings.
* Working-class women are more likely than their middle-class counterparts to feel that their adult life is better than their childhood. Since part of the perceived improvement is due to acquisition of desired material goods, working-class women are more positive toward business in general and specific products, and toward the media in general and advertising in particular, than are middle-class women. (Social Research, Inc. 1973).
Taken together, these points emphasize the fact that most of our data about women come from middle-class respondents and is based on middle-class values. Working-class women make up an important market segment for many products and brands. In addition, they may react to some types of advertising appeals very differently from middle-class women (Johnson and Satow 1978). If we could believe that they are soon likely to adopt middle-class attitudes, values and patterns of behavior, their absence from most consumer behavior studies would not be an important omission. However, the S.R.I. study (1973) also indicates that working-class emphasis on upward mobility into the middle class appears for many to be giving way to an emphasis on achieving desired goals within the working-class milieu. The attention of researchers to the working-class market is therefore important and overdue.
One of the major contributions that we all make to the economy is through buying things. Women's role as care givers has meant that women play an especially prominent role in buying things that provide sustenance for home and family. Studies show that women are responsible for buying 80% of household goods.1 Although it is often played down, it is clear that women have a great deal of influence in the economy as consumers, in other words, a lot of spending power.
Even the non-monetary part of consumption is part of the economy. Shopping for the goods that we need to survive takes time and attention. Buying food and clothes and school supplies and home furnishings often means watching out for sales and discounts. Comparison shopping, searching through coupons, and finding the best deal, is also time-consuming. Shopping is work and is part of the unpaid labour not counted in the formal economy. But whether or not it's recognized as work, shopping is an activity fraught with contradictions and challenges.
Contradictions of Consumption
As consumers, women live under a good deal of pressure. Many women must find ways to feed their families on a limited budget. They search for a balance between affordability, nutrition, and availability, countered with the personal preferences of their families. Women who are working outside of the home face the added problem of time constraints. Certain purchases may be made to save time and energy when women are squeezed between work and family responsibilities. Stopping for fast food seems easier than rushing home to cook dinner for the family after a long day at work.
Women are also often responsible for clothing themselves and their families and are faced with similar demands in this task. Added to that is the pressure to look good and to be 'in style.' Some items, such as brand name clothes, serve as status symbols and communicate to other people what kind of image we want to present. The pressure to own such items can be so intense that even if people can't afford to, they may sacrifice their needs to buy certain things. Think of the teenage son or daughter who 'has to have' a certain brand of running shoe. Women in the workforce face the demands of proper workplace attire as well.
Increasingly, women take responsibility for buying larger items such as houses and cars. And women are also often responsible for buying gifts on behalf of their families. When kids go to birthday parties, it is usually the mother who purchases and wraps the gift. It often works the same way when a couple attends a wedding or anniversary. Women are faced with endless choices and decisions in their lives as consumers.
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