The influence of self‐construals on young Korean consumers' decision‐making styles

Abstract

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to explore the relationships between self‐construals and decision‐making styles of Korean college students. Design/methodology/approach A total of 872 Korean college students from three different Korean university campuses completed three‐part questionnaires (self‐construal, decision making styles and demographic information). Findings It was found that Korean college students' decision‐making styles can vary according to their self‐construals. Research limitations/implications Although data were collected from three different universities located in different geographic locations, the study was conducted using a convenience sample rather than a random sample. Therefore, a randomly selected, diverse and geographical sampling is recommended to be able to generalize results from such a study to the total Korean college student population. Practical implications Findings suggest that high‐end luxury imported goods might appeal to Korean college students with Independent self‐construals. Even though there is an emerging new group of students with an independent self‐construal, the majority of Korean college students still hold a higher interdependent self‐construal than independent self‐construal. Therefore, different marketing strategies should be developed according to the different market segments among the Korean college students based on the different clothing product categories and quality. Originality/value Despite the growing global market and importance of studying cultural differences, little information about the influence of culture on consumer behaviour is available. The findings of the dual‐self concept within the Korean culture and their close relationship with decision‐making styles contribute to the theoretical knowledge base of contemporary consumer behaviour.

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