A University marketing study released  found Americans value self-respect above other values, such as security or a sense of belonging, which holds implications for how advertisers target consumers.
The findings show that there is a shift in desire of having what people don’t have (such as security) to improving what they already have (such as self-respect).
The study based its research on a Web-based survey of 1,500 U.S. adults conducted in 2007 and compared to nearly identical surveys from 1976 and 1986 conducted by University marketing professor Lynn Kahle. The University marketing research team worked with Synovate, a global market research company, in 2007 to gather data.
Kahle’s role in the current research, which the Journal of Advertising Research recently published, was mainly as an advisor to three graduate students: Eda Gurel Atay, Johnny Chen and Guang-Xin Xie, who is now an assistant professor of marketing at the University of Massachusetts-Boston.
The original research done in 1976 and 1986 was conducted as part of a study on mental health.
“In marketing, we find that many times people purchase products to express their core values,” Kahle said. “Consumption is one way to express what you care about and what is important to you. Imagine the different motives and information needs for someone buying a computer who has a most important value of fun versus one whom has a most important value of accomplishment.”
Gurel Atay also agrees with Kahle on the importance of American values to marketing and advertising.
“Several previous studies have shown that people choose products (and) brands to fulfill their values,” Gurel Atay, the lead author of the study, said. “And when marketing strategies, including advertisements, connect to core values of target customers, those strategies are more effective.”
Kahle went further in explaining what the findings of self-respect meant for American consumers.
“Self-respect is the most important value in America, reflecting a desire to solve problems by one’s self,” Kahle said. “Americans are looking inside themselves more for solutions to problems.”
Self-respect was not the only core value to gain importance over the last three decades. Two other values, “fun-enjoyment-excitement in life” and “warm relationships with others,” also topped the list of values Americans rate highly.
“For instance, because self-respect is considered as the most important value for almost all demographic groups, this value can be used in formulating marketing strategies of products that are targeted for multiple customer segments,” Gurel Atay said. “Depending on the type of product and brand characteristics, marketers can also emphasize fun-enjoyment-excitement in life and or warm relationships with others in their marketing campaigns.”
When researchers saw that desires of people wanting something they don’t have ranked lower on the list of American values, such as security and a sense of belonging, they were surprised.
“The steep decline in the importance of security shocked me because, in the news media, we seem to hear constantly about reasons to be worried, especially since 9/11,” Kahle said. “It was also interesting that deficit values, which people pick because they lack something, decreased, and excess values, which people pick when they possess a lot of it, increased. Over the past generation, Americans seem to be doing better at connecting the values they desire.”
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