麻豆传媒AV

Citation

Anker TB (2024) Meaningful choice: Existential consumer theory. Marketing Theory, 24 (4), pp. 591-609. https://doi.org/10.1177/14705931231207317

Abstract
It is controversial whether consumption can constitute genuine, existential meaning for the individual. Building on philosophical explorations of subjective meaning, this study suggests a dynamic relationship between existential and teleological consumption. On the one hand, consumers demonstrate deep-level engagement with entities in the marketing eco-system (such as brand narratives and certain service encounters) to explore their own potentiality and develop an authentic vision of the good life. This is existential consumption. On the other, consumers adopt teleological modes of consumption where products and services are used more instrumentally to enact their vision of the good life. It is proposed that consumer choice is existentially meaningful insofar as it is conducive to the development or realisation of the individual vision of the good life. The theory and its implications are discussed in the context of recent deterministic and pessimistic/nihilistic challenges to marketing theory.

Keywords
authenticity; consumer choice; existentialism; meaningfulness; narrative identity; nihilism; pessimism

Journal
Marketing Theory: Volume 24, Issue 4

• Meaningful Choice: Existential Consumer Theory