Daily existence is more interconnected to consumer behaviors than ever before, encompassing many issues of well-being. Problems include unhealthy eating; credit card mismanagement; alcohol, tobacco, pornography, and gambling abuse; marketplace discrimination; and ecological deterioration; as well as at-risk groups who are impoverished, impaired, or elderly. Opportunities for well-being via consumer behaviors include empowerment via the Internet, product sharing, leisure pursuits, family consumption, and pro-environmental activities, among others.
In 2005 the Association for Consumer Research launched Transformative Consumer Research (TCR). Its mission is to foster research on quality of life that is both rigorous and applied for better assisting consumers, their caregivers, policy administrators, and executives.
This edited volume includes 33 chapters on a wide range of topics by expert international authors. All royalties from sales of this book are donated to the Association to support TCR grants.
About the Author: David Mick is the Robert Hill Carter Professor of Marketing at the University of Virginia's McIntire School of Commerce. He holds a Ph.D. from Indiana University. His research has focused on communication, motives, and meaning in consumer behavior, including advertising, self-gifts, technological products, materialism, and wisdom. His research has appeared in the Journal of Consumer Research, Journal of Marketing, Harvard Business Review, Journal of Public Policy and Marketing, Journal of Consumer Psychology, and Journal of Business Ethics, among other outlets. He has also previously co-edited three books, including The Why of Consumption (2000) and Inside Consumption: Consumer Motives, Goals, and Desires (2005). His research has received the Best Article award at the Journal of Consumer Research (1989), the Maynard Award for a prominent theoretical contribution in the Journal of Marketing (1999), and the Dunn Award for Excellence in Advertising Research from the University of Illinois (2004). He is presently a member of the editorial review boards at the Journal of Consumer Research, Journal of Consumer Psychology, and the Journal of Public Policy and Marketing. David is also an elected Fellow of the Society for Consumer Psychology (2004), former Associate Editor and Head Editor of the Journal of Consumer Research (1997-2003), and past President of the Association for Consumer Research (2005).
Simone Pettigrew is a Senior Lecturer in Marketing in the UWA Business School at the University of Western Australia. Prior to becoming an academic researcher, Simone was employed in marketing positions in the Australian energy sector. She holds a Ph.D. from the University of Western Australia and has published research in a variety of journals, including Marketing Theory, International Journal of Advertising, International Journal of Consumer Studies, Journal of Consumer Marketing, Australian Journal of Primary Health, and Aging and Mental Health. She has won numerous competitive grants from Australian and international funding organizations. Her current grant-funded projects focus on childhood obesity, age-related mental illness, and alcohol-related harm during adolescence. Simone is founder and Editor-in-Chief of the Journal of Research for Consumers (www.jrconsumers.com). Since 2001, JRC has published research that educates, empowers, and benefits consumers. As a web-based publication that successfully targets academic, consumer, and public policy audiences, JRC makes new consumer behavior knowledge accessible to multiple target groups.
Cornelia (Connie) Pechmann is a Professor of Marketing at the Paul Merage School of Business, University of California Irvine. She holds an M.S. in Psychology, M.B.A., and Ph.D. in marketing from Vanderbilt University. Dr. Pechmann conducts controlled experiments to examine the effects of controversial forms of advertising on consumers, including tobacco-related advertising and comparative advertising. She has received $1.5 million in grants to study the effects of tobacco-related media messages on adolescents including cigarette ads and product placements and antismoking ads and television episodes. Dr. Pechmann has published over 50 refereed articles, book chapters, and conference proceedings in top academic publications such as the Journal of Consumer Research, Journal of Marketing Research, Journal of Marketing, and American Journal of Public Health. Dr. Pechmann's article on cigarette advertising and adolescents in Journal of Consumer Research was named Best Article for 2002. Dr. Pechmann serves on the editorial review boards of the Journal of Consumer Research, Journal of Marketing, Journal of Consumer Psychology, Social Influence, and Journal of Public Policy and Marketing. She has also served as a consultant to the U.S. Office of National Drug Control Policy's youth anti-drug media campaign, and as an expert witness in Vioxx drug and tobacco cases. Articles citing Dr. Pechmann's research have appeared in The Wall Street Journal, New York Times, Washington Post, Los Angeles Times and USA Today.
Julie L. Ozanne is the Sonny Merryman Professor of Marketing at Virginia Tech's Pamplin College of Business. She holds a Ph.D. from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Her research has focused on the problems of poverty and health care access in rural Appalachia, the struggles of low literate adults in the marketplace, illegal consumption among juvenile delinquents, environmentally sensitive consumption, and consumer activism. She specializes in alternative methodologies for the study of social problems, such as interpretive, critical, feminist, and participatory action research methods. Her work has appeared in the Journal of Consumer Research, Journal of Public Policy & Marketing, Journal of International Business Studies, The Handbook of Qualitative Research Methods in Marketing, and Product and Market Development for Subsistence Marketplaces, among other outlets. Her research has won the JCR Ferber award and she has been a Visiting Erskine Scholar at the University of Canterbury in Christchurch. She is on the editorial board of Journal of Public Policy & Marketing and Consumption, Culture, & Markets, and she is a member of the ACR advisory council.
