The children's apparel industry is a fast-growing
industry in the United States. It is important to determine
what factors are considered as the most important when
parents purchase their pre-school children's clothing. To
gain a better understanding of parent-consumers' purchasing
behavior of pre-school children's apparel, this study
focused on parent-consumers' evaluative criteria used in
purchasing pre-school children's apparel both in Taiwan and
in the U.S.
The purpose of this study was to compare the evaluative
criteria used by Taiwan and U.S. parent-consumers in their
decisions to purchase children's apparel. The importance of
intrinsic criteria directly related to the product itself
and some selected extrinsic criteria were examined.
The theoretical framework used for the present study
was the EKB consumer behavior model; with focus on the
alternative evaluation stage of the consumer decision making
process. Previous research has examined evaluative criteria
used in purchasing women's and men's apparel, but only
limited research has investigated evaluative criteria used
in purchasing children's apparel.
Survey methodology was used to collect data. A self-administered
questionnaire was distributed to two non-probability,
purposive samples to collect quantitative data.
Data were collected through two selected pre-schools at
Oregon State University in the U.S. and at Fu Jen Catholic
University in Taiwan. The samples consisted of 200 parent-consumers
with a child or children, ages 3 to 6. Subjects
were given questionnaires through teachers or researcher,
resulting in a 84.1% response rate.
Collected data were analyzed using two sample t-tests.
Significant differences were found between the two groups in
the importance of aesthetic and extrinsic criteria but not
in the importance of usefulness and performance criteria.
Among all 22 criteria, significant differences were found
between Taiwan and U.S. respondents in the importance of:
fiber content, type of fabric, fabric print, having
character/logo, color fastness, price, on sale, brand name,
and country of origin. The most important criteria for both
groups were comfort and size/fit.
By identifying the evaluative criteria used by parent-consumers
of pre-school children's apparel in two countries,
the results partially supported the EKB consumer behavior
model. In addition, the findings about the importance of
purchase criteria used by parent-consumers may also benefit
children's apparel manufacturers and retailers in revising
or improving their competitive ability in global marketing. / Graduation date: 1995
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:ORGSU/oai:ir.library.oregonstate.edu:1957/35239 |
| Date | 19 April 1995 |
| Creators | Chen, Pei-Chun |
| Contributors | Burns, Leslie Davis |
| Source Sets | Oregon State University |
| Language | en_US |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Thesis/Dissertation |
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