7.03. The impact of self on materialism among teens

Autores: De Araujo Gil, L., Johnson, L., Doña, G.

Research shows that the self affects a myriad of human behaviors that can also be related to materialism. Very few studies focus on investigating self during the teenage years. Our study seeks to reverse that trend by examining how independent self and interdependent self affects materialism levels of teens using Brazilian data. The total sample consisted of 558 adolescents between the ages of 12 and 19 (grades 7 through 12). Hypotheses were tested using structural equation modeling. We find that independent self has positive effect on materialism and that the interdependent construct is misspecified for these individuals and may be more complex than previously conceptualized.

Furthermore, we created three sub-constructs out of the original interdependent-self construct, none of which affected materialism in the same way, or share the same relationship with independent self: group dependency, for expressions of needing the group, augments materialism; group loyalty, pooling attitude of fidelity, has no effect on materialism; and group respect, which consider questions of deference to the group, diminishes materialism. These are interesting results, since they question our prior believes on the matter, and introduce new factors into the scholarly discussion of this issue.