Appearance vanity or achievement vanity: which better predicts young consumers' decision-making orientations?

PurposeThis study aims to operationalize consumer decision-making styles as higher-order constructs and investigates the influence of two distinct subdimensions of consumer vanity - namely, appearance vanity and achievement vanity - on consumer decision-making orientations (CDMO).Design/methodology/approachUsing data from an online survey of 319 young adults, the authors construct a higher-order structural model capturing the following three orientations: social/conspicuous, utilitarian and undesirable. The partial least squares structural equation modeling approach was used to test the validity of the higher-order structural model and the hypothesized relationships.FindingsResults, confirming the higher-order structure of consumer decision-making styles, highlight the distinctive impacts of the vanity dimensions on different CDMOs. Specifically, appearance vanity predominantly affects social and undesirable orientations, and achievement vanity influences utilitarian orientation.Originality/valueWhile several theoretical classifications of consumer decision-making styles have been proposed in the past, none of the earlier studies leveraged those classifications as higher-order models. Addressing this literature gap, this study provides empirical evidence associating CDMOs with a specific consumer trait - vanity - thereby validating the higher-order nature of consumer decision-making styles.