IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/pal/jobman/v27y2020i6d10.1057_s41262-020-00202-w.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Brand user imagery clarity (BUIC): conceptualization, measurement, and consequences

Author

Listed:
  • Yi Xie

    (University of International Business and Economics)

  • Siqing Peng

    (Peking University)

  • Daniel P. Hampson

    (University of International Business and Economics)

Abstract

Brand user imagery is an important aspect of brand association and, consequently, brand equity. Extant conceptualizations emphasize content features of brand user imagery (e.g., convergence and favorability) but neglect the structural element of the concept, namely the clarity of the imagery. The purpose of this paper is to present the concept of brand user imagery clarity (BUIC) as a distinct and salient aspect of brand user imagery. Drawing on the associate network theory of memory, we offer a conceptualization of BUIC and then proceed to empirically validate a BUIC scale using data from 1172 consumers across four surveys and multiple industries. Results demonstrate the reliability of our 5-item BUIC scale. The scale consistently demonstrates convergent validity and discriminant validity (in relation to brand user imagery favorability, brand prestige, brand quality, and brand personality). Assessment of nomological validity identifies premium pricing strategy as a key determinant of BUIC and self-brand connection as an important outcome. This study contributes to branding literature by proposing BUIC as an important structural feature of brand user imagery and developing a reliable BUIC scale. It also contributes to the consumer–brand relationship literature by indicating the significant effect of BUIC on self-brand connection.

Suggested Citation

  • Yi Xie & Siqing Peng & Daniel P. Hampson, 2020. "Brand user imagery clarity (BUIC): conceptualization, measurement, and consequences," Journal of Brand Management, Palgrave Macmillan, vol. 27(6), pages 662-678, November.
    • Handle: RePEc:pal:jobman:v:27:y:2020:i:6:d:10.1057_s41262-020-00202-w
    DOI: 10.1057/s41262-020-00202-w
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://link.springer.com/10.1057/s41262-020-00202-w
    File Function: Abstract
    Download Restriction: Access to the full text of the articles in this series is restricted.
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1057/s41262-020-00202-w?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Hardesty, David M. & Bearden, William O., 2004. "The use of expert judges in scale development: Implications for improving face validity of measures of unobservable constructs," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 57(2), pages 98-107, February.
    2. Tian, Kelly Tepper & Bearden, William O & Hunter, Gary L, 2001. "Consumer's Need for Uniqueness: Scale Development and Validation," Journal of Consumer Research, Journal of Consumer Research Inc., vol. 28(1), pages 50-66, June.
    3. Wilfred Amaldoss & Sanjay Jain, 2005. "Conspicuous Consumption and Sophisticated Thinking," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 51(10), pages 1449-1466, October.
    4. Belk, Russell W, 1988. "Possessions and the Extended Self," Journal of Consumer Research, Journal of Consumer Research Inc., vol. 15(2), pages 139-168, September.
    5. Michel Gutsatz & Klaus Heine, 2018. "Is luxury expensive?," Post-Print hal-02312216, HAL.
    6. Fournier, Susan, 1998. "Consumers and Their Brands: Developing Relationship Theory in Consumer Research," Journal of Consumer Research, Journal of Consumer Research Inc., vol. 24(4), pages 343-373, March.
    7. Viktoria Maria Radler, 2018. "20 Years of brand personality: a bibliometric review and research agenda," Journal of Brand Management, Palgrave Macmillan, vol. 25(4), pages 370-383, July.
    8. McCracken, Grant, 1989. "Who Is the Celebrity Endorser? Cultural Foundations of the Endorsement Process," Journal of Consumer Research, Journal of Consumer Research Inc., vol. 16(3), pages 310-321, December.
    9. Keller, Kevin Lane, 2003. "Brand Synthesis: The Multidimensionality of Brand Knowledge," Journal of Consumer Research, Journal of Consumer Research Inc., vol. 29(4), pages 595-600, March.
    10. Mittal, Banwari, 2015. "Self-concept clarity: Exploring its role in consumer behavior," Journal of Economic Psychology, Elsevier, vol. 46(C), pages 98-110.
    11. McCracken, Grant, 1986. "Culture and Consumption: A Theoretical Account of the Structure and Movement of the Cultural Meaning of Consumer Goods," Journal of Consumer Research, Journal of Consumer Research Inc., vol. 13(1), pages 71-84, June.
    12. Jennifer Edson Escalas & James R. Bettman, 2005. "Self-Construal, Reference Groups, and Brand Meaning," Journal of Consumer Research, Journal of Consumer Research Inc., vol. 32(3), pages 378-389, December.
    13. Tülin Erdem & Michael P. Keane & Baohong Sun, 2008. "A Dynamic Model of Brand Choice When Price and Advertising Signal Product Quality," Marketing Science, INFORMS, vol. 27(6), pages 1111-1125, 11-12.
    14. Kevin Lane Keller, 2016. "Reflections on customer-based brand equity: perspectives, progress, and priorities," AMS Review, Springer;Academy of Marketing Science, vol. 6(1), pages 1-16, June.
    15. Michel Gutsatz & Klaus Heine, 2018. "Is luxury expensive?," Journal of Brand Management, Palgrave Macmillan, vol. 25(5), pages 411-423, September.
    16. Huber, Frank & Meyer, Frederik & Vogel, Johannes & Weihrauch, Andrea & Hamprecht, Julia, 2013. "Endorser age and stereotypes: Consequences on brand age," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 66(2), pages 207-215.
    17. Zaichkowsky, Judith Lynne, 1985. "Measuring the Involvement Construct," Journal of Consumer Research, Journal of Consumer Research Inc., vol. 12(3), pages 341-352, December.
    18. Vinod Kumar Bishnoi & Ajay Kumar, 2016. "Aaker’s brand personality scale is not universal – Explanation and reasons for bikes in India," Journal of Marketing Analytics, Palgrave Macmillan, vol. 4(1), pages 14-27, March.
    19. Jan-Benedict E M Steenkamp & Rajeev Batra & Dana L Alden, 2003. "How perceived brand globalness creates brand value," Journal of International Business Studies, Palgrave Macmillan;Academy of International Business, vol. 34(1), pages 53-65, January.
    20. Aaker, Jennifer & Benet-Martinez, Veronica & Garolera, Jordi, 2001. "Consumption Symbols as Carriers of Culture: A Study of Japanese and Spanish Brand Personality Constructs," Research Papers 1668r, Stanford University, Graduate School of Business.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Gilal Faheem Gul & Memon Amjad Ali & Gilal Naeem Gul & Gilal Rukhsana Gul & Memon Ahsan Ali, 2022. "Enhancing Service Brand Passion Through Self-Congruity: The Moderating Role of Gender and Age," Journal of Management and Business Administration. Central Europe, Sciendo, vol. 30(2), pages 83-102, June.
    2. Gilal Faheem Gul & Memon Amjad Ali & Gilal Naeem Gul & Gilal Rukhsana Gul & Memon Ahsan Ali, 2022. "Enhancing Service Brand Passion Through Self-Congruity: The Moderating Role of Gender and Age," Journal of Management and Business Administration. Central Europe, Sciendo, vol. 30(1), pages 83-102, June.
    3. Shaun M. Powell, 2020. "Journal of Brand Management: year end review 2020," Journal of Brand Management, Palgrave Macmillan, vol. 27(6), pages 623-628, November.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Yi Xie & Siqing Peng & Daniel P. Hampson, 0. "Brand user imagery clarity (BUIC): conceptualization, measurement, and consequences," Journal of Brand Management, Palgrave Macmillan, vol. 0, pages 1-17.
    2. Gurzki, Hannes & Woisetschläger, David M., 2017. "Mapping the luxury research landscape: A bibliometric citation analysis," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 77(C), pages 147-166.
    3. Sichtmann, Christina & Davvetas, Vasileios & Diamantopoulos, Adamantios, 2019. "The relational value of perceived brand globalness and localness," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 104(C), pages 597-613.
    4. Vytautas Dikcius & Eleonora Seimiene & Ramunas Casas, 2018. "Brand Personality Scale: Is It Applicable For A Small Emerging Country?," Organizations and Markets in Emerging Economies, Faculty of Economics, Vilnius University, vol. 9(2).
    5. Strizhakova, Yuliya & Coulter, Robin A. & Price, Linda L., 2008. "The meanings of branded products: A cross-national scale development and meaning assessment," International Journal of Research in Marketing, Elsevier, vol. 25(2), pages 82-93.
    6. Viktoria Maria Radler, 2018. "20 Years of brand personality: a bibliometric review and research agenda," Journal of Brand Management, Palgrave Macmillan, vol. 25(4), pages 370-383, July.
    7. Schembri, Sharon, 2009. "Reframing brand experience: The experiential meaning of Harley-Davidson," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 62(12), pages 1299-1310, December.
    8. Sandra Awanis & Bodo B Schlegelmilch & Charles Chi Cui, 2017. "Asia’s materialists: Reconciling collectivism and materialism," Journal of International Business Studies, Palgrave Macmillan;Academy of International Business, vol. 48(8), pages 964-991, October.
    9. da Silveira, Catherine & Lages, Carmen & Simões, Cláudia, 2013. "Reconceptualizing brand identity in a dynamic environment," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 66(1), pages 28-36.
    10. Fetscherin, Marc & Heinrich, Daniel, 2015. "Consumer brand relationships research: A bibliometric citation meta-analysis," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 68(2), pages 380-390.
    11. Sharma, Amalesh & Soni, Mauli & Borah, Sourav Bikash & Haque, Tanjum, 2022. "From silos to synergies: A systematic review of luxury in marketing research," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 139(C), pages 893-907.
    12. Agnieszka Zablocki & Bodo Schlegelmilch & Michael J. Houston, 2019. "How valence, volume and variance of online reviews influence brand attitudes," AMS Review, Springer;Academy of Marketing Science, vol. 9(1), pages 61-77, June.
    13. Stokburger-Sauer, Nicola & Ratneshwar, S. & Sen, Sankar, 2012. "Drivers of consumer–brand identification," International Journal of Research in Marketing, Elsevier, vol. 29(4), pages 406-418.
    14. Lars Bergkvist & Charles R. Taylor, 2016. "Leveraged marketing communications: a framework for explaining the effects of secondary brand associations," AMS Review, Springer;Academy of Marketing Science, vol. 6(3), pages 157-175, December.
    15. Chu, Kyounghee & Lee, Do-Hee & Kim, Ji Yoon, 2019. "The effect of verbal brand personification on consumer evaluation in advertising: Internal and external personification," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 99(C), pages 472-480.
    16. Dose, David & Walsh, Gianfranco & Ruvio, Ayalla & Segev, Sigal, 2018. "Investigating links between cultural orientation and culture outcomes: Immigrants from the former Soviet Union to Israel and Germany," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 82(C), pages 281-289.
    17. Keyoor Purani & Krishnan Jeesha, 2022. "Community based brand equity as brand culture: advancing brand equity conceptualization for a connected world," AMS Review, Springer;Academy of Marketing Science, vol. 12(1), pages 52-70, June.
    18. Jones, Robert & Kim, Youn-Kyung, 2011. "Single-brand retailers: Building brand loyalty in the off-line environment," Journal of Retailing and Consumer Services, Elsevier, vol. 18(4), pages 333-340.
    19. Pourazad, Naser & Stocchi, Lara & Pare, Vipul, 2019. "Brand attribute associations, emotional consumer-brand relationship and evaluation of brand extensions," Australasian marketing journal, Elsevier, vol. 27(4), pages 249-260.
    20. Hohenberger, Christoph & Grohs, Reinhard, 2020. "Old and exciting? Sport sponsorship effects on brand age and brand personality," Sport Management Review, Elsevier, vol. 23(3), pages 469-481.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:pal:jobman:v:27:y:2020:i:6:d:10.1057_s41262-020-00202-w. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Sonal Shukla or Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.palgrave.com .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.