Perceived Apparel Quality Revisited: Testing of Its Structural Dimensions from the Perspective of the Generation Y Female Consumers

The perceived quality is defined as “the customer’s judgment about a product’s overall excellence or superiority” (Zeithaml, 1988, p. 3). The importance of perceived product quality in the consumer decision-making process includes its crucial role in affecting purchase intention or choices (Brucks, Zeithaml, and Naylor, 2000; Teas and Agarwal, 2000), consumer satisfaction (Parasuraman, Zeithaml, and Berry, 1994), and as one of the core/primary facets of customer-based brand equity (Netemeyer et al., 2004). College-aged consumers have shown their growing purchasing power for apparel products (Mintel International Group Ltd., 2006). The buying power of college students in the U.S. retailing industry reached $200 billion a year (Gardyn, 2002). Due to their purchase power in the marketplace, it is important for marketers and retailers to better understand this segment’s apparel quality perception during their purchase decision making process. However, little research effort has been paid to their perceptions of apparel quality as one of the major apparel purchase criteria from a college-aged consumers’ perspective. This paper presents methods and results of Phases One and Two of a multi-phase research program in which long-term goals are to develop an instrument to measure multidimensional attributes of apparel quality perception. In the first phase, the researcher investigated insights into perception of apparel quality from the college-aged consumer’s perspective using focus group interviews. A total of 15 female undergraduate students attending a Midwestern university in the U.S. participated in the interviews. They were born between born between 1980 and 1983. The number of participants in each session was fewer than eight, based on suggestions from the literature on focus group interviews (Berg, 1998; Churchill, 1999; Neuman, 1997). The interview schedule was semi-structured with open-ended questions. During the interviews, the researcher read the open-ended questions to each participant and recorded answers in writing and on audio-tape. Quick notes about the facial and nonverbal expressions of participants during the interviews were taken as a reminder of the context of the interview for later interpretation of the interview content (Lincoln and Guba, 1985). The researcher performed member checking after the interview sessions with selected participants to ensure the credibility (validity) of the data, analytic categories, interpretations, and conclusions that the researcher had drawn from the interview data. The outcome of Phase One includes 1) re-conceptualizing the perceived apparel quality construct from a college-aged consumer’s perspective and 2) generating 13 perceived apparel quality items based on the findings focus group interviews and previous literature in the fields of Marketing and Clothing and Textiles. Participants’ verbal expressions on perceived apparel quality reconfirmed the major components of the concept identified in previous literature. They, however, defined the quality of apparel using more of the intrinsic attributes rather than extrinsic attributes of a garment. The major components of the apparel quality definition were 1) durability and performance of a garment, 2) construction, and 3) materials and fabric hand. Based on the findings of focus group interviews as well as the previous literature, a total of 13 items were generated. In the second phase, the researcher empirically tested the dimensionality, reliability, and validity of the perceived apparel quality instrument. Three hundred sixty-one U.S. female college students, born between 1980 and 1984, provided usable responses for the quantitative data analysis. Sweaters for fall/winter seasons were chosen as stimuli for this quantitative study because it has been often chosen as stimuli for testing perceived quality for apparel products (e.g., Heisey, 1990; Sternquist and Davis, 1986). In addition, it was suggested as an appropriate product category for understanding consumer’s quality perception during the focus group interviews. Photographs of 10 different sweaters were shown on two versions of a mock Internet apparel retailer site (higher vs. lower service quality). The questionnaire was administered after participants viewed one of two Internet apparel retail sites. In the experimental study, the treatment effect (higher vs. lower service quality of an Internet retailer sites) had no mean difference on participants’ perception of apparel quality shown on retail sites (t=1.92; p>.05). Therefore, responses were pulled together to create one group for further analyses. Cronbach’s reliability test showed that each of three factors achieved adequate internal validity ranged between .74 and .87. Confirmatory factor analyses using AMOS 6.0 conducted to test the dimensionality of the perceived apparel quality construct. In order to examine the factor structure, a hierarchical model comparison was conducted. Four nested models were created: Model 1 with complete independent items, Model 2 with three independent factors, Model 3 with three related factors, and Model 4 with three related factors with measurement errors. The hierarchical model comparison analysis using fit indices revealed that perceived apparel quality construct has three correlated factor dimensions-Construction/Materials, Style/Design, and Durability/Performance-with a very good model fit for female college students. Theoretical and managerial implications and future research directions are discussed.