"Hopelessly Devoted to You" Towards an Extended Conceptualization of Consumer Devotion

This article seeks to enhance understanding of consumer devotion through an extended, elaborate conceptualization of the concept. It draws on the extant literature on devotion as well as related concepts in consumer behavior, and adds psychological and theological insights. A synthesis carves out the psychological functionality of devotion, its emotional characteristics, and acts of devotion. We develop a tripartite view of devotion consisting of passion, intimacy, and dedication. Finally, implications for future theorizing and research are drawn.

[1]  Russell W. Belk,et al.  The Cult of Macintosh , 2005 .

[2]  R. Belk.  Shoes and Self , 2003 .

[3]  R. Kozinets.  QI Want to BelieveQ: a Netnography of the X-Philes Subculture of Consumption , 1997 .

[4]  E. Hirschman.  The Consciousness of Addiction: Toward a General Theory of Compulsive Consumption , 1992 .

[5]  R. J. Sternberg,et al.  Subjective determinants of attraction: Self-perceived causes of the rise and decline of liking, love, and being in love. Personal Relationships, 5(1), 91-104. Lee, J.A. (1973). The colors of love: An exploration of the ways of loving , 2004 .

[6]  Alokparna (Sonia) Basu Monga,et al.  Brand As a Relationship Partner: Gender Differences in Perspectives , 2002 .

[7]  Andrea Hemetsberger,et al.  Creative Cyborgs: How Consumers Use the Internet For Self-Realization , 2005 .

[8]  Thomas J. Madden,et al.  Consumer-Object Relations: a Conceptual Framework Based Analogously on Sternberg's Triangular Theory of Love , 1988 .

[9]  John F. Sherry,et al.  The Sacred and the Profane in Consumer Behavior: Theodicy on the Odyssey , 1989 .

[10]  C. Geertz,et al.  The Interpretation of Cultures , 1973 .

[11]  A. Ahuvia,et al.  Some antecedents and outcomes of brand love , 2006 .

[12]  René Girard,et al.  Violence and the Sacred. , 1978 .

[13]  M. Eliade.  Initiation, rites, sociétés secrètes : naissances mystiques : essai sur quelques types d'initiation , 1959 .

[14]  K. Oatley,et al.  Love and personal relationships: Navigating on the border between the ideal and the real , 2004 .

[15]  D. Holt.  Why Do Brands Cause Trouble? A Dialectical Theory of Consumer Culture and Branding , 2002 .

[16]  Ronald J. Faber,et al.  Compulsive Buying: A Phenomenological Exploration , 1989 .

[17]  M. Foucault.  Histoire de la sexualité 2 : L'Usage des plaisirs , 1984 .

[18]  J. Schouten.  Selves in Transition: Symbolic Consumption in Personal Rites of Passage and Identity Reconstruction , 1991 .

[19]  Ulrich Beck,et al.  The Normal Chaos of Love , 1995 .

[20]  L. Olivier.  Histoire de la sexualité. Tome 1: La volonté de savoir; Tome 2: L'usage des plaisirs; Tome 3: Le souci de soi Michel Foucault Paris: Gallimard, 1984 , 1985, Canadian Journal of Political Science.

[21]  Erich Fromm,et al.  To Have or to Be , 1976 .

[22]  Linda L. Price,et al.  River Magic: Extraordinary Experience and the Extended Service Encounter , 1993 .

[23]  M. Csíkszentmihályi,et al.  The meaning of things: Coding categories and definitions , 1981 .

[24]  A. Ball,et al.  The Role and Measurement of Attachment in Consumer Behavior , 1992 .

[25]  J. McAlexander,et al.  Subcultures of Consumption: An Ethnography of the New Bikers , 1995 .

[26]  Thomas C. O'Guinn,et al.  brand community , 2022, The Fairchild Books Dictionary of Fashion.

[27]  A. Muñiz,et al.  Religiosity in the Abandoned Apple Newton Brand Community , 2005 .

[28]  Craig J Thompson.  Marketplace Mythology and Discourses of Power , 2004 .

[29]  Erich Fromm,et al.  The Art of Loving , 1956 .

[30]  Marsha L. Richins.  Valuing Things: The Public and Private Meanings of Possessions , 1994 .

[31]  James A. Fitchett,et al.  Having, Being and Consumption , 2002 .

[32]  Eric J. Arnould,et al.  “My Favorite Things”: A Cross-Cultural Inquiry into Object Attachment, Possessiveness, and Social Linkage , 1988 .

[33]  Otto F. Kernberg,et al.  Love Relations: Normality and Pathology , 1995 .

[34]  Kenneth A. Hunt,et al.  A conceptual approach to classifying sports fans , 1999 .

[35]  Richard Rodgers,et al.  My Favorite Things , 1964 .

[36]  Wright Professor Stephen,et al.  Rites of Passage , 2010 .

[37]  S. Freud,et al.  Violence and the Sacred , 2020, On Violence.

[38]  R. Belk,et al.  The Fire of Desire: A Multisited Inquiry into Consumer Passion , 2003 .

[39]  S. Fournier,et al.  Consumers and Their Brands: Developing Relationship Theory in Consumer Research , 1998 .

[40]  A. Ahuvia,et al.  Beyond the Extended Self: Loved Objects and Consumers' Identity Narratives , 2005 .

[41]  M. Gilly,et al.  We Are What We Post? Self‐Presentation in Personal Web Space , 2003 .

[42]  Robert J. Sternberg,et al.  Construct validation of a triangular love scale , 1997 .

[43]  R. Kozinets.  Utopian Enterprise: Articulating the Meanings of Star Trek’s Culture of Consumption , 2001 .

[44]  E. Durkheim.  FROM THE ELEMENTARY FORMS OF THE RELIGIOUS LIFE , 1996, The New Economic Sociology.

[45]  Sigmund Freud,et al.  Totem and Taboo: Some Points of Agreement Between the Mental Lives of Savages and Neurotics , 2013 .

[46]  R. Belk.  Possessions and the Extended Self , 1988 .

[47]  Richard L. Celsi,et al.  An Exploration of High-Risk Leisure Consumption through Skydiving , 1993 .

[48]  De Munck,et al.  Romantic Love and Sexual Behavior: Perspectives from the Social Sciences , 1998 .

[49]  Russell W. Belk,et al.  Heaven on Earth: Consumption at Heritage Village, USA , 1989 .

[50]  A. Venkatesh,et al.  Liberatory Postmodernism and the Reenchantment of Consumption , 1995 .

[51]  J. Vaizey.  Introduction to Sociology , 1970, Nature.