Deborah D. Heisley

Navigating the Central Tensions in Research on At-Risk Consumers: Challenges and Opportunities

A perennial problem in social marketing and public policy is the plight of at-risk consumers. The authors define at-risk consumers as marketplace participants who, because of historical or personal circumstances or disabilities, may be harmed by marketers’ practices or may be unable or unwilling to take full advantage of marketplace opportunities. This definition refers to either objective reality or perceptions. Early research focused on consumers who were at risk because they were poor, ethnic or racial minorities, immigrants, women, or elderly. Todays researchers also study consumers who are at risk because they are from religious minorities, disabled, illiterate, homeless, indigent, lesbian, gay, bisexual, or transgender. The authors identify four tensions affecting research on and policy and marketing applications for at-risk populations: the value of focusing on (1) vulnerabilities versus strengths, (2) radical versus marginal change, (3) targeting versus nontargeting, and (4) encouraging knowledgeable versus naive consumers. They conclude with a discussion of the significance of including at-risk consumers as full marketplace participants and identify future research directions.

Connectedness and Worthiness for the Embedded Self: A Material Culture Perspective

This article is based on a study of intergenerational transfers of contaminated objects, colloquially referred to as “heirlooms.” Motivations and processes are described within the central dialectic of an individual actor seeking positive affect through the pursuit of connectedness and worthiness and in the context of the larger social order. Object symbolism is examined from the perspectives of the individual actor, society, and culture. The family is conceptualized as a special case of the “other.” A theoretical framework is developed that draws extensively on Walter Goldschmidt’s notion of “The Culturally Embedded Self” in The Human Career: The Self in a Symbolic World (1990) and on Sidney Levy’s work as presented in Brands, Consumers, Symbols, and Research (1999). This framework is referred to with the acronym MOSES for Motivations, Object Symbolism, and the Embedded Self.