Factors afecting couples decision amking in comtemporary wedding event decoration

--- Dinh Thi To Nhu DECISION MAKING IN CONTEMPORARY WEDDING EVENT DECORATION: FAMILY INFLUENCE, SOCIAL STATUS, AND PERSONAL VALUES MASTER OF BUSINESS Honours Ho Chi Minh City – Year

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Dinh Thi To Nhu

DECISION MAKING IN CONTEMPORARY WEDDING EVENT DECORATION: FAMILY INFLUENCE, SOCIAL STATUS, AND PERSONAL

VALUES

MASTER OF BUSINESS (Honours)

Ho Chi Minh City – Year 2014

-

Dinh Thi To Nhu

DECISION MAKING IN CONTEMPORARY WEDDING EVENT DECORATION: FAMILY INFLUENCE, SOCIAL STATUS, AND PERSONAL

VALUES

ID: 22110040

MASTER OF BUSINESS (Honours)

SUPERVISOR: Dr VO THI NGOC THUY

Ho Chi Minh City – Year 2014

Tables of Content

Chapter 1: Introduction 1

1.1 Research background 1

1.2 Research objectives 3

1.3 Scope of the study and methodology 4

1.4 Research contribution 4

1.5 Research structure 5

Chapter 2: Literature review 7

2.1 Concept of contemporary wedding and wedding event decoration 7

2.1.1 A contemporary wedding 7

2.1.2 Wedding event decoration 8

2.2 Definition of Consumer behavior and theories of factors affecting consumer purchasing decision 8

2.3 Previous researches about factors affecting couple’s decision making and identifying hypotheses in this study 10

2.3.1 Family influence 11

2.3.2 Social status 15

2.3.3 Personal values 16

Chapter 3: Research Methodology 21

3.1 Research process 21

3.2 Research design 22

3.3 Measurement scales 23

3.4 Quatitative pilot research and results 25

Chapter 4: Data Analysis 29

4.1 Descriptive statistic of sample 29

4.2 Adjustment of hypotheses and research model 37

4.3 Testing of normal distribution 38

4.4 Regression analysis 39

4.5 Findings 42

Chapter 5: General conclusion 46

5.1 Contributions of research 46

5.1.1 Theoretical contributions 46

5.1.2 Managerial implications 47

5.2 Limitations and further researches 48

5.3 Conclusion 49 References

Appendix

List of Figures and Charts

Figure 2.1 Conceptual model: Factors affecting couple’s decision

making in contemporary wedding event decoration: Family influence, social status and personal values 19 Figure 4.1: Adjustment model of the research 37 Chart 3.1 Research process 21

List of Tables

Table 2.1 Theories of factors affecting consumer purchasing decision 10

Table 2.2 Variables and previous researches 11

Table 3.1 Cronbach alpha result of pilot test 26

Table 3.2 KMO and Bartlett's Test result of pilot test 26

Table 3.3 Pattern Matrix result of pilot test 27

Table 4.1 Demographic statistics result 30

Table 4.2 Cronbach’s Alpha result of all variables 32

Table 4.3 KMO and Bartlett's Test result of independent variables 33

Table 4.4 Pattern Matrix of items 34

Table 4.5 KMO and Bartlett's Test result of Dependent variable 36

Table 4.6: Pearson Correlation Coefficient result 39

Table 4.7 Regression Analysis and Anova’s test Result 41

Table 4.8: Hypothesis testing 44

Many recent years, Vietnamese young couples tend to organize their wedding event including many items of decoration such as photo booth, gallery table, aisle décor, stage backdrop, guest tables’ decoration and lighting system This absolutely generate more

expense for their wedding; however they still determine to use the service So, what factors really affect consumption in wedding reception decoration?

The aim of this thesis is to investigate and identify the real impacts on couple’s decision

making in contemporary wedding event decoration, and to provide practical contributions for all suppliers of this field in Ho Chi Minh City for the next years This study was conducted in from September 2013 to April 2014 in inner areas of the city 135 couples who have just married within three years that used wedding event decoration served as subjects in a study designed to investigate All responses of the questionnaires were made

on a 5-point Likert scale with the five elements that required investigating, including family relations, wife/husband attitudes, social status, conformity and the need of uniqueness

The results reveal that social status is the most important impact on the decision making

of couples to use the wedding event decoration In addition, the communication of family members with couples makes a strong effect on their final decision Factors of

conformity, the need of uniqueness and wife/husband attitudes also effect on couple’s

decision making

Keywords: couple’s decision making, family relations, husband/wife attitudes, social

status, conformity, need of uniqueness, wedding event decoration, Ho Chi Minh City

Chapter 1: Introduction

This chapter is a beginning of the thesis that includes five sections The research background is firstly presented Then, the research objectives of the thesis are discussed The chapter also introduces the contribution and scope of the study Finally, the research structure is presented

1.1 Research background

Gidoni (2000) states that a contemporary Japanese wedding consists of traditional customs and Western-style ceremony because of economic motivations Similarly, a contemporary Vietnamese wedding combine the two parts After wearing traditional outfits to join in a traditional wedding ceremony with a list of rituals, bride and groom are ready to change their custom to Western style ones to celebrate their wedding event with their friends, colleagues and relatives in a public institution In this event, many items of a Western-style wedding can be applied such as white wedding gown, wedding cake, champagne fountain, dancing performance (Nguyen & Belk, 2012) and decoration Because of generating many things for a wedding event, budget for a contemporary wedding

is certainly higher than in the past According to a report of Home Credit group,

an average of wedding budget of a couple is around VND100 million for 300 guests (Le, 2013)

Wedding industry is more attractive for investors such as wedding event and convention, photography, wedding dress and make up, and decoration A report

of Doanh Nhan Sai Gon (2013) provides information of VND ten thousand billion of profit in wedding event and convention field, an increase of 15% compared to the last year More and more wedding dress stores and studios have opened with many updated-Western styles in their showrooms Particularly, in ten

recent years, wedding decoration field have developed very fast with many big suppliers like Vietnam Wedding Planner, Bliss, Confetti, V-Party, Hajime, Marry

Me, Lemon Tree, Cleo, and so on Most of the decoration styles currently tend to follow Western wedding concept from photo booth, gallery table to the stage backdrop with many candles, fresh flowers, glasses and crystals A couple easily search on the Internet through Google or Bing to find out the common style of wedding event decoration and choose one supplier to make it on their wedding day

Couples recently express their interesting on decoration in wedding event in Ho Chi Minh City (HCMC) for a more pleasure and memorable wedding, as the author observed through the Internet, online newspapers and social media and the real experience of communications between the author and friends who have just married However, wedding event decoration surely generates an amount of budget that leads to find hard for them to determine to consume the service The number can increase to 10% of intend budget for a wedding (Le, 2013) So, what factors really affect consumption in wedding event decoration?

A recent research of Nguyen & Belk (2012) mentions about the changes of wedding consumption in Vietnam after Doi Moi from some aspects such as social values, social relations, and gender roles Especially, in the research, they state that filial piety is still one of the most important fundamental values of Vietnamese kinship That can affect wedding consumption because couples respect opinions of their elder members in the family In addition, as a study of

Cotte and Wood (2004), “family socialization is a rich field in consumer behavior” (p.78) The research of Nguyen & Belk (2012) also points out the

social status element in wedding consumption when young couples include Western wedding concept into their weddings to show the social status or family status by spending some luxury services Another research shows that couples

focus on their wedding as a performance day of their status, society level or the wealth instead of happiness of the day they can share their lives together (Adrian, 2003) According to the research of Nguyen & Belk (2012), values also make an effect on wedding consumption because of the importance and unique of a wedding as Vietnamese rituals Clawson and Vinson (1977) suggest that personal value is considered as one of the strongest impacts on consumer behavior Particularly, Partner (2001) states about a vital role of lifestyle in a special event such as weddings

These results of researches which were conducted in many countries as well as in Vietnam found out factors affecting to consumer decision making in general Many weddings recently have been included decoration that opens opportunities for event decoration suppliers to provide many services in Ho Chi Minh City This study raises research objectives about exploring the real factors affecting on final decision making of couples that can create more suitable services to save time of consultancy and persuasion to improve competitive advantage in market

1.2 Research objectives

Because consumer behavior is a rich field that need to be explored, many researches were conducted to find out the factors that affecting consumer behavior decision making These researches help managers, businesses can understand thoroughly about the customer insight and offer the best products and services for them Thus, based on the literature review of consumer behavior and affecting of some factors, and especially in the context of wedding event decoration in Ho Chi Minh city, the study aims:

 To propose a model that predicting some factors affecting wedding event decoration in Ho Chi Minh city

 To explore the real impacts on couple’s decision making in contemporary

wedding event decoration

 To evaluate how each factor affects to couple’s decision making

The author would like to provide the findings for wedding decoration suppliers in

Ho Chi Minh City to understand more about their customers and the problems in the competitive market, then constantly design a suitable service for couples to save time and expense

1.3 Scope of the study and methodology

The data collecting will be divided into two parts including pilot test and main test The pilot test is conducted with 20 respondents to pre-test how they understand the variables and questionnaire The main test is then conducted with

135 respondents

This research will be conducted in inner areas of Ho Chi Minh City, included District 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, Tan Binh, Phu Nhuan, Go Vap, and Binh Thanh The interviewees will be couples that have just married within three years that used wedding event decoration

The purpose of the research is to examine the conceptual model The measurement scales are estimated using Exploratory Factor Analysis (EFA) to test the reliability and validity The multiple regressions in Statistical Package for the Social Sciences (SPSS) version 16 would be conducted to evaluate correlation between dependent and independent variables

1.4 Research contribution

The research is intended to contribute twofold contribution including theoretical contributions and managerial implications The research is expected to reach new

aspects of influent factors on consumption of wedding event decoration based on the previous researches and provide some managerial implications for businesses

in this field in Ho Chi Minh City

First, the research will apply the knowledge of Kotler and Armstrong (2011) of factors affecting consumer purchasing decision to new product, a wedding event decoration by performing family influence, social status and personal values and how much they affecting Although many international researchers expressed their interests in these factors affecting on wedding consumption; however, they have not examined thoroughly the effects of three factors that mentioned above to

couple’s decision making on wedding event decoration In Vietnam several

researches also were conducted with social status, social relations and gender roles factors (Nguyen & Belk, 2012) to analyze their impacts on wedding consumption Therefore, this study has been quite new to contribute the way of measuring factors affecting to using wedding event decoration in Vietnam, particularly in Ho Chi Minh city, especially examine deeply about influence of

family influence and social status on couple’s decision, and explore new aspect of

personal values that adopted by from global researches

Second, the research can help wedding event decoration companies understanding about real factors can affect directly to final decision of couples Based on customer insight, they can offer them more flexible and diversified services to choose and determine, save time and budget for a pleasure wedding as customers could wish In addition, through this study, marketing managers of wedding services can create more interesting and attractive marketing campaign to reach more customers in the competitive market

1.5 Research structure

This study includes five chapters that listed as below,

Chapter 1 – Introduction: This chapter is a beginning of the thesis that includes

five sections The research background is firstly presented Then, the research objectives of the thesis are discussed The chapter also introduces the contribution and scope of the study Finally, the research structure is presented

Chapter 2 – Literature review and hypothesis development: This chapter includes

a concept of a contemporary wedding and wedding event decoration, theories of consumer decision making and consumer, the model of process of making decision and some relevant researches and identifying significant factors affecting

to final decision making of couples as well as the conceptual model and its hypothesis

Chapter 3 – Research methodology: This chapter consists four sections First,

research process is presented for clear steps to follow in the study Next, the research design is discussed and measurement scales are listed as adopting from previous researchers Final, the chapter includes the pilot test and results to support for measurement scales

Chapter 4 – Data analysis: This chapter describes how each measurement scale

was evaluated and the result of testing hypothesis, including sample description, measurement scale data analysis, and regression analysis The findings are next discussed

Chapter 5 – General conclusion: This chapter presents the theoretical

contributions and managerial implications of the research, the limitations, some directions for further research and conclusion

Chapter 2: Literature review

This chapter includes a concept of a contemporary wedding and wedding event decoration, theories of consumer decision making and consumer, the model of process of making decision and some relevant researches and identifying significant factors affecting to final decision making of couples as well as the conceptual model and its hypothesis

2.1 Concept of contemporary wedding and wedding event decoration

2.1.1 A contemporary wedding

Leeds (2002) defines that a wedding marks a happy ending of a romantic love of two persons, who want to share their life together In this event, couples also make their commitments and devotion in front of their families, relatives and friends In Vietnam, a wedding is certainly considered as one of the most important ceremonies Based on traditional rituals, cultural values and family perspective, a wedding generates many stages for both bride and groom to prepare and implement for a long time (Nguyen & Belk, 2012) There are a variety of things to determine to purchase or rent for a wedding with a big intended budget for the two families of bride and groom as the Vietnamese culture

In addition, a contemporary wedding is organized more complicated than in the past because of enculturation of Western wedding style in the two biggest cities

of Vietnam, Hanoi and Ho Chi Minh city In the transition period to modernization economy, Vietnamese wedding day is influenced by the global flow consumer goods such as wedding gowns, wedding cakes, fresh flower decoration, photographs and so on (Nguyen & Belk, 2012) When media, the Internet and social website are improved and popularized, information about

lavish wedding are updated through movies, bridal magazines, celebrity weddings, and advertising, Vietnamese brides dream about a fantastic wedding ceremony Thus, wedding event decoration is focused on and developed extremely fast in recent years that followed the Western-style wedding

2.1.2 Wedding event decoration

A contemporary wedding including event decoration can create a romantic, or interesting, or artistic atmosphere for guests’ feeling (Ying, Di & Mahui, 2012)

In this study, wedding event decoration is a term of making photo booth, gallery table, aisle and stage backdrop decoration, guest table’s decoration and lighting

system in the hall of wedding event, that based on what wedding service suppliers

in Ho Chi Minh city and Hanoi are offering for young couples

2.2 Definition of Consumer behavior and theories of factors affecting consumer purchasing decision

According to Schiffman and Kanuk (2007), consumer behavior is the behavior that consumers find ways to search for, purchase, use, evaluate and transfer products or services can satisfy their needs and expectation Among four types of goods including consumable goods, durable goods, specialty goods and industrial goods, wedding is considered as a special service package because of its ritual characteristics and a kind of nondurable goods (Hai, Krueger & Postlewaite, 2013) A wedding can be organized just a time in couple’ lifetime, so it needs to

be consumed a huge budget for many things of preparation to have perfection, impression or celebrity-like event (Daniels & Loves, 2007) Especially, brides tend to spend for a dream wedding because of affecting by their children fairy stories or they can spend more intend budget than they could afford if having much pressure from their family or their reference group, shared by Daniels & Loves (2007)

People make decisions every day to consume goods or services to satisfy their needs Based on the theory about “what they buy”, “where they buy”, “how much they buy”, “when they buy”, and “why they buy”, suppliers can find out their

characteristics of consumer buying decisions However, the reason why consumers choose to buy a product or use a kind of service is relatively difficult (Kotler & Armstrong, 2011) Kotler and Armstrong (2011) also said that consumers do not realize an exact reason for their buying and how much factors affecting on their choice

The theory proposed by Philip Kotler in his book “A Principle of Marketing” in

2011 presses the four strong factors affecting consumer purchasing decision making including cultural factors, social factors, personal factors and psychological characteristics (see more in Appendix) The implication from this theory is useful for marketers to understand why consumers would like to purchase their products or services, especially pay attention about many levels of factors from broad cultural and social influences to motivation, beliefs, and attitudes of a person, but cannot control these elements

In social factors, it includes family, reference groups, and roles and status for the impacts on consumer behavior Cultural factors consist of culture, sub culture, and social status Personal factors include age and life cycle stage, occupation, economic situation, lifestyle, personality and self-concept Motivation, perception, learning and beliefs and attitudes are elements of psychological characteristics

In addition, there are some theories are proposed as table below:

Table 2.1 Theories of factors affecting consumer purchasing decision

Stanton Attitudinal factors, Physical factors,

2012

2.3 Previous researches about factors affecting couple’s decision making and

identifying hypotheses in this study

These theories above were applied in afterwards researches to find out main factors affecting to consumer buying decision in each specific situation and field

In general and wedding consumption segment, there are three factors were applied many times to conduct the researches Based on these elements, hypotheses will be built in order to clarify and evaluate their effect levels in

couple’s decision making in wedding event decoration in Ho Chi Minh city

context

Table 2.2 Variables and previous researches

No Variables Authors

1 Family influence

Childers & Rao, 1992; Cotte & Wood, 2004; Heckler, Childers & Arunachalam, 1989; Pimpa, 2009; Jung & Kau, 2004; Grusec, 2008; Su, Zhou, Zhou & Li, 2008; Baber & Axxin, 1998; Nguyen

2.3.1 Family influence

Family influence is one of the most important factors to consumer buying decision (Childers & Rao, 1992; Cotte & Wood, 2002; Kotler & Armstrong, 2011) According to Heckler, Childers and Arunachalam (as cited in Childers & Rao, 1992), family members can affect “norms, attitudes, and values” of

consumers (p.199) In addition, consumers can be transmitted buying characteristics, manners and preferences of brand to from their parents (Cotte & Wood, 2002) Moore and her colleagues mention that family influence is “the

within family transmission of information, beliefs, and resources from one

generation to the next” (Moore et al 2002, p.17) Kotler and Armstrong (2011)

mentions that roles of purchasing, between wife and husband change with evolving of separate consumer lifestyles There are two aspects of family

influence including family relations and husband/wife attitudes that need to be examined in this study

 Family relations

In the relation of family, parents play an important role to individuals’ decision

making through communication, interaction, and financial aid (Pimpa, 2009) Carlson and Grossbart (1988) also state that family influence become strongly affecting is a result of how they communicate or interact based on their relation Moreover, if consumers depend on finance of their parents for purchasing new product can be more pressure to decide what they really want (Jung & Kau, 2004) The attitudes of parents are also examined to make an effect on consumer behavior as Grusec (2008) proposes that :

the attitudes most frequently considered have to do with the degree of warmth and acceptance or coldness and rejection that exists in the parent-child relationship, as well as the extent to which parents are permissive or restrictive

in the limits they set for their offspring (p.1)

Nguyen and Belk (2012) also suppose that in Vietnamese culture, parents have responsibility of giving birth to children, bringing up them, support them to get married and continuing to take care of their children Therefore, the relations of

parents and their children are very close and can affect much on a child’s decision

making, especially a special goods like a wedding, one of the most important event of a couple as well as their families Before Doi Moi, parents’ relation with

their children is just one way in decision of purchasing a product However, there are many changes in Vietnamese wedding within ten recent years

Accordingly, Nguyen and Belk (2012) conclude couples often tend to communicate much with their parents and elder family members to make decision

for their wedding consumption Some of couples find good jobs and earn much money than their parents can afford for their wedding, even adding luxury services are less affected by their parents As the research of Nguyen & Belk (2012), in some circumstances, Vietnamese young people who do not depend on

their parents’ finance, can have more freedom in making decision to purchase

goods However, they still would like to share their opinions with their parents and listen to them because of filial piety Especially, some couples are still follow opinions of their parents because of their finance support According to a survey

of Home Credit Group, total budget of a Vietnamese wedding is estimated to spend about a hundred million VND for 300 wedding guests at a normal wedding restaurant About 71% of wedding events are subsidized by parents of couple, thus their roles of determination is, of course, more powerful (Le, 2013)

Based on these theories and afterward researches, the author proposes a hypothesis:

H1: There will be a positive influence of family relation on couple’s decision

making in wedding event decoration

 Wife/husband attitude

In this study, because of wedding is a special goods for a couple, so final decision

is made based on joining of both, wife and husband Because of its characteristics

of selling to couples, maintaining harmony and mutual support are important to make decision for purchase (Mitchel, as cited in Su, Zhou, Zhou & Li, 2007) In this situation, it is important and necessary to find out if there is an impact of

wife/husband attitude to couple’s decision making in wedding event decoration

Wife/husband attitude is a term of concerning how they face with conflicts, solve problems and reach the result of purchase or not (Kim & Lee, 1996; Park, 1982;

Qualls, 1987; Webster & Reiss, as cited in Baber & Axinn, 1998), the fairness of communication (Commuri & Gentry, as cited in Baber & Axinn, 1998), and sharing their decision roles (Belch and Willis, 2002) Morgan and Waite, Thornton, Alwin and Camburn, Parson (as cited in Baber & Axinn, 1998) proposes that “gender role attitudes influence a wide range of behaviors” (p.11)

including family decision making A person's gender-role attitudes reflect beliefs about the roles of men and women (McHugh & Frieze, 2006) Currently, attitudes for men and women role in decision making have changed rapidly (Scott, Dex & Joshi, 2008) Their perception about a modern wedding and role in family to determine to purchase goods also improved because of an enculturation

In some countries or among some social groups, the male partner has greater influence than his spouse (Lasse & Becker, 1997; Casterline, Perez & Biddlecom, 1997) Jung and Kau (2004) shows that Malaysian wife has to follow her husband

in family decision In Vietnam, the patriarchal thinking has still existed and women are not allowed to sharing ideas or opinion in their family (Nguyen & Belk, 2012) because of affecting from Chinese culture in a thousand years in the past However, Nguyen and Belk (2012) also mention that in Vietnam nowadays people are working in a modern world, husband and wife share many issues and lead to a fair making decision Women can feel more freely to determine about styles, art, or decoration things such as a wedding event decoration with support and advice from her husband

Based on these theories and afterward researches, the author proposes a hypothesis:

H2: There will be a positive influence of wife/husband attitude on couple’s

decision making in wedding event decoration

2.3.2 Social status

In cultural factors, social status can affect consumer buying decision in every society Social status is formed by long-term relatives in society and “divisions

whose members share similar values, interests, and behaviors” (Kotler &

Armstrong, 2011, p.139) In the society, members in a class can be marked as a higher or lower status than others (Schiffman & Kanuk, 2007) In this study, the author will examine two aspects of social status, including couple wish to show their own class or couples of lower class would like to spend more to reach higher status in society

Adrian (2003) supposes weddings nowadays can show the couples’ luxurious and

wealthy family Therefore, bride and groom focus on their wedding as a performance day of their status, society level or the wealth instead of happiness of the day they can share their lives together (Adrian, 2003) They express their interests in how they look like in the wedding day, how their luxury wedding place is decorated and if food looks great and delicious Therefore, these couples and their families pour big amount of money into a fantastic and lavish wedding consumption by adding many items related to Western style (Nguyen & Belk, 2012)

In addition, Nia and Zaichkowsky (as cited in Kamolwan & Wiwatchai, 2010) believe that personal satisfaction and admiration can be recognized by others by consuming luxury goods in public area Therefore, wedding event decoration can help identify social class of couple or their family and the position in the society Some couples think that they can shine and become wealthy nobles in their special day, so they spend a lot in spite of their true economic status (Lewis, as cited in Daniels & Loves, 2003)

Based on these theories and afterward researches, the author proposes a hypothesis:

H3: There will be a positive influence of social status on couple’s decision

making in wedding event decoration

2.3.3 Personal values

Personal values and personal traits are two aspects of personality element of personal factor that affecting consumer buying behavior According to McCrae and Costa (as cited in Caprara et al., 2006), traits show how people differ from each other based on personal thinking, feeling and acting, while Schwartz (1992)

defines values principles of personal life through “cognitive representations of

desirable, abstract, trans-situational goals” (as cited in Caprara et al., 2006, p.3)

Similarly, Roccas, Sagiv, Schwartz & Knafo (2002) add values can be created by the way people communicate about each other Values also are standards or qualities that person can hold in high regard Thus, these values instruct the way people live and decide what they desire to become These internal factors can make a strong impact on consumer decision making (Eagly & Chaiken; Weidmann, Hennigs & Siebels, as cited in Kamolwan & Wiwatchai, 2010)

There are five aspects of personal values such as consumer ethnocentrism, materialism, conformity, the need for uniqueness and vanity that were mentioned

in a research of Kamolwan and Wiwatchai (2010) In this research, the author also pressed the theory of personal values of Weidmann, Hennigs & Siebels (2007) about individual values and social related values The first dimension is used to describe consumers in one country thinking that purchasing products in other countries is immoral or inappropriate because doing so is unpatriotic The second one mentions about the vital of possessions of material objects in life (Richin & Dawson, 1992) These aspects are not appropriate with the goals of the

thesis, so they cannot apply for the wedding event decoration The last one of personal values is also not considered as a potential variable for the thesis because of its definition about physical appearance, not relevant to wedding event decoration too Therefore, just two of five dimensions of determinants of personal values need to be examined to interpret how they affect wedding event decoration, including conformity and the need for uniqueness

 Conformity

A research of Kamolwan and Wiwatchai (2010) illustrated that conformity is a changing in behavior to become suitable with a social group Conformity is also interpreted as a majority influence in society (Mcleod, as cited in Kamolwan & Wiwatchai, 2010) The changes occur when social expectation and norms are accepted can put pressure on consumers on group Especially, Southeast Asian consumers can focus on luxury goods for a good public display in society or in group that they belong to (Wong & Ahuvia, 1998) They think more about appearance (Kamolwan & Wiwatchai, 2010)

People in same groups tend to conform to their motives of other demands to maintain the harmony among members (Markus & Kitayama, 1991) Another research of Ghazzai and Lahmandi-Ayed (2009) examine the conformity-characterized consumers can purchase the products that can show their same characteristics For Asian countries, young people nowadays can speak English (Nowak, 2005), be familiar with American customs and easily adapt to Western society (Gold, 1992; Nowak, 1998) They update new information and recommendation from both domestic sources and international pages to organize

a special wedding They put many fresh flowers on greeting tables, wear white wedding gown that import from the America or European country, photography, wedding cake, and so on to have a romantic wedding (Nguyen & Belk, 2012)

Based on these theories and afterward researches, the author proposes a hypothesis:

H4: There will be a positive influence of conformity on couple’s decision making

in wedding event decoration

 The need for uniqueness

Everyone is a unique; however, how many percent of people in society would like

to express their uniqueness? Tian, Bearden, and Hunter (2001) define consumer’s

need for uniqueness is a different individual from others or a distinctive one among a bigger group However, its concept is not like non-conformity, it means that consumers choose another different goods from each other to increase their appearance and personal characteristics among the crowd (Tepper & Hoyle, 1996)

Especially, wedding is a special goods that can consume once or twice in a life time, uniqueness can be considered as the important determinant for wedding event decoration Brides and grooms want to make sure of their wedding can reflect their unique personality (Dee, 2006) In the wedding day, they can combine Western services such as decoration in wedding event to satisfy their hobbies and show their personality to guests (Nguyen & Belk, 2012) A recent research of Teah and Phau (2012) suppose “status consumption and consumers’ need for uniqueness are found to influence attitudes” (p.5)

Based on these theories and afterward researches, the author proposes a hypothesis:

H5: There will be a positive influence of the need of unique on couple’s decision

making in wedding event decoration

The conceptual framework underlying four key hypotheses can be seen in figure

1 below

Figure 2.1 Conceptual model: Factors affecting couple’s decision making in

contemporary wedding event decoration: Family influence, social status and

personal values

This chapter presents theoretical background of factors affecting couple’s

decision making in contemporary wedding decoration Base on discussion of literature review, a research model proposes with five hypotheses Two family influence factors – family relation and wife/husband attitudes – are chosen for

this study because they commanded a majority of factors found to affect

Couple’s

decision making in contemporary wedding event

customer decision making in prior studies Social status is also incorporated to research model as well as the personal values factor including conformity and the need of uniqueness The next chapter will discuss about research method used to test this research model

Chapter 3: Research Methodology

This chapter consists four sections First, research process is presented for clear steps to follow in the study Next, the research design is discussed and measurement scales are listed as adopting from previous researchers Final, the chapter includes the pilot test and results to support for measurement scales

3.1 Research process

Based on the research background and literature review, the research was processed to generate a research model and hypothesis Before doing a main research, pilot test was necessarily examined to support for the main test After sampling step was finished, data collection and analysis would be conducted Finally, the findings of the research were ready to discuss and contributions are given for readers The research was conducted as the chart below

Chart 3.1 Research process

3.2 Research design

The main research was conducted by qualitative method with 135 couples who have just married within three years that used wedding event decoration in HCMC through questionnaires The official questionnaires were made in English and then translated into Vietnamese for understanding clearly The measurement scale of indicators was five-point Likert scale; from 1-strongly disagree to 5-strongly agree

Data analysis method

The satisfied questionnaires, after screening, were coded and input the raw data in

SPSS version 16 Cronbach’s Alpha and Exploratory factor Analysis would

evaluate the reliability and validity of measurement scales Then, the multiple regressions would be conducted to evaluate correlation between dependent and independent variables

Reliability

Cronbach’s Alpha is used to compute the internal consistency reliability for

multiple item scales The Item-to-total Correlation Coefficients would be used to reject the unappreciated items if the number of item-total correlations is lower than 0.4 Cronbach’s Alpha is 0.6 or greater is considered “Acceptable”

(Cronbach, as cited in Nguyen, 2013) Cronbach’s Alpha was used to

Validity

After computing Cronbach’s Alpha, the Exploration Factor Analysis method

would be applied to explore the relationship between the variables If the KMO

index was greater than 0.6 and Barlett’s test has signification which is smaller

than 0.05 (p<0.05), the EFA is processed (Kaiser, as cited in Nguyen, 2013)

previous researches and then modified to suitable for wedding event decoration context The second part included questions that collected demographic information of young couples who are respondents in the survey

In the three main constructs, the five independent variables were verified including family relation, wife/husband attitudes, social status, conformity, and the need of unique

Family relation

Scale items of familial influence were adopted from Pimpa (2003)

Code Survey statement

FI1 Family financially supported our decision

FI2 Family provided information for us to decide

FI3 Family expected us to use decoration

FI4 Family discussed carefully about decision

FI5 Family persuaded us to choose decoration service

Wife/Husband Attitudes

Scales of items of wife/husband attitudes were adopted from Ogunjuyigbe, Ojofeitimi, & Liasu (2009) and Tyler & Lind (1992)

Code Survey statement

WH1 We, both totally approved the decision of using decoration

WH2 We discussed carefully before determining to decor

WH3 We, both showed concern about each’s aspect or opinion

WH4 We had opportunities to explain to each other

Social Status

Scales of items of social status were based on the research of Kamolwan and Wiwatchai (2010) that adopted from Park et al (2008)

Code Survey statement

SS1 We could show how we can afford for the wedding

SS2 We could highlight the position when using decoration

SS3 We could be recognized by others in society group based on

decoration SS4 We could present our style in the wedding with people who are

close to us

Conformity

Scales of items of conformity were adopted from Bearden et al (1989)

Code Survey statement

PC1 We thought guests could admire us about the wedding decoration PC2 We thought guests could impress of about the wedding decoration PC3 We belonged to the group so we used the same tendency of

wedding decoration PC4 We were affected when attending in others’ wedding to use

decoration

Need of Uniqueness

Scales of items of need of uniqueness were adopted from Tian et al (2001)

Code Survey statement

PN1 By wedding decoration, we could show our unique style

PN2 We would like to organize a special wedding event that differed

from others PN3 Our favorite wedding event style could greatly express our

individuality

3.4 Quatitative pilot research and results

The pilot test was conducted through quatitative pilot study with sample of 46 valid respondents Two methods were used to examine the pilot test including Cronbach alpha and Exploratory factor analysis (EFA)

Table 3.1 Cronbach alpha result of pilot test

Item-Cronbach's Alpha if Item Deleted Family Relation (FI): alpha = 0.864

Table 3.2 KMO and Bartlett's Test result of pilot test

Kaiser-Meyer-Olkin Measure of Sampling

According to the table, the KMO was greater than 0.5 with the value of 0.688 and

the significance of Bartlett’s Test of Sphericity equaled 0.000 These results were

ready for a satisfactory factor analysis to proceed

Table 3.3 Pattern Matrix a result of pilot test

Extraction Method: Principal Axis Factoring

Rotation Method: Promax with Kaiser Normalization

a Rotation converged in 9 iterations

The Exploratory factor analysis deleted one item (SS1) in the table because its figure was less than 0.5 In addition, the item FI4 were resulted available figures

on the two columns; however, the number in the first column was greater than the sixth that led to its final result at the first column Except SS1, all the items had loading factors were greater than 0.5, the validity of these scales could be processed to examine in the main research

Chapter 4: Data Analysis

This chapter describes how each measurement scale was evaluated and the result

of testing hypothesis including sample description measurement scale data analysis and regression analysis

4.1 Descriptive statistic of sample

Final sample

There were 135 couples who have just married within three years that used wedding event decoration to answer the questionnaires There were 135 questionnaires sent out and 129 qualified questionnaires were used for data analysis The usable response rate to the research is therefore 96 percent

Demographic statistics

Table 4.1 Demographic statistics result

Frequency Percent EDUCATION

As can be seen in table, respondents are from all districts that required asking and there were not big gap between the numbers of respondents in each location The same conclusion is for the years of how long couple married Most couples (the highest level education among two persons) graduated in the university with 66.7% respondents Income of couples is from 30 mil to 50 mil

Cronbach’s Alpha results of each measurement

In the pilot test, all variables were accepted because their Cronbach’s alpha were

greater than 0.6 and Corrected Item-Total Correlation were greater than 0.4 Similarly, the result for the main research was good and all variables were accepted and ready to process EFA (Nunally and Berstein, as cited in Nguyen &

Nguyen, 2008) Accordingly, the Cronbach’ anpha values ranged from 0.774 to

0.845 with family relation, wife/husband attitudes, social status, conformity, and need of uniqueness The correlation coefficient of variations (Corrected Item-Total Correlation) are greater than 0.4 Therefore, all of those items satisfy the criteria so they could put into EFA See more at Appendix

Table 4.2 Cronbach’s Alpha result of all variables

Scale Mean if

Item Deleted

Scale Variance if Item Deleted

Corrected Item-Total Correlation

Cronbach's Alpha if Item Deleted

Decision making: Cronbach’s Alpha = 0.774

Exploratory Factor Analysis

 EFA for factors affecting to couple’s decision making

Principal Axis Factor analysis with Promax rotation was conducted to assess the underlying structure for the twenty items of the questionnaires KMO of this analysis was relatively high with 0.819, extraction sums of squared loadings equaled to 56.56%, more than 50% However, the factor loadings of one items was less than 0.5 that had to be removed out of measurement scales while the rest was than 0.5 that have practical meaning Accordingly, the Family relation scale removed one item FI2 due to factor loading was less than threshold 0.5 See more in Appendix

Table 4.3 KMO and Bartlett's Test result of independent variables

Kaiser-Meyer-Olkin Measure of Sampling Adequacy .802 Bartlett's Test of

of the variance The extraction sums of squared loadings equaled to 57.067%, more than 50% The table below displays the items and factor loadings for the rotation factors, with loading more than 0.5 that were accepted See more at Appendix