UPWARD INTERGENERATIONAL INFLUENCES ON INNOVATION DIFFUSION: THE IMPACT OF LAY THEORIES OF INNOVATIVENESS ON INNOVATION FOR PARENTS

摘要

A family has been identified ed as the most important decision making and consumption unit (Assael 1998). Children constitute an important target market segment. There has been an increasing attention on children's role in family decision making, which is largely because of children's increasing influences on family decisions and increasing spending power (Shoham and Dalakas 2005). Innovative knowledge may be more often in the hands of younger generations. Generally, the more knowledgeable a child is on a product category, the more influences he or she may have on a purchase decision of this category (Elizabeth, Angus and Lorna 2007). Most of the previous research involving children in a family has investigated the influence of young children or adolescents under the age of 18 in the family. Ekstrom, Tansuhaj, and Foxman (1987) provided a reciprocal view on children's consumer socialization, which indicates two routes of influence: one by direct preference expressions and the other by communicating new knowledge to the parents. However, one important route of influence has been ignored, particularly for adult children: the direct giving of products as gifts to the parents.