Abstract | With globalisation taking centre stage in the business world and multiculturalism affecting markets and societies, there is a need to understand the ways that customers respond to the changing marketplace from international and multicultural perspectives. This special edition comprises a set of papers on the theme of ‘Multicultural Perspectives in Customer Behaviour’, emerging from the 6th Customer Research Academy Workshop Series (CRAWS) hosted by Manchester and Lancaster Universities in April 2008. This special edition is timely in addressing important themes raised in the most recent marketing literature, such as: global consumer culture, and the impact of Western culture on consumer behaviour in other countries (Cleveland & Laroche, 2007); consumer acculturation processes, and the impact on identity conflicts and the strategies people use to manage them (Askegaard, Arnould, & Kjeldgaard, 2005; Jafari & Goulding, 2008; Oswald, 1999; Penaloza, 1994; Ustuner & Holt, 2007); globalisation vs. localised strategies, and the interaction of local and global influences on customer behaviour (Belk, 2006); climate change and global warming, the impact on consumer behaviour, and the implications for social responsibility (Lash & Wellington, 2007); and cross-cultural customer research, including important methodological questions around the application of sociological, group-level measures to psychological, individual-level phenomenon in marketing contexts (Bearden, Money, & Nevins, 2006; Lass & Hart, 2004; Salciuviene, Auruskeviciene, & Lydeka, 2005; Shavitt, Lalwani, Zhang, & Torelli, 2006; Singh, Kwon, & Pereira, 2003). |
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