Just Me, Myself and I? : The Cultural Impact of Self on Emotional Brand Attachment

Abstract: Emotional brand attachment has emerged as an important marketing concept that can strengthen a brand's performance. One way to create emotional bonds with consumers is to match the brand's personality with the consumer's self-concept (i.e. self-congruence). Nonetheless, research on brand attachment has a strong westernized focus leaving a vast majority of the world's population outside the frame of research, which limits our understanding of how consumers perception of self form emotional attachments to brands across cultures. We address this issue by developing the novel construct of ought self-congruence and test a conceptual model in two large scale studies including 810 respondents from Sweden and South Korea. The results showed similarities as well as unique cultural differences. Brand personalities in line with a consumer's actual self-view yield the strongest positive impact on emotional brand attachment in both cultures. However, an ideal self-congruent brand only showed a positive impact on Swedish consumers or when the self is sculpt independently from others. In contrast, South Koreans formed attachments to global brands that were congruent with an ought self-perception. A consumer's regulatory focus provides a theoretical explanation to the mixed results. Avenues for further research and managerial implications are also proposed.