Summary of the selected article
| Author | Purpose | Definition of consumption narratives | Dimensions | Method | Findings |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Gilliam et al. (2017) | How consumers’ narratives of brands help them in rapidly changing marketplace | Consumption narrative is the same as brand meaning or brand image which consumers use through consumption | – Narrative is central to the creation of brand meaning by consumers – Narratives are formed by consumers with information that resonates with them and their existing ideals – Consumers co-create brand meaning through their narratives – These narratives are complex, multifaceted and ever-changing with a deep socio-cultural base interconnected to the self | Narrative analysis | The individual consumer narratives were used to create first a possible cultural narrative or bird’s eye view and later archetypal narratives of groups of consumers for a ground-level view of the changing marketplace |
| Chronis et al. (2012) | Exploring the role of imagination in the consumption of collective narrative experiences | Narratives are (re)imagined stroyscapes, which are focal to the object of consumption | – Mental imaging lets consumers enter the world of narrative and create meaning | Narratology | Workings of imagination in tourism sites are inextricably linked to the production of cultural imaginaries, that is, socially important narratives invested with collective values |
| Airoldi (2019) | This paper represents the first attempt to develop a comprehensive methodological framework for “augmenting” taste research through the analysis of digital traces | N/A | – Narrative elements are symbolically deployed to mark taste boundaries can only be grasped through a close reading of consumer discourses | Narrative discourse analysis | Provides methods for mapping consumer digital traces of narratives |
| Van Laer et al. (2014) | To conceive the extended transportation-imagery model (ETIM) | Narratives are stories and are derived from a process of attribution of meaning to and interpretation of a story | Essential elements of narratives are: the plot; the characters; the climax and the outcome and has two levels: At the individual level narratives: constitute a powerful device to frame an experience and at the market level, advertising, branding, communication and consumer research institutions can benefit using narratives | Quantitative meta-analysis | Updates transportation-imagery model and establishes several new paths in narrative transportations |
| Van Laer et al. (2019a) | To examine digital narratives and narrative transportation in marketing in an evolving technological environment | Narrative is a story world | – Narratives affect consumer behaviour through narrative transportation | Meta-analysis | The research shows that the narrative transportation effect is stronger when the story falls in a commercial (vs noncommercial) domain, is a user (vs professional) generated and is received by one story-receiver at a time |
| Van Laer et al. (2019b) | To establish a new theory of narrativity to link the narrative content and discourse of consumer reviews to consumer behaviour | Narrative is the transition of a character from an initial state of events to a later state | – Consumers empathize with the narrative characters – The narrative plot activates consumers’ imagination, which leads to experience suspended reality during narrative reception | Automated text analysis of n-grams | Narrative content and discourse strongly affect and shape consumer behaviour through narrative transportation and persuasion |
| Guthrie and Anderson (2010) | Using consumers’ narrative of a tourist destination to facilitate understanding of how destination image changes with actual experience and what factors or attributes are important | Narrative is an information transfer system by which consumers make sense of their experiences to themselves and to the others | – Narratives are inherent methods to link consumer actions and events to the interrelated aspects to gain an understanding of the consumption – By creating narratives, consumers make sense of themselves and social situations – Narrative is the articulation of consumers’ lived experiences – Narratives provide data | Interpretive qualitative approach | The research reveals three elements involved in the sense-making and sense giving process and sets out the three categories of visitor consumption characteristics that are implicated in the process |
| Hardey (2014) | To study digital consumers and digital marketing narratives, exploring digital data and digital marketing | The interaction between consumers and content in digital and social media is narrative. These narratives are a new dynamic within digital culture and are an active relationship between the users of the technology and the recording of their data | – Consumer narratives are a new form of social media data – Consumer narrative, which Hardey refers to them as marketing narratives, enables companies to promote their brands | Narratology | Digital consumer data provide a unique opportunity and challenge for researchers and organizations that have to be carefully negotiated if the potentials of digital consumer data are to be harnessed |
| Helkkula and Pihlström (2010) | How narrative and narrative inquiry technique might help to develop new ideas and evaluating current service in service development contexts | Narrative is a way to convey the tacit knowledge of consumers’ experiences | – Narratives consist of: “character (users, stakeholders), plot (task, sequence of events) and setting (environment, context)” – Using narratives helps overcome the limitations of understanding consumer behaviours | Narrative inquiry technique and critical incident technique | Metaphors combined with lived critical and imaginary events help to generate creative new service ideas. Customer experiences may be used to interpret unspoken, tacit knowledge, which is beneficial when companies want to learn and create something new with the customer |
| Pace (2008) | Investigating consumer narrative in consumption of video products in websites such as YouTube | Narrative is a paradigm to understand consumption and a tool to analyse it | – Narratives, ontologically, are the same as behaviour, including consumption behaviour – Meaning is created on daily basis in public discourse by narrative – Narratives manifest the inner emotion and experiences | Interpretive qualitative approach | Some preliminary evidence is presented by discussing several YouTube videos. These indicate that YouTube content can be better understood as stories, rather than an example of other approaches such as visual analysis, media studies, videography and others |
| Cooper et al. (2010) | Studying brands and consumption narratives in a pop-culture based on James Bond movies | Narratives are social and contextual meaning that consumers attach to the brands and products and they construct a personal narrative via consumption | – Consumption narratives consist of three main archetypes: Lover narrative: conveys a meaning of romance and sexual desire Superhero narrative: conveys a meaning of sophistication and invincibility Outlaw narrative: insinuates a meaning of danger and revolt | Textual analysis | This article identifies three different and contrasting brand–self-narratives that reinforce a particular archetypal myth of a lover, hero or outlaw |
| Schembri et al. (2010) | Aims investigate how consumers use brands to construct themselves through narrative | Consumption through narrative, a symbolic interrelationship, contributes to the construction of the self | – Consumption narratives creates three symbolic relations between consumer and brand, product and consumption – Narrative is a symbolic interrelationship means that the consumers use an object as a symbol of something else – Narrative is an iconic interrelationship means that the sign relates to the object by imitating or resembling the object through the act of consumption – Narratives is also an indexical interrelationship that builds on a factual relationship between the object and the sign which consumers create through consumption | Interpretive qualitative approach | This article shows that how consumers use brands as a tool construct the self through narratives using three key interrelationships: symbolic, iconic and indexical |
| Shankar et al. (2001) | Investigating the theory and role of narratives in consumption methodology and its application | Narratives are a fruitful way to explore and understand how consumption experiences are made meaningful for consumers | – Narrative has three main functions: Ontological: consumer’s reality is individually and narratively constructed through language but is con-sensualized by the social and cultural world within which the individual is embedded Epistemology: consumption narratives are co-created by consumers Methodology: reality is created by the consumers’ narratives | Interpretive qualitative approach | Develops a narrative paradigm and demonstrate how an understanding of narrative can underpin the three paradigmatic questions of ontology, epistemology and methodology in consumption |
| Lundqvist et al. (2013) | Study the effects of corporate-led narratives on consumers’ brand experiences | Narratives convey a point that is valued (either positively or negatively) by consumers and include a message or action | – Narratives directly affect consumer behaviour – Consumer narratives of brand increase or decrease the willingness to pay for the brand – Consumer narratives are totally different entities that those of “corporates” | Interpretive qualitative approach | Consumers who were exposed to the narratives described the brand in much more positive terms and were willing to pay more for the product |
| Tussyadiah et al. (2011) | Investigating how marketing practitioner might promote tourist destination using tourists’ narratives | For consumers, consumption narratives are means to make sense of their decision and action and are is the most effective device to understand consumer experience | – Consumer think, feel, act and make moral choices according to their narrative structures – Narratives are an organization of events into an intelligible whole such that consumer can always capture the “thought” of the story | Path analysis | It is found that the increased knowledge of a destination through narratives will have a stronger effect on the intention to visit a destination if the audiences can identify themselves with the narratives |
| Baumgartner (2002) | To in investigating the relationship between self and narratives in a consumption context | Narratives are a basic mode of thought through which people understand the world in general and themselves in particular. They also show how consumers use consumption for self-creation | – Consumption narratives are central to creating the self – Self-brand connections are associated with consumption narratives | Narratology | Outlines a broader vision of what knowing the individual consumer might entail providing a personology that views individuals as dispositional, goal striving and narrative entities engaged in consumption in the broadest sense |
| Ardelet et al. (2015) | Aims to investigate the relationship between consumer narrative spontaneous association to luxury products and consequent behaviour | Narratives provide a natural way of thinking about products and by which consumers store, retrieve and index information | – Self-referencing narratives affect product preference at the point of sale – Self-referencing narratives affect continued product preference – Narratives might be used to predict future consumer behaviour | Longitudinal empirical study | This shows that consumers who spontaneously narrate personal narratives when testing products in the store are more likely to prefer products in the store and after usage at home |
| Hamby et al. (2015) | Tries to examine how story-based online consumer reviews influence attitudes towards the reviewed product through a framework of narrative persuasion | Consumption narratives are relationships among elements, which enables casual inference allowing consumers to mentally construct the meaning of consumption | – Consumption narratives are processed differently from arguments – Narratives entail a temporal dimension in which events unfold over time | Path analysis | Demonstrate that reviews with a more narrative-like format lead to higher levels of transportation into the review, which lead to higher levels of reflection on the message and ultimately influence behavioural intent |
| Phillips and McQuarrie (2010) | Tries to understand how narrative transportation occurs in consumer as a response to an advertisement | Narratives, narrative transportation, are a new route to consumer persuasion | Narratives persuade by transporting consumers into a story world Narrative transportation is a distinctive route to persuasion | Interpretive qualitative approach | Aesthetic has potential positive or negative narrative transportation through imagery. Also, narrative transportation persuade consumers through e elaboration likelihood model |
| Grafton Small (2006) | Aims to investigate how sub-cultures and individuality helps individuals to maintain their individual identity through consumption narratives | Narrative is created by consumers and is the way how they relate to each other. Narratives are also an everyday resolution to an enduring paradox: maintaining our individual identities in a society of shared signs and objects, settlements and values | – Narratives are about ourselves and others – Narratives are too subtle to be consistent – Narratives are multiple, ruptured, recursive and diffuse – Narratives can become commodities too | Identity discourse | Using personal experiences of enculturation, these forms of narratives, are discussed against a backdrop of consumer ethnographies and our mutual dependence, upon the retailed and the retold |
| Vazquez et al. (2020) | To develop and test how narrative involvement leads to “parasocial interaction-impulse buying” | Narratives are stories created by TV dramas absorbing and involving consumers affecting their narratives leading to greater connection and ultimately, greater tendency to purchase from that connection | – Consumers engage with products narratively – Consumers cocreate the narratives based on their engagements – Narratives increase parasocial activities | Structural equation modelling | Narrative involvement might lead to an impulsive purchase |
| Anaza et al. (2020) | Investigates the impact of narrative and narrative transportation in advertising on decision-makers attitudinal responses in B2B context | Narratives are stories that consumers are immersed in | – Narratives convey strong emotion and motivations – Narratives foster narrative transportation – Transportation into a story influences an individual’s beliefs and attitudes because humans typically reason in terms of narratives | Mixed method: Structural equation modelling and thematic analysis | – Narratives affect C-level decisions at organizations by improving relationships – In B2B context, narratives create a personal connection between organizational actors |
| Jain et al. (2020) | This paper focuses on developing an empirical and conceptual understanding of the evolving nature of self in the digital world, created through narratives, from non-Westerners | Narratives and narrative self are in the digital world as a form of open-ended self-expression Conveying a combination of experiences, aspirations and fantasies Co-created with peers and technology | – Sensational life experiences metaphors into the narrative of the self – Narratives are rooted in the past, molded in the present and have implications for the future – Narratives may be contradictory and consumers strive to resolve the conflicts by delimiting, making compromises or by synthesizing the narratives – Narratives and narrative self includes posts, comments, likes, tagging, others’ digital activities and other self-related activities online – A consumer can have multiple narrative selves; for instance, the self, expressed through the professional platform, LinkedIn will vary from that on Instagram | grounded theory | – Several narratives of the self are established – Each narrative addresses different segments of personal audiences, enabling new modes of self-expression to overcome the challenges of digital expressions |
| Eng and Jarvis (2020) | The research investigates the differential role of narratives about celebrities’ personal vs professional lives in creating attachment and identifies and tests moderating effects of narrative characteristics including the perceived source of fame, valence and authenticity | Narratives are the consumption of a celebrity brand’s story through which the story receiver interprets it in a causal story-like structure | – Persona narratives are about the celebrity’s professional and personal lives from the celebrity’s brand in consumers’ perceptions between a consumer and a celebrity can be viewed more accurately as a relationship between the consumer and the celebrity’s brand | Mediation analysis and multiple ANOVAs | The results suggest relationship norms that are more altruistic in nature fully mediate the relationship between narrative type and brand attachment. Additionally, personal narratives produce stronger attachment than professional narratives; the celebrity’s source of fame moderates narrative type and attachment; and on-brand narratives elicit higher attachment than off-brand narratives, even when these narratives are negative |
| Johnson et al. (2015) | To investigate if consumer position is to accept a brand’s narrative when explicitly reminded that it is manufactured by firms with an underlying profit motive | Narratives are stories developed by brands | – Explicitly labelled as true, brand narratives might trigger “overthinking” on the part of consumers | Exploratory and confirmatory factor analysis/MANOVA | – Consumers perceive brand narratives as authentic irrespective of how factual they are – Only when one or more authenticity disruptors are present do consumers begin to question the authenticity of the brand narrative – Disruption occurs when the focal brand is perceived to be nakedly copying a competitor or when there is a gross is a match between the brand narrative and reality – In the presence of one or both of these disruptors, consumers judge brands to be less authentic, report lower identification, lower assessments of brand quality and social responsibility and are less likely to join the brand’s community |
| Author | Purpose | Definition of consumption narratives | Dimensions | Method | Findings |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| How consumers’ narratives of brands help them in rapidly changing marketplace | Consumption narrative is the same as brand meaning or brand image which consumers use through consumption | – Narrative is central to the creation of brand meaning by consumers | Narrative analysis | The individual consumer narratives were used to create first a possible cultural narrative or bird’s eye view and later archetypal narratives of groups of consumers for a ground-level view of the changing marketplace | |
| Exploring the role of imagination in the consumption of collective narrative experiences | Narratives are (re)imagined stroyscapes, which are focal to the object of consumption | – Mental imaging lets consumers enter the world of narrative and create meaning | Narratology | Workings of imagination in tourism sites are inextricably linked to the production of cultural imaginaries, that is, socially important narratives invested with collective values | |
| This paper represents the first attempt to develop a comprehensive methodological framework for “augmenting” taste research through the analysis of digital traces | N/A | – Narrative elements are symbolically deployed to mark taste boundaries can only be grasped through a close reading of consumer discourses | Narrative discourse analysis | Provides methods for mapping consumer digital traces of narratives | |
| To conceive the extended transportation-imagery model (ETIM) | Narratives are stories and are derived from a process of attribution of meaning to and interpretation of a story | Essential elements of narratives are: the plot; the characters; the climax and the outcome and has two levels: At the individual level narratives: constitute a powerful device to frame an experience and at the market level, advertising, branding, communication and consumer research institutions can benefit using narratives | Quantitative meta-analysis | Updates transportation-imagery model and establishes several new paths in narrative transportations | |
| To examine digital narratives and narrative transportation in marketing in an evolving technological environment | Narrative is a story world | – Narratives affect consumer behaviour through narrative transportation | Meta-analysis | The research shows that the narrative transportation effect is stronger when the story falls in a commercial (vs noncommercial) domain, is a user (vs professional) generated and is received by one story-receiver at a time | |
| To establish a new theory of narrativity to link the narrative content and discourse of consumer reviews to consumer behaviour | Narrative is the transition of a character from an initial state of events to a later state | – Consumers empathize with the narrative characters | Automated text analysis of n-grams | Narrative content and discourse strongly affect and shape consumer behaviour through narrative transportation and persuasion | |
| Using consumers’ narrative of a tourist destination to facilitate understanding of how destination image changes with actual experience and what factors or attributes are important | Narrative is an information transfer system by which consumers make sense of their experiences to themselves and to the others | – Narratives are inherent methods to link consumer actions and events to the interrelated aspects to gain an understanding of the consumption | Interpretive qualitative approach | The research reveals three elements involved in the sense-making and sense giving process and sets out the three categories of visitor consumption characteristics that are implicated in the process | |
| To study digital consumers and digital marketing narratives, exploring digital data and digital marketing | The interaction between consumers and content in digital and social media is narrative. These narratives are a new dynamic within digital culture and are an active relationship between the users of the technology and the recording of their data | – Consumer narratives are a new form of social media data | Narratology | Digital consumer data provide a unique opportunity and challenge for researchers and organizations that have to be carefully negotiated if the potentials of digital consumer data are to be harnessed | |
| How narrative and narrative inquiry technique might help to develop new ideas and evaluating current service in service development contexts | Narrative is a way to convey the tacit knowledge of consumers’ experiences | – Narratives consist of: “character (users, stakeholders), plot (task, sequence of events) and setting (environment, context)” | Narrative inquiry technique and critical incident technique | Metaphors combined with lived critical and imaginary events help to generate creative new service ideas. Customer experiences may be used to interpret unspoken, tacit knowledge, which is beneficial when companies want to learn and create something new with the customer | |
| Investigating consumer narrative in consumption of video products in websites such as YouTube | Narrative is a paradigm to understand consumption and a tool to analyse it | – Narratives, ontologically, are the same as behaviour, including consumption behaviour | Interpretive qualitative approach | Some preliminary evidence is presented by discussing several YouTube videos. These indicate that YouTube content can be better understood as stories, rather than an example of other approaches such as visual analysis, media studies, videography and others | |
| Studying brands and consumption narratives in a pop-culture based on James Bond movies | Narratives are social and contextual meaning that consumers attach to the brands and products and they construct a personal narrative via consumption | – Consumption narratives consist of three main archetypes: | Textual analysis | This article identifies three different and contrasting brand–self-narratives that reinforce a particular archetypal myth of a lover, hero or outlaw | |
| Aims investigate how consumers use brands to construct themselves through narrative | Consumption through narrative, a symbolic interrelationship, contributes to the construction of the self | – Consumption narratives creates three symbolic relations between consumer and brand, product and consumption | Interpretive qualitative approach | This article shows that how consumers use brands as a tool construct the self through narratives using three key interrelationships: symbolic, iconic and indexical | |
| Investigating the theory and role of narratives in consumption methodology and its application | Narratives are a fruitful way to explore and understand how consumption experiences are made meaningful for consumers | – Narrative has three main functions: | Interpretive qualitative approach | Develops a narrative paradigm and demonstrate how an understanding of narrative can underpin the three paradigmatic questions of ontology, epistemology and methodology in consumption | |
| Study the effects of corporate-led narratives on consumers’ brand experiences | Narratives convey a point that is valued (either positively or negatively) by consumers and include a message or action | – Narratives directly affect consumer behaviour | Interpretive qualitative approach | Consumers who were exposed to the narratives described the brand in much more positive terms and were willing to pay more for the product | |
| Investigating how marketing practitioner might promote tourist destination using tourists’ narratives | For consumers, consumption narratives are means to make sense of their decision and action and are is the most effective device to understand consumer experience | – Consumer think, feel, act and make moral choices according to their narrative structures | Path analysis | It is found that the increased knowledge of a destination through narratives will have a stronger effect on the intention to visit a destination if the audiences can identify themselves with the narratives | |
| To in investigating the relationship between self and narratives in a consumption context | Narratives are a basic mode of thought through which people understand the world in general and themselves in particular. They also show how consumers use consumption for self-creation | – Consumption narratives are central to creating the self | Narratology | Outlines a broader vision of what knowing the individual consumer might entail providing a personology that views individuals as dispositional, goal striving and narrative entities engaged in consumption in the broadest sense | |
| Aims to investigate the relationship between consumer narrative spontaneous association to luxury products and consequent behaviour | Narratives provide a natural way of thinking about products and by which consumers store, retrieve and index information | – Self-referencing narratives affect product preference at the point of sale | Longitudinal empirical study | This shows that consumers who spontaneously narrate personal narratives when testing products in the store are more likely to prefer products in the store and after usage at home | |
| Tries to examine how story-based online consumer reviews influence attitudes towards the reviewed product through a framework of narrative persuasion | Consumption narratives are relationships among elements, which enables casual inference allowing consumers to mentally construct the meaning of consumption | – Consumption narratives are processed differently from arguments | Path analysis | Demonstrate that reviews with a more narrative-like format lead to higher levels of transportation into the review, which lead to higher levels of reflection on the message and ultimately influence behavioural intent | |
| Tries to understand how narrative transportation occurs in consumer as a response to an advertisement | Narratives, narrative transportation, are a new route to consumer persuasion | Narratives persuade by transporting consumers into a story world | Interpretive qualitative approach | Aesthetic has potential positive or negative narrative transportation through imagery. Also, narrative transportation persuade consumers through e elaboration likelihood model | |
| Aims to investigate how sub-cultures and individuality helps individuals to maintain their individual identity through consumption narratives | Narrative is created by consumers and is the way how they relate to each other. Narratives are also an everyday resolution to an enduring paradox: maintaining our individual identities in a society of shared signs and objects, settlements and values | – Narratives are about ourselves and others | Identity discourse | Using personal experiences of enculturation, these forms of narratives, are discussed against a backdrop of consumer ethnographies and our mutual dependence, upon the retailed and the retold | |
| To develop and test how narrative involvement leads to “parasocial interaction-impulse buying” | Narratives are stories created by TV dramas absorbing and involving consumers affecting their narratives leading to greater connection and ultimately, greater tendency to purchase from that connection | – Consumers engage with products narratively | Structural equation modelling | Narrative involvement might lead to an impulsive purchase | |
| Investigates the impact of narrative and narrative transportation in advertising on decision-makers attitudinal responses in B2B context | Narratives are stories that consumers are immersed in | – Narratives convey strong emotion and motivations | Mixed method: Structural equation modelling and thematic analysis | – Narratives affect C-level decisions at organizations by improving relationships | |
| This paper focuses on developing an empirical and conceptual understanding of the evolving nature of self in the digital world, created through narratives, from non-Westerners | Narratives and narrative self are in the digital world as a form of open-ended self-expression | – Sensational life experiences metaphors into the narrative of the self | grounded theory | – Several narratives of the self are established | |
| The research investigates the differential role of narratives about celebrities’ personal vs professional lives in creating attachment and identifies and tests moderating effects of narrative characteristics including the perceived source of fame, valence and authenticity | Narratives are the consumption of a celebrity brand’s story through which the story receiver interprets it in a causal story-like structure | – Persona narratives are about the celebrity’s professional and personal lives from the celebrity’s brand in consumers’ perceptions between a consumer and a celebrity can be viewed more accurately as a relationship between the consumer and the celebrity’s brand | Mediation analysis and multiple ANOVAs | The results suggest relationship norms that are more altruistic in nature fully mediate the relationship between narrative type and brand attachment. Additionally, personal narratives produce stronger attachment than professional narratives; the celebrity’s source of fame moderates narrative type and attachment; and on-brand narratives elicit higher attachment than off-brand narratives, even when these narratives are negative | |
| To investigate if consumer position is to accept a brand’s narrative when explicitly reminded that it is manufactured by firms with an underlying profit motive | Narratives are stories developed by brands | – Explicitly labelled as true, brand narratives might trigger “overthinking” on the part of consumers | Exploratory and confirmatory factor analysis/MANOVA | – Consumers perceive brand narratives as authentic irrespective of how factual they are |
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