WEEK 11: MATERIAL SELF

The Material Self

This section focuses on how people maintain extensions of themselves through material
possessions and maintenance of particular lifestyles. In the context of what the society values as
needs and wants, this section discusses how an individual acquires goods, the factors that shape
his/her economic decisions, and what these things say about one’s sense of self.
• Our possessions are a major contributor to and reflection of our identities. A variety of
evidence is presented supporting this simple and compelling premise. The Material self
suggest that the environment surroundings affect what we think we need versus to what we
really need. This also develops on thinking alone or thinking and deciding with other people
in terms of purchasing.
I shop, therefore, I am. I have, therefore, I am?
• Identities can be reflected on the possessions that people have. Some research are identified
and drawn upon in developing this concept which the concept is from consumer behavior. To
be able to identify this consumer behavior, people need to gain some understanding of the
meanings that consumer attach to possessions. People should first recognize that
possessions, intentionally or unintentionally, regard their possessions as parts of themselves.
• People are likely to purchase products that can relate to their personality. Material
possessions signify some aspects of one’s sense of self and identity.
• Possessions, tell a lot about their owners. Thus, one’s sense of self and identity is influential
on how an individual chooses to purchase his/her wants and how he/she makes economic
decisions that will address his/her personal and social needs
• The decisions that go into the purchase of items and certain services is dependent on a
number of factors, including financial constraints, availability of items and services, and the
influence of family and friends.
• However, the most important factor is determining whether these items and services fall
under:
o Wants. Synonymous with luxuries. People buy them for reasons that do not warrant
necessity.
o Needs. These are important for survival. Food, clothing, and shelter are basic needs so
people purchase them out of necessity.
• In the process of acquiring material goods, people generally consider 2 things:
o Utility. Concerned with how things serve a practical purpose.
o Significance. Concerned with the meaning assigned to the object. It is also concerned with
how objects become powerful symbols or icons of habit and ritual which can be quite separate
from their primary function.
• According to John Heskett, a British writer and lecturer on the economic, political, cultural
and human value of industrial design, design combines “need” and “desire” in the form of a
practical object that can also reflect the user’s identity and aspirations through its form and
decoration. For him, there is a significance and function behind everyday things. He explains
the effect of design in everyday life. This reflects the personal identity wherever the person
is: home, work, and restaurant or at a leisure place. This design really matters from the
smallest things like toothpick, spoon and fork, the kind and presentation of food that people
eat up to the bigger gadgets, equipment and cars.
• Roland Barthes (1915 – 1980) the French theorist, was one of the first to observe the
relationship that people have with objects, and in particular looked at the objects as signs or
things which could be decoded to convey messages beyond their practical value.
 • In the 1950s, he popularized the field of Semiology (the study of objects as signs). A sign is
anything that conveys meaning. It was Barthes who revealed that everyday objects are not
just things but a complex system of signs which allows one to read meaning into people and
places. What people increasingly produce are not material objects, but signs.
• In Semiotic analysis, objects function as signifiers in the production of meaning. For example,
clothes may have a simple functional meaning, to cover and protect the body but also double
up as a sign. They construct a meaning and carry a message, which as member of a culture
one can understand.
• According to him, a sign has two elements: signifier which refers to its physical form and
signified, the mental concepts it refers to. Hence, objects are not just things but are reflections
of the wider lives of communication and individuals. Not surprisingly, the clothes one wears,
the car one drives and the furnishing of one’s home, are all expressions of one self, even
when they act as disguises rather than reflections.
• As Tuan (1998) argues, “Our Fragile sense of self needs support, and this we get by having
and possessing things because, to a large degree, we are what we have and possess”. This
premise regarded possessions is a part of self of a person that is not a new concept. This is
concluded by William James who laid the foundations for modern conceptions of help, he
said that “a man’s self is the sum total of all the he can call his, not only his body and his
psychic powers, but this clothes and his house, his wife and children, his ancestors and
friends, his reputation and works, his lands, and yacht and bank-account.
• All these things give him the same emotions. If they wax and prosper, he feels triumphant; if
they dwindle and die away, he feels cast down, -not necessarily in the same degree for each
thing, but in much the same way for all.” If people define possessions as things, they call
theirs, James was saying that people are the sum of their possessions.
• Some of the evidence is found in the nature of self-perceptions, particularly found in the
diminished sense of self when possessions are unintentionally lost or stolen.
Anthropologically, the role of possessions is treated ritually and after death.
• In addition, the self-have areas that are not reviewed more on the relationship between
possessions and sense of self. Essentially, the having, doing, and being can be a focus on
understanding material self that is relevant to the question of how people define who they
are.
• In addition, material self can be explained in understanding self-extension. That is, both good
and bad aspects of objects are seen to attach to people through their physical contact or
proximity. This can result in multiple levels of self. On the other hand, to give importance on
the number of categories of possessions that are commonly incorporated into the sense of
self. Categories may be collections, money, pets, other people, and body parts.
• The Theory of the meaning of material possession suggest that material goods can fulfil a
range of instrumental, social, symbolic and affective functions:
1. Instrumental functions relate to the functional properties of a product. For example, a
person bought a pick-up style car for family and business functions.
2. Social symbolic function signifies personal qualities, social standing, group affiliation and
gender role. For instance, buying iPhone instead of other mobile phones.
3. Categorical functions refer to the extent to which material possessions may be used to
communicate group membership or status.
4. Self-expression functions reflect a person’s unique qualities, values or attitudes. There are
people who may represent themselves by collecting objects with a Hello Kitty brand and the
like.
• Also Objects or Materials as Process of Self-Extension, which includes the following:
1. Ways of incorporating Possessions into the Extended Self
 • Sartre suggests that there are three primary ways through which a person learns to regard
an object as part of self. One way is through appropriating or controlling an object for personal
use.
• This can be done through appropriate intangible or non ownable objects by overcoming,
conquering, or mastering them. . Similarly, it is only through learning to ride a first bicycle,
manipulating a new computer system, driving a first car, or successfully negotiating rapids in
a new kayak that these objects really become parts of the extended self. Sartre also sees
giving possessions to others as a means of extending self-a special form of control.
• A second way of having an object and incorporating it into self is by creating it; this view
echoes anthropological findings and Locke's (1690) political philosophy. Whether the thing
created is a material object or an abstract thought, the creator retains an identity in the object
for as long as it retains a mark or some other association with the person who brought it into
existence.
• This identity is codified through copyrights, patents, and scientific citations that preserve
associations between people and their mental creations. Sartre feels that buying an object is
merely another form of creating the object, and that even the latent buying power of money
contributes to a sense of self.
• The third way in which objects become a part of self is by knowing them. Whether the object
known is a person, place, or thing, Sartre maintains that the relationship in knowing the object
is inspired by a carnal and sexual desire to have the object.
2. Contamination
• Goffman (1971, pp. 44-47) suggests six modes of interpersonal contamination. An important
omission in this list of modes of interpersonal contamination is the acquisition of possessions
of another person that have been intimately associated with that person. The following are
some of the contaminations a person may experience:
Violation of one's personal space
Touching and bodily contact;
Glancing, looking, and staring;
Noise pollution;
Talking to/addressing one Bodily excreta.
Corporeal excreta (spittle, snot, perspiration, food particles, blood, semen, vomit,
urine, and fecal matter-and stains of these); b. Odor (e.g., flatus, tainted breath, body
smells); c. Body heat (e.g., on toilet seats); d. Markings left by the body (e.g., plate
leavings-leftover food).
3. Maintaining Multiple Levels of Self
• As previously noted, some possessions are more central to self than are others. The
possessions central to self may be visualized in concentric layers around the core self, and
will differ over individuals, over time, and over cultures that create shared symbolic meanings
for different goods.
• However, there is another sense in which the individual has a hierarchical arrangement of
levels of self, because people exist not only as individuals, but also as collectivities. They
often define family, group, subculture, nation, and human selves through various
consumption objects.
• Boorstin (1973) suggests, one of the key ways of expressing and defining group membership
is through shared consumption symbols. Such symbols help identify group membership and
 define the group self. Just as an individual may use personal possessions such as jewelry,
automobile, make-up, and clothing to help define an individual sense of self, a family is most
apt to use distinct family possessions to define a family self for its members.
• The first is that the house is a symbolic body for the family. Just as clothing alters the
individual's body, furnishings and decorations alter the family's body. The second important
point is that the expressive imagery of the house that is definitional of the family is only fully
acquired during consumption. At the point of acquisition, only a portion of the ultimate
meaning of these objects is present
• In considering the functions of extended self, discussion was directed toward the relative
roles that having, doing, and being play in people’s lives and identities. Developmental
evidence suggests that this identification with things begins quite early in life as the infant
learns to distinguish self from the environment and then from others who may envy a person’s
possessions.
• Emphasis on material possessions tends to decrease with age, but remains high throughout
life as people seek to express themselves through possessions and use material possessions
to seek happiness, remind themselves of experiences, accomplishments, and other people
in their lives, and even create a sense of immortality after death. The accumulation of
possessions provides a sense of past and tells people who they are, where they came from
and where they are going.
• Self-extension occurs through control and mastery of an object, through creation of an object,
through knowledge of an object, and through contamination via proximity and habituation to
an object. The extended self operates not only on an individual level, but also on a collective
level involving family, group, subcultural, and national identities. These additional levels of
self were posited to account for certain behaviors that might be seen as selfless in the
narrower individual sense of self.
The role of Consumer Culture on the Sense of Self and Identity
● Consumers unconsciously (and sometimes consciously) know that their possessions are
intimately tied to their sense of the self. Product ownership and use help consumers define and live
out their identity. By implication, then, the current view construes a dichotomy between what one is
sans possessions and what one becomes due to or with possessions.
● Consumer Identity is the pattern of consumption that describes the consumer. People may no
longer consume goods and services primarily because of its functional satisfaction. This develops
the consumer culture. Consumption has become increasingly more meaning-based: brands are
often used as symbolic resources for the construction and maintenance of identity.
● Brands and products are now being used by many consumers to express their identities. People
may construct their social identities through the consumption of commercial brands or luxury
commodities. This is one of the basic features of people in the modern era, a behavior that leads to
consumerism.
● Consumerism is the preoccupation with an inclination towards the buying of consumer goods. This
is because of the availability of the pen market or technology-based market. High class consumption
is attached to the identities of people in the society and it legitimizes consumer culture in the daily
lives of people.
● To fully explicate that view and tease out the underlying theory, it is first necessary to dissect this
sans possessions' self. Decomposing the sans possessions' self would help us place possessions
in a better context—how possessions fit into the consumer's self. The sans possession' view of self
is populated in the consumer behavior literature by two visibly different discourses.
● The first is a 'personal identity' view, wherein self is seen as a multi-faceted, multi-layered, social
and psychological being, reflecting, deeply and continually, on itself. This conception has blossomed
richly in the post-modem, interpretivist consumer research literature where it is referred to as the
core self.
● A consumer's identity is deemed to reside in a personal narrative —the story consumers constantly
construct and play out in their minds about who they are and/or are striving to become. Self is viewed
as a sum of personal qualities, more or less enduring, that an individual sees himself in possession
of. These include personality traits in their subjective version (i.e., personality traits as perceived by
the person himself/herself) as well as any superficial behavioral and body appearance traits.
● The self-narrative conception of identity offers a rich literary view against which products and
brands may be appraised for potential fit. But it calls for intensive high-skilled ethnographic research.
The self-image view lends itself to easy, quantitative measurement. But as already argued, this view
is anchored and embedded entirely in personality-like dispositions and surface characteristics and
ignores other content' —described below.
● This view serves, if at all, to appraise consumers' superficial images of self, and to deploy this
brand of research in self-image brand-image congruence models (e.g., Malhotra, 1981; Todd, 2001).
However, brand choices, particularly those made to primarily enact and advance one's self concept,
often go beyond such superficial image' congruence.
● Purchase can be the consumer's self-concept or self-identity. This includes both sans
possessions' self and the extended self, and is often the object of introspection among most
consumers at one time or the other. Although the concept of 'I' can include virtually everything a
person ever come to own and live with, a systematic list would include six components: (a) their
bodies; (b) their values and character; (c) their success and competence, (d) their social roles, (e)
their traits, and, finally (f) their possessions.
● Not all products a person consumes become possessions. Some are clearly consumables, not
possessions. And not all products that qualify to be called possessions become part of the extended
self. Even so, products (consumables and durables alike) can relate to one's selfconcept without
becoming part of the self-concept. This would be the case when products are instrumental in
furthering some component of the self-concept.
● If a person had to invest a lot of resources (money, time, energy) finding and selecting a product
then to psychologically justify that kind of investment, people tend to view that product as part of
their extended self. For this reason, more expensive purchases and hard to find purchases, and
purchases for which they saved for a long time are more likely to become part of the extended self.
● Products thus can relate to one's self in two ways: (a) by being instrumental to enhancing their
self sans possessions,' and (b) by becoming a valued possession. As to the second role, product
possessions become part of self (actually extended self by six mechanisms described above: by
self-based choice, by investment in acquisition, by investment in use, by bonding during use, as
collections, and as memory markers.
● Not all product categories have a place in a person's sense of self. Such products are best sold
based on functional benefits; of course, these functional benefits can be displayed as connected to
higher level outcomes in relevant means-end-chains.