The meta-discourse of contemporary brands and the indexing of consumption: a way to build bonds of meaning

There is an important volume of reflections on the theoretical and methodological proximity of semiotics and brand. I emphasize the texts of Lencastre and Corte-Real on brand myopia, Perez on brand expression and the proposition of a brand analysis model based on TGS de Peirce, and Mick with his studies of branding, marketing, and advertising, among others. However, the constitutive tension of the sign-brand, in its complexity as a media phenomenon determined by the sign object, pulsates in harmony with the emotional, associative, and cognitive relations it is able to generate in the interpreting minds. Brand as a complex sign, detached from the shackles of marketing management, grows toward the performing hybridism of digital technologies and arts, finding its interpreters – open-minded, active, and desirous of constant negotiations of meaning – in countless semioses. The purpose of the present article is to show that the sign strength of contemporary brands lies in their ability to index consumption based on advertising metadiscourse that reveals its audiences' social values and the objectual power by which it is determined. To this end, the study integrated knowledge of the semiotic analysis of the expressions of twenty international brands in the fashion, food, and technology industries, and the systematization and analysis of their value offers.     

Diamond signs: generic stones and particular gems

Analysis of narratives from ethnographic research with diamond consumers representing the target market (largely middle-class white women between 20 and 50 years of age) reveals how symbolic associations promoted by industry are refracted through interpretations of both adverts and diamonds in general, but shows that local contingencies (basic attitudes and knowledge about diamonds and their production, circumstances of acquisition, and personal histories) are significant in determining meanings of people's own specific diamonds. Far from being batch absorbers of advert discourse, consumers are idiosyncratic, creative, and sometimes playful interpreters, and furthermore may distinguish between these strategies and those suggested by adverts or as performed by others. These findings are in part explicable on introducing for diamond consumption an important distinction between type and token, whereby a token is a specific instantiation of a generic type. This approach contributes to developing methods supple enough to capture consumers’ multi-dimensional interpretive strategies.     

当代大学生的消费与幸福观

消费文化对正在成长中的大学生的思想、行为尤其是消费观和幸福观产生了影响。当代大学生更注重生活的需要和享受,消费观、节约观与老一辈不同。总体来看,当代大学生幸福观积极向上,绝大部分大学生对幸福、金钱和消费有比较正确的认识,并关注自己的主观幸福和精神生活,但在幸福价值观和幸福行为追求上有一定的知行背离。也有少部分同学认为财富、消费代表幸福,存在非理性消费现象。应加强对大学生进行适度消费和反对消费主义教育。     

贵州农户消费行为研究——基于贵州10村800户的调查

消费者行为的变化是经济研究中一个重要的组成部分,文章重点围绕贵州农村固定观察点10村800农户及家庭成员的消费行为进行探讨,具体从农户名义消费水平及变动趋势,农户实际食品消费水平及变动趋势,农户实际住房消费水平及变动趋势,农户实际耐用品消费水平等方面来分析。从分析结果看,贵州10村农户的生活水平有了比较大的变化,已由温饱型上升到目前的奔小康型。     

Green tea in the Sahel: The social history of an itinerant consumer good

Since the liberalisation of the market in the 1990s, the amount of green tea imported from China to the Sahel has dramatically increased. This article traces some of the stages in the development of green tea from its introduction in the early nineteenth century by Moorish traders from Morocco to a mass consumer good in the Sahel and the adjoint Savannah regions. Having started as a beverage with medicinal and vitalising properties, it was adopted by the aristocratic urban elite in Sahelian trading towns, and much later via the pastoralists by the general population, while spreading out further south. The gradual democratisation of green tea is related to the changing norms of tea consumption, of family authority, and to different stages in the packaging, naming and presentation of tea, together with sugar. Green tea has become the most popular drink in cities such as Bamako, where it remains strongly associated with its Moorish introduction.     

A Matter of Context: A Comparative Study of Media Environments and News Consumption Gaps in Europe

Research has shown that individual-level characteristics such as socioeconomic status and political interest are becoming more important as predictors of news consumption in a rapidly changing media environment. Despite this general trend, this article argues that the importance of individual-level predictors of news consumption varies between national media environments. We use extensive survey data from 16 European countries and multilevel modeling in order to investigate both contextual-level and cross-level effects on news consumption. The results show that media environment characteristics have additional effects on news consumption beyond the effects of individual-level characteristics such as education and political interest, but also moderating impacts on these individual-level predictors of news consumption. More specifically, national media environments characterized by higher levels of newspaper-centrism are related to smaller gaps in newspaper reading between those with high and low levels of education and political interest. Lower degrees of newspaper-centrism are, on the other hand, related to a weaker “lower-class bias” of television news and larger gaps in news consumption between those with and without high political interest. These findings are discussed in light of previous research on news consumption, knowledge, and participation gaps as well as cross-national comparative research.     

中国城镇居民养老保险对消费行为的影响研究——基于Feldstein生命周期假说模型

现阶段我国面临人口老龄化加剧和内需疲软难题,研究城镇居民养老保险对消费的影响,有利于为我国建立扩大消费需求长效机制提供理论支撑和政策建议。文章通过使用1980-2010年中国城镇居民人均消费性支出、人均可支配收入、人均储蓄和人均养老保险支出等数据,基于Feldstein生命周期假说模型,实证分析中国城镇居民养老保险对消费行为的影响效应。分析结果表明,中国城镇居民人均养老保险支出每增加1%,消费就会增加0.5%,说明城镇居民养老保险对消费有较大的推动作用,另外增加居民的人均可支配收入,也可以扩大消费。     

Market coordination and the making of conventions: qualities,consumption and sustainability in the agro-food industry

Abstract

The coordination of activity across sites and spaces of production and consumption is a key concern for economic analysis. Joining a revival in the application of convention theory to agro-food scholarship, this paper considers complementary insights – related principally to ‘the economy of qualities’ – that animate different aspects of e/valuation, competition and alignment. These understandings are extended by more thoroughly acknowledging contemporary developments in consumption scholarship. The arguments are advanced through a case study of the orange juice market, linking its current high-carbon trajectory to the commercial and cultural significance of freshness. The analysis offers new insights into distributed processes of qualification as well as the mechanisms through which conventions are assembled and sustained. Finally, a more integrated approach to food production and consumption is outlined.     

多类别养老保险对居民家庭消费影响的对比研究

在老龄化不断加深、居民消费率增长缓慢、消费需求日益多元化的背景下,研究不同类别养老保险对居民家庭消费水平和消费结构的影响日益重要。采用CGSS(2015)调查数据,使用倾向值匹配(PSM)回归模型,分析不同类别养老保险对居民家庭消费水平和消费结构的影响及内在机制,研究发现:参加基本养老保险和商业性养老保险均会显著增加居民家庭总消费、生存性消费和发展性消费,基本养老保险和商业性养老保险对发展性消费的增加效应均大于生存性消费;参加商业性养老保险对居民家庭总消费、生存性消费和发展性消费的增加效应大于基本养老保险;养老保险影响居民家庭消费的核心机制是居民的总收入以及再分配偏好。为拉动居民消费,应把第三支柱的个人养老金缴费纳入个人所得税专项或专项附加扣除;提高基础养老金的水平,进一步落实养老金水平的动态调整机制。     

Politics and Corporate‐Sector Environmentally Significant Actions: The Effects of Political Partisanship on U.S. Utilities Energy Efficiency Policies

This study assesses the direct, indirect, and total impacts of political partisanship on state‐level utilities' investment in energy efficiency. This subject is of utmost importance because energy efficiency improvement has become a linchpin in worldwide efforts to combat climate change and other environmental challenges. Analysis of data on 51 electric utilities nested within 31 U.S. states indicates that political partisanship influences utilities' energy efficiency policies. There is strong evidence that electric utilities in states dominated by the Republican Party are less likely to invest in energy efficiency than those in states governed by the Democratic Party. This finding suggests that political partisanship may be shaping the policy and regulatory frameworks put in place by state governments to incentivize or compel the participation of private‐sector entities' in environmental management and/or resource conservation.