A Synthesis of the Consumer-Brand Relationship Domain: Using Text Mining to Track Research Streams, Describe Their Emotional Associations, and Identify Future Research Priorities

We conduct a text-mining analysis of 287 articles representing the consumer-brand relationship (CBR) literature from 1999 to 2015. We propose that the CBR domain is reflected by 71 constructs, of which less than half can be considered important. We structure the domain by identifying its seven major research streams as well as demarcating their respective evolution and emotional features. Using the original data and incorporating a second corpus based on the articles included in the current Journal of the Association for Consumer Research issue on “Brand Relationships, Emotions, and the Self,” we outline a collection of insights that define opportunities for future research.