An Investigation of Decision‐Making Styles of Consumers in China

This study investigates Chinese consumers' decision‐making styles. The Consumer Style Inventory (CSI) is administered to 387 adult consumers in China. Both an exploratory factor analysis and a confirmatory factor analysis are adopted to validate the CSI inventory. This results in an eighteen‐item and seven‐factor solution. Findings indicate that five decision‐making styles are valid and reliable in Chinese culture: perfectionistic, novelty‐fashion conscious, recreational, price conscious , and confused by overchoice . Cluster analysis is employed to identify prominent market segments. Based on the findings, three segments are formed: trendy and perfectionistic consumer, traditional and pragmatic consumer , as well as confused by overchoice consumer . Marketing and management implications are discussed.