Influence of College Students’ Gender and Relationship Status on Their Clothing Purchase Process

Abstract

The purpose of this study is to identify the effects of college students` relationship status on their clothing behavior and purchasing process. The subjects of this study were college students. After a survey 113 questionnaires were used for the data analysis excluding incomplete ones, Factor analysis. paired t-test, Pearson`s correlation, one-way ANOVA. MANOVA and Chi-square test were conducted The data analysis found that female students had higher levels of clothing interest, and fashion-seeking, impulse buying and individuality-seeking motives than male students. Female students who had boyfriends showed particularly higher levels of fashion-seeking and impulse-buying motives. Throughout the clothing purchase process stages, students were most influenced by girlfriend/boyfriend, especially in the evaluation stage. Students who had girlfriends/boyfriends were significantly more influenced by them. Female students were more influenced by parents at the evaluation stage and their female friends at the information search stage.