Journal ArticleDOI
River Magic: Extraordinary Experience and the Extended Service Encounter
Eric J. Arnould,Linda L. Price +1 more
TLDR
In this paper, the authors explored the provision of extraordinary hedonic experiences on commercial, multiday river rafting trips in the Colorado River basin and found that personal growth and self-renewal, "communitas", and harmony with nature are significant in explaining overall satisfaction.Abstract:
This article explores the provision of extraordinary hedonic experiences on commercial, multiday river rafting trips in the Colorado River basin. White water river rafting provides a dramatic illustration of some of the complex features of delivering an extraordinary experience. Multiple methods were employed over two years of data collection to articulate the lived meaning of this experience from both the guides' and the consumers' perspectives. Robust quantitative measures were developed from rich qualitative data. Participant observation and interview data enriched the interpretation of quantitative results. Experiential themes of personal growth and self-renewal, “communitas,” and harmony with nature are evidenced across the data; they evolve and are woven together over the course of the trip. Together they are significant in explaining overall satisfaction. There is a complex relationship between client expectations and satisfaction. The narrative of the rafting experience rather than relationships between expectations and outcomes is shown to be central to its evaluation. Implications for other services and consumption activities are discussed.read more
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Consumer Culture Theory (Cct): Twenty Years of Research
TL;DR: In this paper, a synthesizing overview of consumer research addressing the sociocultural, experiential, symbolic, and ideological aspects of consumption is provided, with the aim of providing a viable disciplinary brand for this research tradition that we call consumer culture theory.
Posted Content
Brand Experience: What is it? How is it Measured? Does it Affect Loyalty?
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Journal ArticleDOI
Understanding Customer Experience Throughout the Customer Journey
TL;DR: In this article, the authors aim to develop a stronger understanding of customer experience and the customer journey in this era of increasingly complex customer behavior by examining existing definitions and conceptualizations of customer experiences as a construct.
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Building brand community
TL;DR: In this article, the authors explore the relationship between the customer and the brand, between the customers and the firm, between consumers and the product, and among the customers' friends.
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Subcultures of Consumption: An Ethnography of the New Bikers
TL;DR: The concept of the subculture of consumption solves many problems inherent in the use of ascribed social categories as devices for understanding consumer behavior as discussed by the authors, which is based on three years of ethnographic fieldwork with Harley-Davidson motorcycle owners.
References
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Journal Article
SERVQUAL: A multiple-item scale for measuring consumer perceptions of service quality.
TL;DR: In this paper, the authors describe the development of a 22-item instrument (called SERVQUAL) for assessing customer perceptions of service quality in service and retailing organizations, and the procedures used in constructing and refining a multiple-item scale to measure the construct are described.
Journal ArticleDOI
A Conceptual Model of Service Quality and Its Implications for Future Research
TL;DR: The attainment of quality in products and services has become a pivotal concern of the 1980s as discussed by the authors, while quality in tangible goods has been described and measured by marketers, quality in services is la...
Journal ArticleDOI
Modernity and Self-Identity: Self and Society in the Late Modern Age
TL;DR: In this paper, the self: ontological security and existential anxiety are discussed, as well as the trajectory of the self, risk, and security in high modernity, and the emergence of life politics.
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Modernity and Self-Identity: Self and Society in the Late Modern Age
TL;DR: In the context of a post-traditional order, the self becomes a reflexive project as mentioned in this paper, which is not a term which has much applicability to traditional cultures, because it implies choice within plurality of possible options, and is 'adopted' rather than 'handed down'.