Consumer Background and Decision Making Styles of Malaysian College Students

Abstract

This study tested a section of consumer styles inventory (CSI) among Malaysian college students. Using stratified and simple random sampling, 2068 samples were collected from five higher learning institutions in Klang Valley, Malaysia. The study extracted seven factors through exploratory factor analysis from the original CSI scale which was found reliable and useful to consumer markets. Gender, age, ethnicity, family size, household income and place where a student was raised were found to have significant influence on the CSI factors. The findings will be a guide for markets facing competitive pressures by guiding them on the appropriate market segmentation. In addition, firms should focus on the influential background variables during new product designs in order to get the target markets’ preferences and balance their competitive pressures simultaneously.