Prolonged consumption of sucrose in a binge-like manner, alters the morphology of medium spiny neurons in the nucleus accumbens shell

The modern diet has become highly sweetened, resulting in unprecedented levels of sugar consumption, particularly among adolescents. While chronic long-term sugar intake is known to contribute to the development of metabolic disorders including obesity and type II diabetes, little is known regarding the direct consequences of long-term, binge-like sugar consumption on the brain. Because sugar can cause the release of dopamine in the nucleus accumbens (NAc) similarly to drugs of abuse, we investigated changes in the morphology of neurons in this brain region following short- (4 weeks) and long-term (12 weeks) binge-like sucrose consumption using an intermittent two-bottle choice paradigm. We used Golgi-Cox staining to impregnate medium spiny neurons (MSNs) from the NAc core and shell of short- and long-term sucrose consuming rats and compared these to age-matched water controls. We show that prolonged binge-like sucrose consumption significantly decreased the total dendritic length of NAc shell MSNs compared to age-matched control rats. We also found that the restructuring of these neurons resulted primarily from reduced distal dendritic complexity. Conversely, we observed increased spine densities at the distal branch orders of NAc shell MSNs from long-term sucrose consuming rats. Combined, these results highlight the neuronal effects of prolonged binge-like intake of sucrose on NAc shell MSN morphology.

Mobile phone consumption and implications for SMS marketing

This paper reports on a Q-methodology study on the consumption of mobile phones and opinions on SMS-marketing, extracted from interpretive interviews and focus groups. The Metaphors Q-sort, developed within a framework of Holt's (1995) four metaphors of consumption, identifies three experiential value clusters in the consumption of mobile phones: the Mobile Pragmatists, the Mobile Connectors and the Mobile Revelers. The SMS-marketing Q-sort identifies two key clusters of subjective opinions on various aspects of SMS-based mobile-marketing. By integrating the findings from these two Q-sorts, we demonstrate that while all three value clusters express positive opinions towards ‘location specific’ and ‘customer initiated contact’ SMS-marketing, there are noticeable differences in how marketers should develop their strategies to maximize the consumers’ perceived experiential value derived from the consumption of their mobile phones. Keywords: mobile phones; experiential consumption: SMS-marketing; Q-methodology

M-technology, Consumption and Gambling: A Conceptualisation of Consumer Vulnerability in an M-gambling Marketplace

Technology imbued m-marketing systems influence the consumptive lives of citizens, by facilitating anytime, anywhere business-to-consumer interactions. Business pundits’ enthusiasm towards mobile services (m-services) has been driven by the promise of a marketspace context involving seamless, business-to-consumer interactions that can be simultaneously impulse-driven, highly entertaining and omnipresent. Arguably, gambling too is impulse-driven, exciting and easily accessible. An important question that needs to be addressed is: how the convergence of mobile technology and gambling will impact the millennial consumer. The authors address this question by examining the contextually bounded interactions between internal and external factors that make mobile phone users potentially vulnerable during m-gambling interactions. By examining key themes that describe the convergence of m-technology and gambling, we clarify the experiential nature of m-gambling and its relationship to consumer vulnerability.

Emotions in the Experiential Consumption of Mobile Phones

Although marketers have a strong interest in finding ways to engage with consumers through mobile phones, the everyday experiential, or affective consumption practices surrounding this technology have received limited attention in the literature. To address this limitation, we used appraisal theory, which specifies it is the way individuals appraise situations or events that elicit emotions. We conducted an experience sampling method study to explore the emotions that individuals experience during their interactions with and through their mobile phones and what situations or events elicit these emotions. The preliminary findings show a number of significant relationships between emotions and specfic clusters of situations and events. Additionally, age and gender were also important indicators. The research contributes to a deeper understanding of the experiential nature of mobile information technologies through consumers’ everyday-consumption-related emotions and the situations and events that elicit them.

Cross-cultural consumer/consumption research : dealing with issues emerging from globalization and fragmentation

To understand the effects of globalization and fragmentation, macromarketing scholars need insights about links between individual consumer behavior and societal outcomes. The challenge in this regard is to create a program of macrooriented cross-cultural research. This article offers a crosscultural consumer behavior research framework for this purpose. The framework encompasses four key areas of consumer behavior that are related to the forces of globalization and fragmentation, including the environment, identity, wellbeing,and market structure and policy. A discussion of these substantive areas is followed by a suggested macro-microoriented research agenda and a call for paradigm plurality in pursuing this agenda.

The interactions of consumption characteristics on social norms

Purpose: An extended Theory of Planned Behavior (TPB) model tests how customer loyalty intentions may relate to subjective and descriptive norms. The study further determines whether consumption characteristics – product enjoyment and importance – moderate norms-loyalty relationships.----- Methodology: Using a two-study approach focusing on youth, an Australian study (n = 244) first augmented TPB with descriptive norm. A Singapore study (n = 415) followed up with how consumption characteristics might moderate norms-loyalty relationships. With both studies, linear regressions tested the relationships among the variables.----- Findings: Extending TPB with descriptive norm improved TPB’s predictive ability across studies. Further, product enjoyment and importance moderated the norms-loyalty relationships differently. Subjective norm related to loyalty intentions significantly with high enjoyment, whereas descriptive norm was significant with low enjoyment. Only subjective norm was significant with low importance.----- Research limitations: Single-item variables, self-reported questionnaires on intended rather than actual behavior, and not controlling for cultural differences between the two samples limit generalizablity.----- Practical implications: The significance of both norms suggests that mobile firms should reach youth through their peers. With youth, social pressure may be influential particularly with hedonic products. However, the different moderations of product enjoyment and importance imply that a blanket marketing strategy targeting youth may not work.----- Originality/Value: This study extends academic knowledge on the relationships between norms and customer loyalty, particularly with consumption characteristics as moderators. The findings highlight the importance of considering different norms with consumer behavior. The study should help mobile firms understand how social influences impact customer loyalty.

Alcohol consumption by undergraduate students

Assessed correlates of alcohol consumption (AC) in 212 undergraduates (81 "college" and 131 "noncollege" residents [COLRs and NCOLRs], mean ages 18.9 and 18.6 yrs, respectively) and studied the proportion who were drinking at potentially harmful levels (HLs). This study also examined changes in AC during the course of the 1st semester and predicted drinking levels in the 2nd semester from demographics, drug use, social variables and self-efficacy data. Data were collected using self-administered questionnaires. During both semesters, the COLRs reported drinking significantly more alcohol than NCOLRs, but during vacation the intake of the 2 groups was almost equal. Higher AC in the 2nd semester was best predicted by higher AC during the 1st semester, followed by more AC by friends and higher parental occupation status. Female COLRs were those most likely to be drinking at HLs. Results also showed that a significant proportion of COLRs were drinking at HLs.

Consumption and the postmodern city

Probes into the consumer culture in the postmodern city through a survey of a population that recently moved into refurbished homes in downtown Manchester, England. Attraction to the middle class of culturally based urban regeneration; Cultural consumption and lifestyle; Sociology of contemporary cultural change.