The influence of materialism on consumption indebtedness in the context of low income consumers from the city of São Paulo

This research is in the domains of materialism, consumer vulnerability and consumption indebtedness, concepts frequently approached in the literature on consumer behavior, macro-marketing and economic psychology. The influence of materialism on consumer indebtedness is investigated within a context that is characterized by poverty and by factors that cause vulnerability, such as high interest rates, limited access to credit and to quality affordable goods. The objectives of this research are: to produce a materialism scale that is well adapted to its environment, characterizing materialism adequately for the population studied; to compare results obtained with results of other studies; and to measure the relationship between materialism, socio-demographic variables, attitude to debt and consumption indebtedness. The primary data used in the analyses were collected from field research carried out in August, 2005 that relied on a probabilistic household sample of 450 low income individuals who live in poor regions of the city of Sao Paulo. The materialism scale, adapted and translated into Portuguese from Richins (2004), proved to be very successful and encourages new work in the area. It was noted that younger adults tend to be more materialistic than older ones; that illiterate adults tend to be less materialistic than those who did literacy courses when they were already adults; and that gender, income and race are not associated with the materialism construct. Among the other results, a logistic regression model was developed in order to distinguish those individuals who have an installment plan payment booklet from those who do not, based on materialism, socio-demographic variables and purchasing and consumer habits. The proposed model confirms materialism as a behavioral variable useful for forecasting the probability of an individual getting into debt in order to consume, in some cases almost doubling the chance of occurrence of this event. Findings confirm the thesis that it is not only adverse economic factors that lead people to get into debt; and that the study of demand for credit for consumption purposes must, of necessity, include variables of a psychological nature. It is suggested that the low income materialistic consumer experiences feelings of powerlessness and exclusion because of the gap that exists between their possessions and their desires. Lines of conduct to combat this marginalization from the consumer society are drawn targeting marketing professionals, public policy makers and vulnerability researchers. Finally, the possibility of new studies involving the materialism construct, which is central to literature on consumer behavior, albeit little used in empirical studies in Brazil, are discussed.

Liberation as Revolutionary Praxis: Rethinking Buddhism Materialism

While it is only in recent decades that scholars have begun to reconsider and problematize Buddhist conceptions of “freedom” and “agency,” the thought traditions of Asian Buddhism have for many centuries struggled with questions related to the issue of “liberation”—along with its fundamental ontological, epistemological and ethical implications. With the development of Marxist thought in the mid to late nineteenth century, a new paradigm for thinking about freedom in relation to history, identity and social change found its way to Asia, and confronted traditional religious interpretations of freedom as well as competing Western ones. In the past century, several attempts have been made—in India, southeast Asia, China and Japan—to bring together Marxist and Buddhist worldviews, with only moderate success (both at the level of theory and practice). This paper analyzes both the possibilities and problems of a “Buddhist materialism” constructed along Marxian lines, by focusing in particular on Buddhist and Marxist conceptions of “liberation.” By utilizing the theoretical work of Japanese “radical Buddhist” Seno’o Girō, I argue that the root of the tension lies with conceptions of selfhood and agency—but that, contrary to expectations, a strong case can be made for convergence between Buddhist and Marxian perspectives on these issues, as both traditions ultimately seek a resolution of existential determination in response to alienation. Along the way, I discuss the work of Marx, Engels, Gramsci, Lukàcs, Sartre, and Richard Rorty in relation to aspects of traditional (particularly East Asian Mahāyāna) Buddhist thought.

Past feelings renovated, or, Ideas occasioned by the perusal of Dr. Hibbert's Philosophy of apparitions / written with the view of counteracting any sentiments approcaching materialism, which that work, however unintentional on the part of the author, may have a tendency to produce.

Interleaved with unnumbered pages of manuscript notes.

Select discourses on the functions of the nervous system, in opposition to phrenology, materialism, and atheism, to which is prefixed a lecture on the diversities of the human character arising from physiological peculiarities

Mode of access: Internet.

The history of materialism and criticism of its present importance /

v. 1. Materialism in antiquity.--The period of transition.--The seventeenth century.--v. 2. The eighteenth century.--Modern philosophy.--The natural sciences.--v. 3. The natural sciences (continued).--Man and the soul.--Morality and religion.

Modern materialism in its relations to religion and theology, comprising an address delivered in Manchester new college, October 6th, 1874, and two papers reprinted from "The Contemporary review",

Mode of access: Internet.

Religion as affected by modern materialism: an address delivered in Manchester New college, London, at the opening of its eighty-ninth session, on Tuesday, October 6, 1874.

Mode of access: Internet.

Seven decades of the Union. The humanities and materialism,

Mode of access: Internet.

The invisible hand: transversal thinking with new materialism in curriculum design

This proposal invites participation in a design intensive, in which educators bring along an idea for a unit, seminar, lecture, lesson as the basis for a practical and creative workshop merging conceptual art, writing, poetry and curriculum planning, while engaging playfully with New Materialism. In this work we seek to move beyond merely interrogating designs for future subjects, and to embolden our thinking about curriculum, asking questions to explore how the pedagogical imagination works with both the material and immaterial, the corporeal and incorporeal, within ecologies continually transforming in the process of making. Through this, we explore ways to challenge “delivery”, or “conduit” metaphors of education, to see design as “situated” in new ways involving both human and nonhuman elements, resisting stasis, resisting closure. This workshop positions curriculum design in the realm of the artist/activist, rather than that of the bureaucrat/technician and opens up a space for reflection on the processes of making curriculum. The workshop also therefore seeks to question how knowledge around curriculum is produced, and to document the ways in which our work as educators is part of a continuous becoming, as we ourselves, and our designs, co-emerge. We remember that curriculum design is fundamentally a creative project, always taking form and transforming in relation to what surrounds us, rather residing in documents, which tend to conceal the entanglements around their making. Instead, we embody and live curriculum; it is happening now