• Journal of the Korean Society of Clothing and Textiles
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• v.29 no.3_4 s.141
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• pp.478-490
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• 2005

The purpose of this study identifies effect of apparel merchandise characteristics on experienced emotion for apparel shopping and effect of consumer's emotion on attitude toward the internet shop. The data were collected from a sample of 271 internet shopper of university students(male: 82, femaie: 189). They visited the on-line shop for apparel shopping and after searching a casual clothing which they wanted to buy, requested to answer the questionnaire. The covariance structural model and research hypothesis analyzed by using AMOS 4.0 program. The results are as follows: First, the structural model is accepted($X^2$=128.30/d.f.=119/p=0.26, GFI=0.95 ; AGFI=0.93; RMR:0.05: NFI=0.94; PNFI=0.73). Second, apparel merchandise characteristics(price, information, assortment) of the internet shop lead a consumer's positive emotions for apparel shopping. Limited assortment variety of product induce negative emotions. Third, positive and negative emotions that consumer experienced for apparel shopping influence attitude toward the internet shop.

• Journal of the Korean Society of Clothing and Textiles
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• v.33 no.5
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• pp.764-774
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• 2009

The purpose of this study is to investigate the differences in consumer clothing shopping orientation and shopping behaviors by the multi-selection of internet and offline stores. The data were collected from 201 men and women in their twenties and the respondents were grouped into three as internet-store users, multi-store users, and offline-store users. The data were analyzed using factor analysis, ANOVA, post-hoc analysis, frequency analysis, and chi-square analysis. The results are as following. First, the clothing shopping orientation was partly different among the groups. Regarding the offline shopping orientation, the groups showed difference in the impulsive orientation, and regarding the online shopping orientation, the groups showed differences in the goal oriented and enjoying orientation. In all the three cases, the internet users showed strongest orientation, and the next were multi-store users and offline-store users. The cause of these results were explained as the familiarity and experience with the channel. Second, the clothing shopping behaviors were also partly different among the groups. The groups showed no differences in the preferred store type and benefits sought, but showed significant difference in the attitude toward the internet shopping. The internet-store users showed most positive attitude, and the next were multi-store users and offline-store users.

• Journal of the Korean Society of Clothing and Textiles
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• v.28 no.5
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• pp.690-700
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• 2004

The purposes of this research were to segment consumer groups according to sportswear benefits sought and to find the differences among the groups in regard to domestic vs imported brand attitudes, internet vs department store attitudes, and sportswear purchasing behavior. The subjects used for the research were 773 male and female consumers who were residents in Seoul. The data were analyzed by factor analysis, cluster analysis, ANOVA, and Duncan test. The results showed that there were four sportswear benefit segments: figure compensation/ ostentation, individuality, comfort/function, and youth-oriented groups. Statistical analyses showed that the four sportswear benefit segments were different in regard to imported brand attitudes, department store attitudes, and sportswear purchasing behavior. For example, figure compensation/ ostentation segment had more positive attitude toward imported brands and department stores, considered design and advertisement important as sportswear selection criteria, and had a highest expenditure on sportswear purchase. The implications of the research were discussed.

• Journal of Global Scholars of Marketing Science
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• v.18 no.2
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• pp.19-45
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• 2008

This study is to empirically examine the primary dimensions of visual merchandising (VMD) of internet shopping mall, namely store design, merchandise, and merchandising cues, to be a attractive virtual store to the shoppers. The authors reviewed the literature related to the major components of VMD from the perspective of the AIDA model, which has been mainly applied to the offline store settings. The major purposes of the study are as follows; first, tries to derive the variables related with the components of visual merchandising through reviewing the existing literatures, establish the hypotheses, and test it empirically. Second, examines the relationships between the components of VMD and the attitude toward the VMD, however, putting more emphasis on finding out the component structure of the VMD. VMD needs to be examined with the perspective that an online shopping mall is a virtual self-service or clerkless store, which could reduce the number of employees, help the shoppers search, evaluate and purchase for themselves, and to be explored in terms of the in-store persuasion processes of customers. This study reviewed the literatures related to store design, merchandise, and merchandising cues which might be relevant to the store, product, and promotion respectively. VMD is a total communication tool, and AIDA model could explain the in-store consumer behavior of online shopping. Store design has to do with triggering a consumer attention to the online mall, merchandise with a product related interest, and merchandising cues with promotions such as recommendation and links that induce the desire to pruchase. These three steps might be seen as the processes for purchase actions. The theoretical rationale for the relationship between VMD and AIDA could be found in Tyagi(2005) that the three steps of consumer-oriented merchandising are a store, a product assortment, and placement, in Omar(1999) that three types of interior display are a architectural design display, commodity display, and point-of-sales(POS) display, and in Davies and Ward(2005) that the retail store interior image is related to an atmosphere, merchandise, and in-store promotion. Lee et al(2000) suggested as the web merchandising components a merchandising cues, a shopping metaphor which is an assistant tool for search, a store design, a layout(web design), and a product assortment. The store design which includes differentiation, simplicity and navigation is supposed to be related to the attention to the virtual store. Second, the merchandise dimensions comprising product assortments, visual information and product reputation have to do with the interest in the product offerings. Finally, the merchandising cues that refer to merchandiser(MD)'s recommendation of products and providing the hyperlinks to relevant goods for the shopper is concerned with attempt to induce the desire to purchase. The questionnaire survey was carried out to collect the data about the consumers who would shop at internet shopping malls frequently. To select the subject malls, the mall ranking data announced by a mall rating agency was used to differentiate the most popular and least popular five mall each. The subjects was instructed to answer the questions after navigating the designated mall for five minutes. The 300 questionnaire was distributed to the consumers, 166 samples were used in the final analysis. The empirical testing focused on identifying and confirming the dimensionality of VMD and its subdimensions using a structural equation modeling method. The confirmatory factor analysis for the endogeneous and exogeneous variables was carried out in four parts. The second-order factor analysis was done for a store design, a merchandise, and a merchandising cues, and first-order confirmatory factor analysis for the attitude toward the VMD. The model test results shows that the chi-square value of structural equation is 144.39(d.f 49), significant at 0.01 level which means the proposed model was rejected. But, judging from the ratio of chi-square value vs. degree of freedom, the ratio was 2.94 which smaller than an acceptable level of 3.0, RMR is 0.087 which is higher than a generally acceptable level of 0.08. GFI and AGFI is turned out to be 0.90 and 0.84 respectively. Both NFI and NNFI is 0.94, and CFI 0.95. The major test results are as follows; first, the second-order factor analysis and structural equational modeling reveals that the differentiation, simplicity and ease of identifying current status of the transaction are confirmed to be subdimensions of store design and to be a significant predictors of the dependent variable. This result implies that when designing an online shopping mall, it is necessary to differentiate visually from other malls to improve the effectiveness of the communications of store design. That is, the differentiated store design raise the contrast stimulus to sensory organs to promote the memory of the store and to have a favorable attitude toward the VMD of a store. The results that navigation which means the easiness of identifying current status of shopping affects the attitude to VMD could be interpreted that the navigating processes via the hyperlinks which is characteristics of an internet shopping is a complex and cognitive process and shoppers are likely to lack the sense of overall structure of the store. Consequently, shoppers are likely to be alost amid shopping not knowing where to go. The orientation tool enhance the accessibility of information to raise the perceptive power about the store environment.(Titus & Everett 1995) Second, the primary dimension of merchandise and its subdimensions was confirmed to be unidimensional respectively, have a construct validity, and nomological validity which the VMD dimensions supposed to have a positive correlation with the dependent variable. The subdimensions of product assortment, brand fame and information provision proved to have a positive effect on the attitude toward the VMD. It could be interpreted that the more plentiful the product and brand assortment of the mall is, the more likely the shoppers to favor it. Brand fame and information provision as well affect the VMD attitude, which means that the more famous the brand, the more likely the shoppers would trust and feel familiar with the mall, and the plentifully and visually presented information could have the shopper have a favorable attitude toward the store VMD. Third, it turned out to be that merchandising cue of product recommendation and hyperlinks affect the VMD attitude. This could be interpreted that recommended products could reduce the uncertainty related with the purchase decision, and the hyperlinks to relevant products would help the shopper save the cognitive effort exerted into the information search and gathering, which could lead to a favorable attitude to the VMD. This study tried to sheds some new light on the VMD of online store by reviewing the variables mentioned to be relevant with offline VMD in the existing literatures, and tried to link the VMD components from the perspective of AIDA model. The effect size of the VMD dimensions on the attitude was in the order of the merchandise, the store design and the merchandising cues.It is said that an internet has an unlimited place for display, however, the virtual store is not unlimited since the consumer has a limited amount of cognitive ability to process the external information and internal memory. Particularly, the shoppers are likely to face some difficulties in decision making on account of too many alternative and information overloads. Therefore, the internet shopping mall manager should take into consideration the cost of information search on the part of the consumer, to establish the optimal product placements and search routes. An efficient store composition would be possible by reducing the psychological burdens and cognitive efforts exerted to information search and alternatives evaluation. The store image is in most part determined by the product category and its brand it deals in. The results of this study support this proposition that the merchandise is most important to the VMD attitude than other components, the manager is required to take a strategic approach to VMD. The internet users are getting more accustomed and more knowledgeable about the internet media and more likely to accept the internet as a shopping channel as the period of time during which they use the internet to shop become longer. The web merchandiser should be aware that the product introduction using a moving pictures and a bulletin board become more important in order to present the interactive product information visually and communicate with customers more actively, therefore leading to making the quantity and quality of product information more rich.

• Journal of Distribution Research
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• v.15 no.2
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• pp.101-122
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• 2010

In this study, it is explored whether positive and negative emotions affected hedonic and utilitarian values experienced while shopping apparel in the Internet. In addition, the effect of hedonic and utilitarian shopping values on store approach behaviors was explored. For this study, Babin and Attaway's research model that was used for off-line shopping malls was adopted to investigate the relationships among research variables. Data obtained through experiments with 278 female college students were submitted for an analysis. Exploratory and confirmatory factor analysis and structural equation modeling with AMOS 6.0 were used to analyze data. Based on the model test, negative emotions negatively affected hedonic and utilitarian shopping value perception while positive emotions positively affected hedonic and utilitarian shopping value perception for the Internet apparel shopping site. Hedonic and utilitarian shopping values positively influenced attitude toward the Internet shopping site while only utilitarian shopping value affected revisiting Internet apparel shopping site. Managerial and academic implications were generated based on results.

• Journal of Fashion Business
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• v.23 no.1
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• pp.25-36
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• 2019

The purpose of this study is to offer a base line data to facilitate entrance of a Korean fashion company into the Uzbekistan market by conducting a survey of the Uzbekistan students in Korea. This is done in order to gather data on their clothes wearing condition and factors affecting the purchase intention for Korean fashion products. In this study, a survey was conducted to 260 Uzbekistan students in Korea. The results of the study were as follows: 1) Uzbekistan students bought clothes mainly from road shops and the Internet. They bought a lot of pants, shirts, jackets, jumpers, and preferred to wear black, white, blue, and red color. The dissatisfactory parts were shown in order of the width of trousers, the length of the sleeve, and the shoulder. The most unsatisfying products were the pants and T-shirt. 2) They considered the aesthetics of the fashion products evaluation criteria, the human source and the internet advertisement of the fashion information source, and the customer service of the store selection criteria. These students showed very favorable attitude towards Hallyu and Korea. In addition, their preference and purchase intention for KFP were high. 3) The level of satisfaction on 'quality', 'color', and 'care' of KFP were very high, but lowest on the 'size' and 'price' of the clothes. 4) It was revealed that the attitude toward Hallyu and Korea, the satisfaction and preference of KFP, and demographics have a significant impact on the intention toward purchasing fashion products.

• Journal of Global Scholars of Marketing Science
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• v.18 no.4
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• pp.245-276
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• 2008

Brand equity is one of the most important concepts in business practice as well as in academic research. Successful brands can allow marketers to gain competitive advantage (Lassar et al.,1995), including the opportunity for successful extensions, resilience against competitors' promotional pressures, and the ability to create barriers to competitive entry (Farquhar, 1989). Branding plays a special role in service firms because strong brands increase trust in intangible products (Berry, 2000), enabling customers to better visualize and understand them. They reduce customers' perceived monetary, social, and safety risks in buying services, which are obstacles to evaluating a service correctly before purchase. Also, a high level of brand equity increases consumer satisfaction, repurchasing intent, and degree of loyalty. Brand equity can be considered as a mixture that includes both financial assets and relationships. Actually, brand equity can be viewed as the value added to the product (Keller, 1993), or the perceived value of the product in consumers' minds. Mahajan et al. (1990) claim that customer-based brand equity can be measured by the level of consumers' perceptions. Several researchers discuss brand equity based on two dimensions: consumer perception and consumer behavior. Aaker (1991) suggests measuring brand equity through price premium, loyalty, perceived quality, and brand associations. Viewing brand equity as the consumer's behavior toward a brand, Keller (1993) proposes similar dimensions: brand awareness and brand knowledge. Thus, past studies tend to identify brand equity as a multidimensional construct consisted of brand loyalty, brand awareness, brand knowledge, customer satisfaction, perceived equity, brand associations, and other proprietary assets (Aaker, 1991, 1996; Blackston, 1995; Cobb-Walgren et al., 1995; Na, 1995). Other studies tend to regard brand equity and other brand assets, such as brand knowledge, brand awareness, brand image, brand loyalty, perceived quality, and so on, as independent but related constructs (Keller, 1993; Kirmani and Zeithaml, 1993). Walters(1978) defined information search as, "A psychological or physical action a consumer takes in order to acquire information about a product or store." But, each consumer has different methods for informationsearch. There are two methods of information search, internal and external search. Internal search is, "Search of information already saved in the memory of the individual consumer"(Engel, Blackwell, 1982) which is, "memory of a previous purchase experience or information from a previous search."(Beales, Mazis, Salop, and Staelin, 1981). External search is "A completely voluntary decision made in order to obtain new information"(Engel & Blackwell, 1982) which is, "Actions of a consumer to acquire necessary information by such methods as intentionally exposing oneself to advertisements, taking to friends or family or visiting a store."(Beales, Mazis, Salop, and Staelin, 1981). There are many sources for consumers' information search including advertisement sources such as the internet, radio, television, newspapers and magazines, information supplied by businesses such as sales people, packaging and in-store information, consumer sources such as family, friends and colleagues, and mass media sources such as consumer protection agencies, government agencies and mass media sources. Understanding consumers' purchasing behavior is a key factor of a firm to attract and retain customers and improving the firm's prospects for survival and growth, and enhancing shareholder's value. Therefore, marketers should understand consumer as individual and market segment. One theory of consumer behavior supports the belief that individuals are rational. Individuals think and move through stages when making a purchase decision. This means that rational thinkers have led to the identification of a consumer buying decision process. This decision process with its different levels of involvement and influencing factors has been widely accepted and is fundamental to the understanding purchase intention represent to what consumers think they will buy. Brand equity is not only companies but also very important asset more than product itself. This paper studies brand equity model and influencing factors including information process such as information searching and information resources in the fashion market in Asia and Europe. Information searching and information resources are influencing brand knowledge that influences consumers purchase decision. Nine research hypotheses are drawn to test the relationships among antecedents of brand equity and purchase intention and relationships among brand knowledge, brand value, brand attitude, and brand loyalty. H1. Information searching influences brand knowledge positively. H2. Information sources influence brand knowledge positively. H3. Brand knowledge influences brand attitude. H4. Brand knowledge influences brand value. H5. Brand attitude influences brand loyalty. H6. Brand attitude influences brand value. H7. Brand loyalty influences purchase intention. H8. Brand value influence purchase intention. H9. There will be the same research model in Asia and Europe. We performed structural equation model analysis in order to test hypotheses suggested in this study. The model fitting index of the research model in Asia was $X^2$=195.19(p=0.0), NFI=0.90, NNFI=0.87, CFI=0.90, GFI=0.90, RMR=0.083, AGFI=0.85, which means the model fitting of the model is good enough. In Europe, it was $X^2$=133.25(p=0.0), NFI=0.81, NNFI=0.85, CFI=0.89, GFI=0.90, RMR=0.073, AGFI=0.85, which means the model fitting of the model is good enough. From the test results, hypotheses were accepted. All of these hypotheses except one are supported. In Europe, information search is not an antecedent of brand knowledge. This means that sales of global fashion brands like jeans in Europe are not expanding as rapidly as in Asian markets such as China, Japan, and South Korea. Young consumers in European countries are not more brand and fashion conscious than their counter partners in Asia. The results have theoretical, practical meaning and contributions. In the fashion jeans industry, relatively few studies examining the viability of cross-national brand equity has been studied. This study provides insight on building global brand equity and suggests information process elements like information search and information resources are working differently in Asia and Europe for fashion jean market.