Patterns of Vietnamese buying behaviors on luxury branded products

Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to discuss and test the combined effects of openness to experience (OE) and power, and the moderator effects of social norms (SN) and perceived resources on the choice of luxury attributes for branded products in Vietnam. Design/methodology/approach: Based on a self-administered survey data of 207 Vietnamese consumers, a structural equation modeling approach for moderator analysis with latent constructs is used to test the hypotheses. Findings: OE and power have both direct and interactive positive influences on the choice of luxury product attributes. In particular, the effect of OE is weakened by the negative moderator effect of SN, but the effect of power is strengthened by the positive moderator effect of perceived resources. The inclusion of interactions increases the explained variance of the choice of luxury product attributes from 24.8 to 35.8 percent. Research limitations/implications: Future studies would benefit to investigate other personality traits (e.g. extroversion or agreeableness), personal values (e.g. achievement), SN (e.g. descriptive norms) and resources (e.g. time). Practical implications: The study findings suggest that brand managers should attend the how individual and social factors interacts in explaining the choice of luxury product attributes. Originality/value: This study is the first discussing, testing and finding empirical evidence supporting the combined effects of OE and power on the choice of luxury product attributes as well as moderator effects in these relationships