Department

Consumer and Food Sciences

Degree

MConSci (Clothing Management) (with distinction)

Validation of a scale to measure consumers' engagement in voluntary simplistic clothing consumption behaviour in South Africa

The study focused on developing and validating a scale to measure consumers' engagement in voluntary simplistic clothing consumption behaviour in South Africa. In today’s environment of mass production and overconsumption, better lifestyle choices should be encouraged to safeguard the earth’s dwindling natural resources. Quick turnaround times and the reduced lifespan of clothing items have given rise to the so-called “fast fashion” industry that, in its entirety, causes great environmental concern. Pertaining to empirical resources to combat the repercussions of this industry, consumers need to adopt more sustainable lifestyles and embrace what is empirically known as “voluntary simplicity” (Leonard-Barton, 1981; Elgin & Mitchell, 1977). To accomplish the envisaged outcome of this study, the guidelines and procedures for scale development prescribed by Kang and Johnson (2011) were particularly useful and led to three phases namely initial scale item generation, scale purification, and scale validation. SPSS statistical software was used for data analysis and as per specified guidelines, the data were randomly split into two datasets to perform scale purification procedures on the first dataset and subsequent scale validation procedures on the second dataset. The insight derived from a valid and reliable measure as in this study can be used by government and other stakeholders to streamline intervention strategies to effectively target sustainable clothing consumption behaviour in the local economy.

Email

[email protected]

Supervisors

• Primary supervisor: Dr NC Sonnenberg
• Co-supervisor: Dr H Taljaard

Research Profiles

• LinkedIn – https://www.linkedin.com/in/tracey-gouveia-reis-42039738
• ResearchGate – https://www.researchgate.net/profile/ Tracey_Reis

Memberships

• International Textile and Apparel Association (ITAA)

Conferences

• Taljaard, H., Sonnenberg, N. & Reis, T. (2018) The development of a scale for measuring voluntary simplistic clothing consumption in the South African emerging market context. International Textile and Apparel Association Annual Conference: Re-imagine the renewable. Cleveland, Ohio, USA, 6-9 Nov. (74% acceptance rate). Proceedings: https://lib.dr.iastate.edu/itaa_proceedings/2018/presentations/46
• Reis, T., Sonnenberg, N. & Taljaard, H. (2018) Developing a scale to measure consumers' engagement in voluntary simplistic clothing consumption behaviour in the South African emerging market context. 13th International South African Association of Family Ecology and Consumer Science Conference. Pretoria, SA, 5-9 March.