Building Resilience to Consumer Culture Through Community Involvement

 Tim Kasser, Ph.D.

Knox College 

When I speak to audiences about the problems of consumer culture, I typically review published empirical research on materialistic values and goals.   At some point in my talk, I usually mention the finding that materialistic values oppose pro-social behavior and social cohesion.  In support of this, I present correlations showing that people with strong materialistic values have significantly lower empathy, more competitiveness, more Machiavellian tendencies, and less generosity, and engage in fewer pro-social behaviors.   I then make my point:  Materialism undermines a healthy society. 

This interpretation naturally leads to a strategy for social change:  We should remove materialistic messages from the surrounding world.  Indeed, that is the general strategy most of us affiliated with CCFC operate under.  We aim to get ads out of schools and public places.  We aim to regulate or eliminate advertising directed at children.   

While I still agree with these strategies, we can consider these same correlations from another angle:  When people are more empathic, less competitive, less Machiavellian, more generous, and more pro-social, then they are less materialistic.   Support for this interpretation also comes from the research of Grouzet et al. (2005) of Schwartz (1992), who have shown in dozens of nations around the world that values and aspirations for financial success directly oppose those for community feeling and for universalism.  As Schwartz (1992) wrote: “acceptance of others as equals and concern for their welfare interferes with the pursuit of one’s own relative success and dominance over others.” 

If we think about this way of understanding these correlations, we should consider adopting yet another strategy to fight against the commercialization of childhood.  That is, if we encourage the values of helping the world be a better place and of caring about other people and other species, then we can build up the values that naturally oppose the materialistic values that cause so many problems.     

There are three reasons why this is important for CCFC to consider.  First, community involvement provides a clear alternative to kids, parents and school teachers who ask “What else do you have to offer instead of consumerism?”  Second, it suggests that CCFC has many allies who may not be directly fighting commercialism, but who may be doing so indirectly.  Finally, because it will take a long time to remove materialistic messages from our children’s world, we can, in the mean time, be inoculating kids and building their resistance to consumerism by encouraging them to care about community involvement.  

Tim Kasser PhD (tkasser@knox.edu) is associate professor of psychology at Knox College in Galesburg, IL. He is author of The High Price of Materialism (MIT Press, 2002) and co-editor of Psychology and Consumer Culture: The Struggle for a Good Life in a Materialistic World (APA, 2004).