KOREASCHOLAR

Self-construal refers to how people define themselves in relation to others (Brewer & Gardner 1996; Markus & Kitayama 1991; Singelis 1994) and this concept is relevant to a range of consumer behavior’s (Mandel, 2003; Escalas & Bettman, 2005). Most importantly, self-construal can be used to understand behaviors in which the influence of others may play a significant role in influencing uptake of risky behaviors, such as tobacco smoking. This research examines the role of self-construal in resisting tobacco smoking among Tongan and New Zealand European women. While previous work on self-construal has primarily used a quantitative approach, this study argues that a qualitative approach, specifically using images to represent scale items of self-construal is more effective in capturing the nuances of self-construal in the context of minority groups. This study contributes methodologically to the self-construal literature by demonstrating how a qualitative approach enables the complexities of self-construal to be captured in a way that a quantitative approach would not have allowed.

• ‘Ilaisaane M.E. Fifita(University of Auckland, New Zealand)