The primary aim of this study was to analyze the fashion trend of wearing T-shirts with slogans at home and abroad and to consider the social influence of these shirts on fashion. The research method was based on the documentary method and the existing literature, and the study range was limited to the period from the middle of the 20th century to the present. Slogan T-shirts played important roles because they make the wearers highly visible wherever they go. T-shirts with slogans not only intentionally expressed the wearers’ views on multiple social issues but they also made those issues more visible, thereby encouraging society to deal with them. The T-shirts also helped to form a social consensus regarding the issues. For this reason we referred to slogan T-shirts as ‘the social fashion’ in this research. Regarding the results, the research found that T-shirts with slogans were a social fashion that conveyed real political slogans and thus influenced people’s political beliefs. Second, they politicized the issues in public interests with the public perspective. Third, the purpose of slogan T-shirts was to help people express their personality publicly and thereby bond with other people who held similar sympathies. Furthermore, the T-shirts conveyed multiple meanings in each message.

Born in the 19th century as an intermediate between the past and the future, steampunk provides a strong feeling of fantasy. The objective of this research is to understand the utilization of steampunk in all realms through an in-depth literature review and empirical study. Taking the findings as a foundation, we will analyze examples shown in fashion designs that are put into real production, and those designs that can provide inspiration for further design development. The research methodology will constitute a major analysis of advanced research, internet materials, and literature. Photo materials will be collected from professional websites for steampunk. The product method such as follows. Firstly, we will classify the internal meaning of characteristics in steampunk that are similar to the characteristics that are being researched, then take it as the standard and arrange to integrate all five features: restoration, pluralism, duplicity, resistibility and abnormality. We will spread out the design based on images from advanced research. Secondly, in order for to design a steampunk product, I decided on four themes: devastated environment, brutal wars, cool-headed machinery, and the overlap of the future and the past. Inspiration was acquired from representative movies and animations featuring steampunk. Thus, new directions for fashion design with steampunk features can be discovered. It raises the feasibility of this combination in modern society. In the future with the development of technology, it functions as a design that is easy for users to approach.

The purpose of this study is to classify fashion lifestyle types for color planning and to propose color planning of spring & summer by fashion lifestyle by analyzing preferred colors by fashion lifestyle type. The survey was conducted on women between the ages of 30 and 59 using a separately prepared questionnaire and color sample table and also through one-on-one interviews. The results of this study are as follows. First, the participants’ fashion lifestyles were divided into three categories: information individuality type, display type, and practicality type. Second, regarding basic colors: the basic color consistently used for a long time, it was found that there were significant differences in preferred hue and tone according to the types of fashion lifestyles. Specifically, the most preferred hue of all the fashion lifestyle types was achromatic color N and the most preferred tone was V. Third, regarding color trends: the trendy color occupying a market transiently, there were significant differences in preferred hue and preferred tone according to the types of fashion lifestyle. The most preferred hue of all the fashion lifestyle types was B. The most preferred tone of the information individuality type and the display type was V, and that of the practicality type was B. The study found that, in color planning, fashion lifestyles can function as an effective tool to subdivide consumers. Based on the empirical results of this study, I propose that color planning should be based on the type of fashion lifestyle.

The importance of marketing on mobile platforms as well as mobile commerce is increasing dramatically in fashion industry. The purpose of this study was to categorize mobile fashion marketing strategies and to examine application usage motivations that influence brand attitude, purchase decisions, and post-purchase evaluation. Qualitative research methods, in particular focus-groups and in-depth interviews, were conducted to examine the typology of mobile marketing and fashion application usage motivations. Then, a modified survey was used to quantitatively examine what content consumers expect from fashion applications. Results of the qualitative study indicated that consumers perceive sensory (visual, tactile, auditory), relationship, information and practical marketing strategies through motives. Survey result from 229 consumers revealed four fashion application usage motives: sensory, relationship, information and practical. Based on these motives consumers were segmented into three groups: the experience/relationship-conscious, the product informationconscious, and the lifestyle information-conscious. The product information-conscious group showed higher level of monthly income and clothing expenses but lower level of mobile device usages. Lifestyle information-conscious group and experience/ relationship-conscious group had higher level of attitude, and post-purchase evaluation. It was experience-relationship conscious consumers who spent more time in mobile use. This study shows a better understanding of mobile marketing environment of fashion applications.

The purposes of this study were to: 1) identify sub-factors of fashion shopping orientation (FSO) in adults aged 20 through 39, and analyze the differences among those FSO factors according to classified groups, which were based on gender and purchase frequency in a mobile shopping mall, and 2) to investigate the effects of FSO factors on mobile purchase intention according to the same classified groups. The questionnaire was conducted from November 10, 2015 to November 20, 2015 and its 432 respondents were classified into four groups, which were male/heavy purchaser, male/light purchaser, female/heavy purchaser, and female/light purchaser. The results of this study were as follows: First, fashion shopping orientation consisted of five sub-factors, which included “conspicuous brand pursuit”, “economic pursuit”, “pleasure/trend pursuit”, “impulse shopping”, and “convenience pursuit”. Second, There were significant differences in three factors of FSO between male purchasers and female purchasers. Male purchasers showed higher tendency than female purchasers in “conspicuous brand pursuit”, while female purchasers showed higher tendency than male purchasers in “economic pursuit” and “convenience pursuit”. All the factors of FSO showed significant differences among the classified groups. Third, “economic pursuit”, “pleasure/trend pursuit” and “convenience pursuit” affected mobile purchase intention in the case of male purchasers while “economic pursuit” and “conspicuous brand pursuit” had a influence on mobile purchase intention in the case of female purchasers. Fourth, the factors of FSO affected mobile purchase intention partly in each group. In conclusion. “economic pursuit” was proven to be the main influential factor to induce consumers to have a mobile purchase intention.

This study considers the modern expression of oriental esthetics by analyzing the fashion design with the Chinese ink technique based on the concept of Chi-Yun- Sheng-Tung, which was regarded as the best rule of art creation in oriental history. This study was performed by conducting a literature review of related books and advanced studies, and then, collection analysis was done with photos derived from fashion websites (seoulfashionweek.org, chinafashionweek.org, vogue.com, firstview. com) from 2010 S/S to 2016 S/S. A total of 317 fashion photos of designs created using the Chinese ink technique by Korean designers at Seoul Fashion Week and Chinese designers at China Fashion Week were analyzed. The contemporary fashions created with the Chinese ink technique were characterized by, first, the bold brush strokes and natural spreading effects of Chinese ink, second, the emphasis of empty space by taking essential elements, and third, the coexistence of deep Chinese ink colors with modern primary colors. The formativeness of the contemporary fashions created with Chinese ink technique based on Chi-Yun-Sheng-Tung were as follows: first, temperance, pursuing spiritual and minimal expression, second, empty space, making design elements interact and pursue harmony, third, changeable rhythm, symbolizing the growth and variation revealing the power of life, and fourth, vitality, represented in the rhythmical movement of the brush. This study was based on the oriental esthetics inherent in Chi-Yun-Sheng-Tung, and it attempted to analyze contemporary fashion design. The aim was to show the possibility of modern applications to traditional values, and it can be a meaningful case in design planning based on culture.

Social networking sites (SNS) are defined as web-based services that enable consumers to create a public profile and a list of contacts with whom they share a social network (Kang et al., 2014). On SNS sites, consumers can find the right product, obtain advice from people, make purchases, post product recommendations, reviews and photos, and create SNS communities (Shen, 2008). The shopping motive acts as an important trigger to browse for products on social media websites. Product browsing over social media sites could influence the intention of future purchase and sharing information of product and brand with friend and acquaintances. For companies related to social media business, both intention to purchase and information sharing are crucial elements. However, few efforts have been made to identify the factors driving consumer intentions to purchase and word-of-mouth of fashion products on social media sites. The objectives of this study were to determine the factor to facilitate product browsing and to find out the causative relationship among influential factors and consumer intentions to purchase and word-of-mouth of fashion products on social media sites. The instrument was developed based on the previous literatures (Brien, 2010; Park, et al., 2012; To, 2007; Woo & Hwang, 2013) and each item was measured by five-point Liker type scales. A total of 269 data were collected during a regularly scheduled class in universities, who have experienced to purchase fashion products or make a product review on social media sites. Mean age of the respondents was 22.3 years old. Nearly 75.3 percent of the subjects were women, and more than half of the respondents (61.6%) have purchased the products (e.g., apparel, shoes, etc.) on social commerce sites over three years. The structure equation model analysis was conducted by AMOS 23.0 using a correlation matrix with maximum likelihood approach. The structural equation model was relatively acceptable (chi-square value = 136.30, df = 66, p = .000; GFI = .94, AGFI = .91, RMR = .05). Cronbach's alphas were ranged between .83 and .87. This result suggests that utilitarian shopping motives have influenced directly product browsing, purchase intention, and word-of-mouth intentions of fashion products on social media sites. The more product browsing on social media sites, the more intended to purchase and word-of-mouth of fashion products with friend and acquaintances. It implies that consumer with utilitarian shopping motives are likely to more browse, and then to more purchase and write the review of fashion products on social media sites. However, consumers with hedonic shopping motives are prone to more write the review of fashion products to their friends and acquaintances without product browsing or purchase intention on social media sites.

There is a general consensus in the literature that impulse buying is normatively wrong, but accounts for a substantial volume of the goods sold every year across the broad range of product categories, including fashion products. Research revealed that young consumers particularly contributed greatly to the increase of impulse buying. While lack of self-control has been found strongly associated with the unplanned nature of impulse buying, with an environment of abundance and consumerism, self-indulgence, rather than lack of self-control, may become a more important driver for impulse buying for modern consumers (Sharma, Sivakumaran, & Marshall, 2011). Therefore, the purpose of this study is to investigate how self-indulgence influences young consumers’ impulse buying and the post purchase consumer regret. This study also aims to test the role of fashion consciousness in the relationship between young consumers’ self-indulgence and impulse buying for fashion products. Self-indulgence is considered a hedonistic tendency, which includes enjoying spending money on oneself, buying things for one’s own pleasure, and trying to enjoy life (Sharma, Sivakumaran, & Marshall, 2011). It was recognized as one of the two opposing cognitive forces leading to impulse behavior (Miao, 2011). While the impulse to purchase is comprised of anticipated pleasures and immediate gratification (Rook, 1987), ironically, consumer regret is one of the major emotional consequences associated with impulse buying. There are two types of consumer regret: cognitive dissonance, resulted from an immediate post-purchase comparison of what was purchased versus the other available alternatives, and consumer guilt, related specifically to the consumption decision situations. Literature suggested that individuals show interest in fashion products with the belief that fashion products will contribute to their appearance, image, and/or bring enjoyment to their life (Workman & Kidd, 2000). In that same token, an individual with high self-indulgence tendency is more likely to show interest in fashion in hopes of identifying fashion items for indulgence purpose. Moreover, this indulgence motivated fashion consciousness will more likely lead to high impulse buying for fashion products. Based on the literature, hypotheses were developed for this study as represented in the following figure. Data was collected using a survey of college students majored in textile/fashion management at a large southeast university in the USA. A total of 190 surveys were distributed and returned. The majority of the subjects were females (73.7%), white (74.7%), and held part-time work (56.7%). Existing scales were adopted to measure self-indulgence (Sharma, Sivakumaran, & Marshall, 2011) and fashion consciousness (Bruner & Hensel, 1998). Impulse buying behavior and post-purchase regret were measured by asking subjects to retroactively recall their shopping trips for fashion products during the past three months. A group of items developed by the researchers were used to measure both the impulse buying behavior and consumer regret. A Confirmatory Factor Analysis (CFA) was first employed to assess the psychometric properties of the constructs. Overall, the fit indices of the measurement model were acceptable (NFI=0.86, IFI=0.935, RMSEA=0.066, CMIN/DF=1.7). A Structural Equation Modeling (SEM) was conducted to test the relationship proposed in the hypotheses. To test the mediating effect of fashion consciousness on the relationship between self-indulgence and impulse buying behaviors, a bootstrapping bias-corrected confidence interval procedure was conducted. Overall, the fit indices of the SEM model were acceptable (CMN/df=1.338, NFI=0.90, IFI=0.97, RMSEA=0.044). The SEM results suggested that self-indulgence had a significant influence on impulse buying for fashion products directly and indirectly via fashion consciousness. The impulse purchase behavior had a positive influence on the consumers’ feeling of guilt for the impulse purchase behavior, while no significant influence was found on cognitive dissonance. This research makes several contributions to the literature of impulse buying. First, the study suggests that consumers’ self-indulgence exerts significant direct and indirect influences on consumers’ impulse buying for fashion products. This result may provide an explanation to the phenomenon of increasing impulse buying behavior in the marketplace, even though it is widely considered as a “misbehavior”. Secondly, this study suggests a significant mediating role of fashion consciousness in the relationship between self-indulgence on consumers’ impulse buying for fashion products. The abundance of fashion products in the market and the appreciation of the social and affective function of fashion products contribute to the chain effect from self-indulgence to fashion consciousness and finally to impulse purchase for fashion products. Third, this study confirms the negative guilt feeling resulted from the impulse buying behavior.

The ever-evolving fashion industry has brought forth direct and indirect effects on the environmentto the extent that environmental contamination, labor exploitation, and pirated or counterfeit products have emerged as serious social issues. The sustainability-related issues are associated with all stages of the product lifecycle, ranging from the extraction of raw materials to product disposal (Berkhout & Smith, 1999).In lifecycle management (LCM), the triple bottom line (TBL) of sustainability is seen from the perspective of the product lifecycle (Kocmanova & Nemecek, 2009). TBL refers to corporate efforts to keep a balance among financial viability, environmental soundness and social accountability (Elkington, 1997). As sustainable products are defined in the light of lifecycles, research on product lifecycle management (PLM) has drawn much attention (Gmelin & Seuring, 2014).In addition, PLM is known to exert substantial effects on new product development, which warrants the need to view new sustainable products from the perspective of PLM (Cantamessa, Montagna, & Neirotti, 2012). Therefore, the present study intends to apply a conceptual model of PLM-based new sustainable product development to the fashion industry and to take multifaceted approaches to sustainable fashion product development. To that end, case studies of 21 local and global sustainable fashion brands, 1:1 in-depth interviews with 24 experts from sustainable and non-sustainable fashion brands, and participant observation of 5 sustainable fashion brands were conducted as part of this study. The findings illuminate the management issues attributable to the lack of technology and expertise, as well as the quantification issues involving monitoring or normalized data collection, despite the presence of some process-specific sustainable items in sustainable products developed by the fashion brands. Also, the findings will serve as reference data for further discussions and provide some implications for the sustainable fashion product development of fashion brands.

Despite the consumer's interest in sustainable fashion and the sustainable fashion phenomenon in the fashion business being a serious issue for our society, only a limited number of studies focus on investigating the consumer's perceived value of sustainable fashion. Although eco-friendly consumption has been recognized as one of the major concerns of the fashion business, environmentally prudent consumption has not yet transformed into purchasing behavior. However, fashion companies try to offer many seasonal collections due to the fast fashion trends to meet the consumer's needs. Such trends have brought about an enormous amount of apparel waste, negative environmental impacts and serious questions about social issues. In addition, today’s fashion consumers appear to have a narrow point of view on sustainable/green fashion that focuses mainly on organic clothing, and avoids or shows no interest in the wider scope of sustainability encompassing environmental, social and economic concerns (Cervellon, Hjerth, Richard, & Carey, 2010). Increasing the consumption of sustainable fashion necessitates research into how fashion consumers make purchasing decisions. Therefore, the information and value of sustainable fashion need to be diffused by fashion consumers. Hethom and Ulasewicz (2008) stated that the consumer acts as a major stakeholder with the greatest impact on the development of a sustainable industry. Furthermore, it is necessary to examine the consumer's purchase decision-making process for sustainable fashion products in academia. According to previous studies, the awareness of sustainability issues is also growing due to the environmental impacts. However, this awareness has not yet affected apparel purchasing behavior and actual purchasing (Kim & Damhorst, 1998). In order to affect the behavior of fashion consumers and expand sustainable fashion in today's marketplace, it is essential to identify the influencing factors in purchase decision-making process for sustainable fashion products.

Using a range of interpretive methods, including focus-group interviews, in-depth interviews, and structured field observations, this study investigates how shopping experiences within sustainable fashion stores may cause consumers to change their attitudes towards sustainable fashion. Heider’s balance theory was applied to interpret the results, whereby we constructed the maps of individual consumers’ positive and negative associations of concepts, events, and outcomes within consumers’ purchasing decisions about sustainable fashion products. Our findings suggest that there could often be a gap between the consumer’s perception of sustainable fashion and their actual purchase behavior, which creates an ‘imbalanced’ state. However, positive store experiences may persuade consumers to achieve a balance by purchasing sustainable fashion products. The study provides important and theoretical and practical insights for sustainable fashion marketing

As mass production techniques developed in technological innovation due to the industrial revolution, the world started to face serious pollution problem and therefore ‘sustainable’ and ‘eco-friendly’ movement showed up in our societies. The fashion industry has emphasized the environmental design since the early 1960s. However, in the system engaged on trends and mass-production process, fashion designers and consumers could not pay more attention to the environment issues as expected. In these days, consumers not just in fashion products but also any other products started to care about ‘fair trades’, ‘environmental issues’, ‘human rights’, and ‘donations’ when they shop. Therefore, if fashion industries pay more attention to sustainable marketing and merchandising while selling their products, it will help consumers to build up a ‘sustainable thinking’. Usage of eco-friendly materials and recycling are well-known for practicing eco- friendly fashion but unfortunately, they are only limited in the process of making and disposal stage in fashion. Nowadays, there is an increasing concern and emphasis on fair trade, environmental awareness, human rights and other ethical consumerism practices, and is growing in tendency, which has prompted authentic and honest marketing strategies to become more effective as opposed to the existing one-shot events (Kim et al., 2013). If this trend of planning business strategies with authentic and sustainable tactics is implemented into the Fashion industry, then it will be able to establish a sustainable consumer culture. Until now, contemporary research on environmentally friendly and sustainable fashion are mostly centered on sustainable fashion ideas and studies on sustainable textiles (Fletcher, 2011). However, there was limited studies on sustainable design with various perspectives and design planning, which have much practical and real-world usage for designers or planners in the fashion industry. Therefore, it is necessary to conduct more studies on fashion design planning methods and guidelines that fashion merchandisers and designers in the industry can use.

Sustainability was first presented in 1972. It was how biological systems remain diverse and productive indefinitely. Long-lived and healthy wetlands and forests are examples of sustainable biological systems. Now, people do not only focus on economy but also focus on social, environment and culture. In this paper we try to find out how to build sustainability index based on customers’ perception of companies’ sustainable performance in fashion industry. The index was explored based on American Customer Satisfaction Index. Through testing the sustainability performance of fashion industry using sustainability index this study tries to find out how customers were affected by fashion companies sustainability performance and how to improve customer repurchase intention through sustainability performance.

The market distribution channels has changed from single to multi-channels due to the diffusion of digital development products. In addition the new consumption emergence has been applied in showrooming and reverse-showrooming. One of well-known shopping district in South Korea, Dongdaemun, has been introduced Dongdaemun-based fashion brand which use on/offline multi-channel distribution. This study aims to segment multi-channel attributes of Dongdaemun-based fashion brands and analyse the effects of customer equity attributes, customer satisfaction, and re-purchase intention. The goals of this study are as follows: 1) to identify multi-channel attributes of Dongdaemun-based fashion brands, 2) to analyse the influence of multi-channel attributes on customer equity, customer satisfaction, and repurchase intention, 3) to explore the consumer group differences on shopping orientation. This study applied means-end chain theory to conduct in-depth interviews for the purpose of deriving the multi-channel attributes of Dongdaemun-based fashion brands and explore the influence of such attributes on customer equity, customer satisfaction, and re-purchase intention. This study collected 493 samples and structural equation modeling was used for final data analysis. The main findings of this study are as follows. The multi-channel attributes have a significant impact on value equity and brand equity. Relationship equity is influenced by product diversity, entertainment, and informativeness. The all of customer equity drivers have significantly impacts on repurchase intention and only brand equity have significant effect on repurchase intention. Also, customer satisfaction affects re-purchase intention. Brand equity have a significant influence on CLV. The consumers group differ in how consumers recognize multi-channel attributes of Dongdaemun-based fashion brands, based on channel preference. This study shows the importance of customer equity and suggests long-term implications for the development of Dongdaemun-based fashion brands.

Due to the highly competitive nature of the apparel industry, fashion brands attempt to constantly engage consumers through various marketing strategies. Social media was found to drive female consumer purchases for apparel items. In shopping for fashion, consumers have used their personal connections on social media as an information source about different brands and products and to seek approval of their peers before making a purchase decision (Park & Cho, 2012). Cha (2009) found that female consumers look to their social media network connections for emotional connections, opinions, and approval on clothing, perfume, and accessories they are considering purchasing online. Ruane and Wilson (2013) found that female consumers use social media sites for information on where to shop and what merchandise to purchase. In studying the effect of blogs on corporate outcome, the role Millennials play is found to be significant. They are heavily reliant on word of mouth when up to 93% of Millennials has purchased a product after hearing about it from a family member or friend (Hoffmann, 2014). They not only usually read reviews prior to purchase, but also pass their recommendations via social media post-purchase (Hoffman, 2014). This age group constitutes 27% of the US population and in spite of their lower incomes, they spend more money on e-commerce than any other age group ($2,000 annually) (Smith, 2015). Therefore, this study aims to suggest strategies to fashion brands on effective blog campaign, which may eventually provide insights on how marketers can encourage engagement with female Millennial apparel consumers. The study’s objectives are 1) to examine the effect of brand awareness building customer’s brand credibility, brand similarity and blog engagement 2) to investigate the impact of brand responses on customer’s brand credibility, brand similarity and blog engagement, and 3) interaction effect between brand awareness and brand responses on customer engagement through cognitive evaluation in fashion blog context. A 3 (brand response: automated response, personalized response, no response) x2 (Brand awareness: well know, unknown) experimental design was developed through a pre-test of 139 participants. For main-test, experiment conditions and the following survey were completed by the convenience sample of 537 students in a large Southern university. Research findings revealed the significant impact of brand awareness on customer perceived brand credibility and brand similarity which were significant predictors of engagement intention. In contrast, the study indicated the insignificant relationship between brand responses and blog engagement intention. Study’s result not only suggested implications for marketers but also expanded further studies contributing on the body of knowledge.

A firm’s new product success is mainly determined by how well it is accepted by the mass in a short time. Although companies have been adopting various marketing methods, word-of-mouth [WOM] has been regarded as one of the most effective means for customer acquisition (Villanueva, Yoo & Hanssens, 2008), primarily due to its reliability, social support, and support by social pressure and surveillance as Arndt (1967) has suggested (as cited in Woodside and Delozier, 1976). Moreover, online word-of-mouth is being given new significance alongside the advent of social media such as Facebook, Twitter, blogs, and other online channels (Berger and Iyengar, 2013; Dellarocase, 2003; Schafer & Taddicken, 2015). For this reason, researchers have paid a close attention to opinion leaders, who are not only early adopters of innovation themselves (Goldsmith & Witt, 2003), but also information transmitters and influencers (Vernette, 2004). Therefore, this study aims to identify both online and offline opinion leaders, who could adopt new products first, and diffuse the adoption of new products to others. Thus, this study draws upon the innovation diffusion theory conceptualized by Rogers (1995). According to Rogers (1995), innovation is defined as an individual’s or an organization’s perception of an idea as new. In addition, he articulates that if an innovation is transferred through certain communication channels over time within a social system by its members, diffusion occurs (Rogers, 1995; Rogers, 2002). The main purpose of this paper is to examine the intermediary role of opinion leadership as a quintessential link between consumer characteristics (consumer innovativeness and lifestyle and values) and new product adoption behavior. The research data is collected through survey, which is conducted by distributing questionnaires to a group of users of Apple Watch by Apple, Mi band by Xiaomi, and the products by Fitbit. The model of the study will be tested through structural equation modeling approach. In particular, this paper considers not only regular opinion leadership in offline context, but also online opinion leadership in order to go with the tide of the developing online world. Moreover, this study selects wearable technology as a new product category, which makes the overall research highly fashion-oriented. Furthermore, this study explores the moderating effect of involvement of product category on the relationship between lifestyles and values and opinion leadership. The author anticipates that fashion innovativeness and four lifestyle and values factors (sense of accomplishment, self-fulfillment, excitement, and fun and enjoyment) will positively affect online and offline opinion leaderships, which again will have a positive influence on new product adoption behavior. Moreover, this study predicts that the correlation between lifestyles and values and involvement of product category will have a positive influence on online and offline opinion leaderships and new product adoption behavior. This study may contribute both to the academia and to the managers within businesses that deal with wearable devices. Theoretically, this study is of particular value in that it adopts consumers’ lifestyles and values as predictors of opinion leadership and new product adoption behavior, which is an uncommon approach within existing research streams regarding opinion leadership and new product acquisition. In managerial terms, by revealing the significant relationships between the consumer characteristics and both offline and online opinion leaderships who are the potential customers of new products, this study enables the managers to identify their targets and differentiate their marketing strategies considering the different characteristics of consumers in offline and online environments. In particular, since this study adopted several wearable technologies as new products, businesses that deal with wearable devices may pay close attention to the results of this study and manipulate their marketing strategies in adequate terms.

While it was found that consumers’ experience on purchase intention is significantly affected by greater involvement in blogging (Hsu & Tsou, 2011), not many fashion companies use blogs to improve online consumption and relationship with their employee or customer (Fieseler & Fleck, 2013). Further, despite the growing significance of blog communication, there is a lack of understanding for the impact of accumulation of social capital in the blogosphere on the consumers’ attitude and engagement in previous research. This study is designed to address this gap, and particularly the role of three dimensions of social capital (i.e., structural, relational, and cognitive) in understanding blog user’s attitude and engagement. The purpose of this study is to investigate 1) the effect of blog user’s motivation (i.e., perceived usefulness, perceived ease of use, reputation, altruism, enjoyment, community identification) on their level of social capital within the blog 2) the influence of structural social capital and cognitive social on user’s relational social capital and 3) the impact of relational social capital on blog user’s attitude and engagement. Data was collected through a marketing research firm utilizing online survey method. With 530 usable data, the results of this study indicated enjoyment have positive significant effect on structural social capital while community identification have negative significant effect on structural social capital. For the effect of blogging motivation on cognitive social capital, the result showed positive significant effect of perceived usefulness, altruism and community identification on cognitive social capital Further, structural social capital does not have relationship with relational social capital while cognitive social capital has significant effect on relational social capital. The results also indicated that the relational social capital has influence on blogging attitude, which in turn has strong positive relationship with blogging engagement. The findings of this study contribute some useful knowledge about fashion blog and the relationships of the three social capital dimensions to the literature. Also, this study not only provides theoretical insight into understanding the influence of fashion blog user’s motivation on blogging behavior and satisfaction of needs of belong, it also exposes the influence of relationships building in blog community on user’s blogging attitude and engagement. Previous studies focused more on social influence on knowledge sharing motivation, and most of the researchers paid attention to the interaction of cognitive social capital and relational capital. This study employs the knowledge sharing motivation findings of previous studies, and it uses the effective motivation factors to test if they have the same impacts on people’s blogging behavior.

Fashion bloggers and their personal brands have attracted significant attention in recent years, as prior research has indicated their importance in shaping the fashion industry. As fashion is cultural-specific social construct, to understand how bloggers’ personal brands are developed, it is critical to examine the practices of bloggers from two different cultures, namely, Taiwanese and American. The two cultures are chosen because fashionable persons in the U.S. are well established and can be considered as qualified brands that accumulate a significant amount of followers and fame. However, this institutional process is still under development in Taiwan where routine practices, norms and rules, and the structural features that serve to guide and constrain the behaviours of individuals have yet been established. To focus on the practices within the institution, the framework of practice theory is applied to analyze how individual bloggers negotiate their ways to become branded persons. Focusing on the best practices in the field, 20 most popular fashion blogs from the U.S. and Taiwan were selected in the sample. The verbal and visual texts visible in these blogs are analyzed. The results suggest that moving from amateur bloggers who take interests in fashion to establishing a well-connected fashionable persona in the fashion industry is a long process of celebrities in the making. The contrasts between the two countries indicate that cultural elements are important factors to consider in understanding the formation of persona-fied brands. It appears that the usual assumption of distinction between the public persona and the private persona does not always imply in persona-fied brands. When the external institutions have yet been established, the practices of such a distinction may prove to be challenging. While all the bloggers included in the sample are still unified persons that encompass both the creation and the execution of the personal brands. U.S. bloggers are slowly moving toward professional management of the brands where they see themselves as persona-fied brands and where other persons may execute the brandable qualities on their behalf. On the other hand, Taiwanese bloggers rarely make such a distinction. In fact, most of the bloggers have yet identified the two facets in their personas. They do not see themselves as micro-celebrities that stand in a higher level of the hierarchy than their fans. They regard themselves as part of a fashionable community where others appreciate their taste. This is evident by the practices of how they organize their communities and how they interact with their fan bases.

Motivated by the recent cases of negligent social responsibility as manifested by foreign luxury fashion brands in Korea, this study investigates whether agency costs depend on the sustainability of different types of corporate governance. Agency costs refer either to vertical costs arising from the relationship between stockholders and managers, or to horizontal costs associated with the potential conflicts between majority and minority stockholders. The firms with luxury fashion brand could spend large sums of money on maintenance of magnificent brand image, thereby increasing the agency cost. On the contrary, the firms may hold down wasteful spending to report a gaudily financial achievement. This results in mitigation of the agency cost.