Materialistic Vs Non-Materialism

Materialistic versus Non-Materialistic is a dimension that focuses on the hedonism of humans, for it compares the search of happiness through material items to the search of happiness internally, which these two are quite the opposites according to their definitions. Geert Hofstede proposed several other dimensions of culture and how the differed in their regards. Examples of cultures and services will be discussed within the assignment, for these two dimensions cover extreme levels of culture, while the information on these dimensions is robust, and the importance of each dimension will be discussed with the cultures and services.

When someone is placing too much importance on material items instead of intellectual or spiritual objects,

they are thinking materialistically, while one is also thinking with a materialistic mind frame that everything is caused by a manifestation of matter, but the focus for the class of consumer behavior is on the former definition where one is placing extreme significance on physical matter, (Merriam-Webster, n.d.). Cultures representative of this dimension are seen to have many important monuments or other artificial structures because of the high regard for these objects as being important to the culture in some type of way. France, India, China, and other developed countries are seen to be associated as materialistic cultures because of how they place importance on items they have produced because of how these are seen as building blocks to the countries they are today, which there are many well-known landmarks in these areas that tourist can easily recognize, and these are material objects meant to signify importance. Within these cultures, tours of museums are services provided to anyone interested in learning of the significance to the materials within, and these museums hold most of the important material finds relevant to each culture. The Louvre is an example of such a museum, and it is located in France.

Non-materialistic cultures are the opposite of materialistic cultures because they do not place value on material possessions, while the focus of these cultures is more of a spiritual essence because of how intertwined the church and the state could be.

These cultures are associated with religious laws that can be strict like the Puritans banning Christmas in early America, or the fact that drinking is illegal in Saudi Arabia because of how it is against the Koran. These cultures place high emphasis on self-actualization because of how this is guided by the holy book, and these cultures will not place a significant importance on material goods like the other end of the dimension, which religious books would be the only history relevant to the cultures within this extreme. Services provided in this dimension are more spiritual than the materialistic culture, so churches are services provided to those who want to worship, which these services may be mandated in certain

cultures.
Geert Hofstede was a scientist that studied cultures of many different walks of life to find that each of these cultures differed in one way or another, and Hofstede proposed five dimensions of culture that study the relationship of social interactions, which he proposed that a high level of social mores is necessary to prevent ambiguity in one of these dimensions, (Brink, n.d.).

These different dimensions have an impact on marketing, which materialistic societies will respond to more informative advertisements about specific luxury products or must-haves, and the non-materialistic culture will not respond well to such advertisements because of how they are content within themselves with the guidance of their spiritual other. The non-materialistic societies will be more focused on spiritual alignment than getting the new Bentley, which means that more operantly conditioned advertisements would be effective in these cultures.

In conclusion, Gert Hofstede defined some of the most significant dimensions of culture through his empirical research of different cultures, which there are still many other dimensions not defined within these five, and the materialistic versus non-materialistic culture is one such dimension. The materialistic culture focuses on material items, while the non-materialistic culture focuses on self-fulfillment and spiritual alignment. Churches are services that are quite successful in these non-materialistic cultures, while luxury car dealerships and museums

are cash cows in materialistic cultures.

References:
Brink, T. L. (n.d.) "UNIT 6: MOTIVES & ATTITUDES". Retrieved from http://my.uopeople.edu/pluginfile.php/94690/mod_book/chapter/69944/BUS3302Unit04RA.pdf
Materialism. (n.d.) In Merriam Webster online. Retrieved from http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/materialism