Measuring Perceived Economic Inequality: Implications for Consumer Research and Beyond

Perceived economic inequality has emerged as an important predictor of attitudes and behaviors, yet marketing is behind other fields in incorporating this important construct despite its potential for explaining marketplace attitudes and behaviors. However, further integrating this construct into marketing research requires first addressing a measurement problem: researchers in other disciplines (e.g., sociology, psychology, and political science, among others) are not unified in how they define this construct and have developed a wide range of perception-based measures that employ different methodological approaches, many of which lack solid theoretical foundations. This lack of definitional and operational consistency raises significant concerns about whether the perception of economic inequality is truly being measured. I address these gaps by conducting a complete evaluation of the construct of perceived economic inequality in order to guide future research in marketing and beyond. First, I systematically review existing operationalizations to better understand the heterogeneity in approaches. Then, I systematically review definitions and, based on this review, I propose a unified definition of perceived economic inequality. Next, I select multiple measures of perceived economic inequality, and, across a large-scale convergence analysis and three predictive validity studies, I examine the empirical structure of these measures. Critically, I focus on three outcomes within overarching categories where perceived economic inequality should have significant influence: status concerns, fairness concerns, and prosocial behavior. My empirical studies identify and address two critical issues. First, measures of perceived economic inequality differ in their associations with each other and with theoretically relevant constructs. Second, these measures vary in their ability to predict preferences for luxury brands (status concerns), marketplace fairness evaluations (fairness concerns), and donation intentions (prosocial behavior). This lack of convergence and predictive consistency suggests that these measures are not interchangeable, thereby undermining construct validity and suggesting that conclusions about the role of perceived economic inequality on important attitudes and behaviors are inconsistent. Based on these findings, I provide guidelines for choosing a measure of perceived economic inequality, and I propose directions for future research in marketing seeking to apply this construct.

Name thesis:degree_name

Ph D

Discipline thesis:degree_discipline

Business Administration

Grantor dc:publisher

The University of Western Ontario

Year dc:date.issued

2026

Author dc:creator

• Wodnicki, Philippe

Advisors dc:contributor.advisor

• Goode, Miranda
• Kristofferson, Kirk

• Perceived Economic Inequality
• Economic Inequality
• Construct Validity
• Status
• Fairness
• Prosocial Behavior.

Language dc:language.iso

en

Handle dc:identifier.uri

https://hdl.handle.net/20.500.14721/40026

OAI identifier oai:identifier

oai:uwo.scholaris.ca:20.500.14721/40026