Image Congruity or Functional Congruity? The Moderating Effect From the Social Visibility of Hotel Consumption at Different Price Levels

Abstract

Consumers maintain a balance between functional congruity and self-image congruity when choosing a hotel brand. We argue that the way in which consumers tip the balance is related to their perception on how socially visible or invisible their consumption of the hotel brand is. This study draws on the self-congruity theory and tests eight hotel brands in the United States. The results show that functional congruity, in general, has a greater effect than self-image congruity on the consumers’ attitude toward a brand. However, the effect of self-image congruity increases with the perceived social visibility of hotel consumption, and this increase is especially salient for high-priced hotels but is not with low-priced hotels. We show that whether the consumption of the brand is socially visible or invisible is an important factor to consider when trying to understand a consumer’s attitude toward a hotel brand.

Keywords

social visibility of hotel consumption hotel brand consumption self-image congruity functional congruity hotel branding

The concept of hotel brands has evolved significantly over the past decade. A hotel brand was previously a cue to consumers on the hotel’s service quality (O’Neill & Xiao, 2006). However, today it reflects a consumer’s lifestyle, personality, and group identity. For example, boutique and lifestyle hotels started as niche products but became a global phenomenon in the current lodging market. Almost every leading hotel group has extended their brand portfolios to boutique and lifestyle hotels, such as Edition for Marriot, Andaz for Hyatt, and Element and Aloft for Starwood.

With this shift in hotel consumption, consumers now appreciate a hotel’s imaginative features more than ever (Barreda, Bilgihan, Nusair, & Okumus, 2016; Khan & Rahman, 2017). Due to the influence of social media, such as Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram, hotel consumption has emerged from the shadows and into the light. Consumers can now express their self-image and lifestyle by revealing online where they stay to friends and families. In this sense, the consumption of hotel brands has shifted from being relatively private to being more public, thereby influencing the role of expressive and functional features in the brand’s evaluation.

According to the self-congruity theory, brand attitude is the function of the image and functional congruities that consumers perceive about a brand (Sirgy & Johar, 1999). However, research shows that the impacts of self-image and functional congruities do not always have an equal influence on all product categories (Parker, 2009). In fact, brand use—whether a product or a brand is consumed privately or publicly—moderates the roles of self-image and functional congruities (e.g., Aaker, 1999; Parker, 2009). For instance, consumers tend to consume certain products, such as a car, an automobile, or a dress, for a public use purpose, and rely on extrinsic cues such as color, visibility of the brand logo to make purchase decisions. But products such as shoe polish, electric razor, and “health” foods, which are often consumed privately, are selected primarily based on functionality (Hamm & Cundiff, 1969).

However, with the development of social media, the boundary between private and public brand use has significantly blurred. Whether consumers perceive a product or a brand as public is contingent on personal and situational differences. So we use the concept of the social visibility of brand consumption to account for the level of a hotel brand’s public use (Josiassen & Assaf, 2013). Although prior research has explored the moderating effect of the social visibility of brand consumption in other settings (Josiassen & Assaf, 2013), its effect on the hotel industry and its dynamic influence at different price levels are still elusive. To fill this gap, we aim to examine the relations between self-image and functional congruities and brand attitude, and the moderating role of the social visibility of hotel consumption in different price categories. This study contributes to hotels’ positioning and marketing strategies by clarifying the context in which a hotel should highlight its expressive or functional features.

Conceptual Background

Driven by the diverse needs of consumers, especially millennials, the proliferation of new brands shows no intention of slowing down. Today, the seven biggest international hotel corporate groups hold more than 80 different brands (e.g., Wyndham, 15; Choice, 11; Marriott, 22; IHG, 8, including 3 Holiday Inn varieties alone; Hyatt, 11; and Hilton, 13). The number only grows if the hotel brands created by local-based companies are counted. Meanwhile, the ratio of branded hotels has constantly grown across the world. The global brand rate of the hotel industry has reached 53% and is exceptionally high in North America at approximately 70% (Barrows, Powers, & Reynolds, 2012). Thus, more and more hotels depend on the brands they join to stand out in the market. Therefore, knowledge of what consumers think about a brand and the influence of specific contexts can help hotels improve their brand management.

The Theory of Self-Congruity

This study draws from the theory of self-congruity that was first proposed by Sirgy (1986). This theory contends that the perceived match between the consumer’s self-concept and the self-image that the brand evokes primarily drives consumption behavior. Self-concept or self-schema refers to the attitudes and perceptions that a person holds toward the self (Malär, Krohmer, Hoyer, & Nyffenegger, 2011). Self-concept is not a static but a developmental construct that is amenable to the changes in the body, objects, family, people, groups, and social values and institutions (Josiassen & Assaf, 2013). Research widely studies self-concept in the context of consumption because it determines purchase decisions to a large extent (Malär et al., 2011).

Research finds that the basic purpose of all human activity is to protect, maintain, and enhance the self-concept or the symbolic self (Onkvisit & Shaw, 1987). People are naturally driven to minimize the discrepancies between the demonstrated self and the self they have in their own mind (Sirgy, 1986). The nature of self-concept comes from three innate needs: self-esteem, self-consistency, and self-knowledge (Sirgy, 1986). Self-esteem is one of the primary motives for people to engage in human behaviors (Johar & Sirgy, 1991; Sirgy & Johar, 1999). It is human nature to express self-concepts through outside agents, such as conspicuous consumption to signal personal status through luxury products or brands. Regarding self-consistency and self-knowledge, people instinctively seek a coherent consistency between beliefs and behaviors because inconsistency can cause unpleasantness and tension (Malär et al., 2011; Su & Reynolds, 2017). During the process of maintaining the coherence between self-concept and behaviors, people also acquire more knowledge about the self to better understand who they are and who they would like to be.

Congruity is an important contributor in establishing the relation between brand image, self-concept, and purchase behavior (Josiassen & Assaf, 2013). The self-congruity theory argues that consumers prefer brands that are consistent with their standards and their preconceived images of themselves (Sirgy et al., 1997). Caring about self-expression, consumers easily form an attachment to a brand with a strong identity that is well matched with the self. Samli and Sirgy (1981) extend the concept of self-congruity into two paradigms—self-image congruity and functional congruity—and contend that both constructs have effects on the consumer’s choice of product and brand. Self-image congruity refers to the coherence built on expressive features. Functional congruity represents the perceived consistency in functional features (Samli & Sirgy, 1981).

Researchers have documented the positive effect of self-congruity on a wide range of consumer behaviors such as brand preference, purchase intention, product evaluations, and satisfaction (Graeff, 1996; Jamal & Al-Marri, 2007; Sirgy et al., 1997). For example, Jeong and Jang (2018) find that self-image congruity significantly influences a positive attitude as well as revisit intentions toward a restaurant. Kang, Tang, and Lee (2015) show that self-image congruity and functional congruity are critical antecedents of brand loyalty.

Su and Reynolds (2017) test the utilities of self-image and functional congruities in the context of hotel consumption and find that both constructs are indicators of a consumer’s attitude toward a hotel brand, but functional congruity has a more important effect. The study also finds that the utilities of self-image and functional congruities vary with the consumer’s purpose for traveling. Business travelers value functional congruity more than leisure travelers. Drawing on these findings, we hypothesize the following:

Hypothesis 1₀: Self-congruity does not relate to the consumer’s attitude toward a hotel brand.

Hypothesis 1_a: Self-congruity positively relates to the consumer’s attitude toward a hotel brand.

Hypothesis 2₀: Functional congruity does not relate to the consumer’s attitude toward a hotel brand.

Hypothesis 2_a: Functional congruity positively relates to the consumer’s attitude toward a hotel brand.

Moderating Effect From the Social Visibility of Hotel Consumption

The social visibility of brand consumption refers to an individual’s perception that the consumption experience of a certain brand is socially visible to and highly regarded by a reference group such as friends, family, or colleagues (Josiassen & Assaf, 2013; So et al., 2018). By virtue of the social visibility level, brand consumption can be categorized as either public or private (Richins, 1994). And the social attention that consumers receive from consumption can enhance the consumer’s sense of self and need for self-expression (So et al., 2018). Although very limited studies have argued the dimensions of the concept, consumer’s perception of the social visibility of hotel consumption should be contingent on both personal differences and situations. For example, a person who often shares his or her traveling experience, including where to stay, on social media might tend to think hotel consumption is public; and the person who schedules an important meeting with someone in a hotel might also think that his or her hotel consumption is public.

The literature finds that the social visibility of consumption has important implications for consumers’ psychological decision making (e.g., Chao & Schor, 1998; Josiassen & Assaf, 2013; Roy et al., 2016; So et al., 2018). There are situations (i.e., high social visibility) in which customers make purchases to achieve relative self-expressive status, and situations (i.e., low social visibility) in which they simply make purchases because of intrinsic functional attributes (Chao & Schor, 1998). We argue that self-image congruity and functional congruity both play critical roles in determining the attitude toward a brand; their effects vary with different levels of the consumption’s social visibility.

Consumers use the high social visibility of consumption to express and enhance their social and self-identities (Chao & Schor, 1998), which is related to the congruity between the hotel’s brand image and customers’ perceptions regarding whether staying with the brand will improve their social status (Sirgy & Su, 2000). Building on the self-congruency theory, which argues that consumers strive to achieve congruity between their actual and ideal selves (Sirgy & Su, 2000), consumers use products and services to express their identities and consume those products and services that match their ideal self (Hong & Zinkhan, 1995). When the brand’s consumption is socially or publicly visible, consumers tend to evaluate the brand using extrinsic cues; if a brand matches their self-image, then consumers are more likely to judge it favorably (Josiassen & Assaf, 2013). Therefore, the purchasing of a stay at a hotel brand is the key to establishing an individual’s social position, and the functional attributes of the brand are less important than its social attributes (Josiassen & Assaf, 2013). In other words, the relation between a consumer’s self-image congruity and his or her attitude toward a brand is stronger if the consumption is more socially visible than less socially visible. The effect of intrinsic functional attributes, however, is less salient when the consumption is more socially visible. Drawing on those arguments, we propose the following hypotheses:

Hypothesis 3₀: The social visibility of hotel consumption does not moderate the effect of self-image congruity and functional congruity on the attitude toward a hotel brand.

Hypothesis 3_a: The social visibility of hotel consumption moderates the effect of self-image congruity and functional congruity on the attitude toward a hotel brand such that (a₁) the effect of self-image congruity is stronger and that (a₂) the effect of functional congruity is weaker when the hotel consumption is socially more visible.

Moderating Effect of Hotel Price Categories

The price category that a hotel brand belongs to is an important indicator of its consumers’ social status. Based on room rates, the consumer can categorize the brands as economy, mid-price, or luxury hotels (e.g., Stevens, Knutson, & Patton, 1995) or simply high-priced and low-priced categories (e.g., Hung, Shang, & Wang, 2010). For the ease of testing, we adopt the high-priced and low-priced categories. The literature shows that only when consumers recognize products and services as signaling status or being conspicuous does the visible consumption ensure the recognition of status (Muñiz & O’Guinn, 2001). As conspicuous consumption always comes with expensive or luxury products and services (Han & Hyun, 2017; Trigg, 2001; Truong, Simmons, McColl, & Kitchen, 2008), high-priced hotels should be associated with a more conspicuous nature than low-priced hotels (Han & Hyun, 2017). Therefore, we argue that hotel price categories and the social visibility of hotel consumption jointly influence the effects of the self-image congruity and functional congruity on the attitude toward a brand. Thus, we propose the following hypothesis:

Hypothesis 4₀: The two-way interaction is consistent between high-priced and low-priced hotel categories.

Hypothesis 4_a: The two-way interaction differs between high-priced and low-priced hotel categories.

Method

Design and Participants

To examine the overall model (Figure 1), we use a survey based on Amazon Mechanical Turk that features a nationwide pool of consumers and has become a popular data source for consumer studies (Buhrmester, Kwang, & Gosling, 2011; Paolacci, Chandler, & Ipeirotis, 2010). A total of 420 respondents completed the survey with a compensation of $0.5 for each participant. We sought at least 400 respondents for the study because two moderated structural equation modeling (SEM) models were involved and a minimum of 100 to 200 samples are the rule of thumb for running an SEM model (Boomsma & Hoogland, 2001). The demographic analysis showed that 55% of the 420 respondents were male with the median age between 25 and 34 years. Of the respondents, 77% were Caucasian, and 70% claimed that they were employed. Their median income was between $40,000 and $59,999. More specific demographic information can be found in Table 1.

Figure 1

The Hypothesized Model

Table 1

Demographic Characteristics of Samples

Demographics	Proportion			Chi-Square Test p Value
Demographics	Total (%)	Low-Priced (%)	High-Priced (%)	Chi-Square Test p Value
Male	55	54	55	.86
Female	45	45	44
18-24 years old	13	14	13	.07
25-34 years old	47	42	52
35-44 years old	22	22	21
45-54 years old	10	13	6
55-64 years old and above	6.6	9	5
White and Caucasian	77	83	70	.14
Hispanic or Latino	6.9	4	9
African American	6.2	4	7
Asian/Pacific Islander	7.6	7	10
Other	1.1	0	1
Less than high school	0	0	0	.11
High school	15	29	20
Associate degree	15	14	19
Bachelor’s degree	53	46	51
Master’s degree and above	7	10	9
Less than $20,000	17	32	20	.13
$20,000 to $39,999	37	26	26
$40,000 to $59,999	13	20	27
$60,000 to $79,999	11	9	14
$80,000 to $ 99,999	7	6	7
$100,000 and above	4	4	4

Procedures

Prior to the main survey, participants were asked to select one hotel brand that they knew well from the following list: Ritz-Carlton, Four Seasons, Westin, Hyatt, Courtyard, Garden Inn, Holiday Inn Express, and Super 8. Four of them (Ritz-Carlton, Four Seasons, Westin, and Hyatt) represent the high-priced hotel category, and the other four (Courtyard, Garden Inn, Holiday Inn Express, and Super 8) represent the low-priced category.

Following this selection, participants were asked about their knowledge of the hotel brand to exclude the possibility that they misrepresented themselves just to get paid. If a participant answered that he or she had “no” knowledge of the selected brand, he or she was thanked and directed to exit the survey. All other participants who had knowledge about the selected hotel brand were directed to our main survey.

Measures

Brand Attitude is assessed with four items adopted from the literature on a 7-point Likert-type scale (1 = strongly disagree to 7 = strongly agree). Sample items include, “I think XX hotel brand is appealing.”

Self-image congruity is measured with five items extracted from Malär et al. (2011) and Sirgy et al. (1997). Sample items include, “XX hotel brand is a reflection of how I see myself” and “If I consider XX hotel brand as a person, I perceive that I share the same personality traits with him or her.” Each statement is rated on a 7-point Likert-type scale that ranges from 1 = strongly disagree to 7 = strongly agree.

Functional congruity is measured with four items developed by Su and Reynolds (2017). Sample items are “XX hotel brand has most of the functional qualities I desire from a hotel” and “XX hotel brand performs well on the functional attributes I value the most.” These items are rated on a 7-point Likert-type scale in which 1 = strongly disagree and 7 = strongly agree.

The social visibility of hotel consumption is measured by four items adopted primarily from Josiassen and Assaf (2013). The items include, for example, “I consider hotel brand as an important approach to signal my social status.” Among the four items, one is an inverted item: “I think the hotel where I stay during traveling is observable to other people.” A 7-point Likert-type scale measures each item in which 1 = strongly disagree and 7 = strongly agree.

The reliability of these scales is pretested with a sample of 229 undergraduate students from a university in the northwest of the United States. The result shows that the Cronbach’s alpha for functional congruity is .82, self-congruity is .92, social visibility of hotel consumption is .80, and brand attitude is .95. Descriptions of these constructs are given in the appendix.

Results

Confirmatory Factor Analysis

We apply a confirmatory factor analysis to test the fit and construct validity of the measurement model. The results are shown in Table 2. The results show that most factor loadings are higher than or equal to 0.6 except for the two items that measure the social visibility of hotel consumption (i.e., “I always keep the hotel brand where I stay as my personal thing” and “Where I stay during traveling can always be observed by others”). After dropping these two items, we perform another confirmatory factor analysis. The measurement model shows a satisfactory fit (CFI [comparative fit index] = 0.97, RMSEA [root mean square error of approximation] = 0.07, SRMR [standardized root mean square residual] = 0.04). All item loadings on their specific constructs are higher than 0.6, and the correlations among factors are lower than 0.8 (Kline, 2011). The results confirm that the measurement model has convergent and discriminant validities (Kline, 2011).

Table 2

Results of Confirmatory Factor Analysis

Construct	Factor Loading	Correlation
Construct	Factor Loading	FCOG	SVC	ATT
SCOG		0.44**	0.56**	0.76**
SCOG1	0.88
SCOG2	0.89
SCOG3	0.80
SCOG4	0.63
SCOG5	0.83
FCOG		—	0.09	0.65**
FCOG1	0.86
FCOG2	0.87
FCOG3	0.86
FCOG4	0.83
SVC		—	—	0.18**
SVC2	0.63
SVC3	0.95
ATT		—	—	—
ATT1	0.91
ATT2	0.90
ATT3	0.93
ATT4	0.92

Note: SCOG = self-image congruity; FCOG = functional congruity; SVC = social visibility of hotel consumption; ATT = brand attitude. Comparative fit index = 0.97; root mean square error of approximation = 0.07; standardized root mean square residual = 0.04.

p ≤ .01.

The Basic Structural Equation Model

A set of SEM tests were performed. We first analyzed the basic model (Figure 2) to demonstrate the effects of the independent variables and then tested the moderating effect of the social visibility of hotel consumption (Figure 3) and then the moderation of hotel price levels (Figures 4 and 5). These tests were conducted with the Mplus software package. The results (Figure 2) show a good global model fit (CFI = 0.97, TLI = 0.97, RMSEA = 0.06, SRMR = 0.04), and support Hypotheses 1 and 2. Specifically, self-image congruity (β = 0.27, p = .00) and functional congruity (β = 0.68, p = .00) have positive effects on consumers’ attitude toward a brand.

Figure 2

Results of the Basic Structural Equation Model

Figure 3

Moderating Effect of Social Visibility on Hotel Consumption

Figure 4

Moderating Effect for High-Priced Hotel Category

Figure 5

Moderating Effect for Low-Priced Hotel Category

Moderating Effect From the Social Visibility of Hotel Consumption

Our next step is to test the moderating effect from the social visibility of hotel consumption. According to Klein and Moosbrugger (2000), an interaction between two latent variables (f₁ and f₂) can be tested by creating a new latent construct f₁ × f₂. Thus, we test the interaction by creating two latent constructs between self-image congruity and the social visibility of hotel consumption and between functional congruity and the social visibility of hotel consumption.

The results show that the interaction between self-image congruity and the social visibility of hotel consumption (β = 0.04) has a positive effect on the attitude toward a hotel brand, and the significance of the effect is p = .08. No significant interaction effect exists between functional congruity and social visibility (β = −0.05, p = .34). The findings indicate that the effect of self-image congruity on attitude is stronger as an individual perceives higher social visibility for the hotel consumption, but the effect of functional congruity is not affected by the social visibility of hotel consumption. Thus, the findings partially support Hypothesis 3_a1 but reject Hypothesis 3_a2.

Moderating Effect From Social Visibility of Hotel Consumption at Different Price Levels

Hypothesis 4 might be further differentiated by different hotel price categories. To test the three-way interaction hypothesis, we divide the sample into two subgroups: high-priced hotels and low-priced hotels. The demographic information for each segment is displayed in Table 1. And we perform a set of logistic regressions to test if there are differences in the respondents’ demographics across the two sections. In the regression models, the price level is treated as the dependent variable, and the demographic variables are respectively entered as the independent variables. As a result, the two samples have no difference pertaining to gender, education, income, and ethnicity, but they differ slightly in terms of age.

Then, we perform the same moderation analysis as in the above section for each subgroup. The results show that the social visibility of hotel consumption moderates the relations among self-image congruity, functional congruity, and attitude and is a function of hotel prices. The effect of social visibility is only salient in the high-priced category but not in the low-priced category. This result supports Hypothesis 4 that the social visibility of hotel consumption presents different moderating effects for different hotel price levels.

For the high-priced category, the social visibility of hotel consumption has a significantly positive moderating effect on self-image congruity (β = 0.05,p = .00), and a significantly negative moderating effect on functional congruity (β = −0.15, p = .02). The results indicate that in the high-priced category, the effect of self-image congruity on the attitude toward a hotel brand grows stronger and the effect of functional congruity grows weaker as a customer perceives higher social visibility for the hotel consumption. However, no significant moderating effect of social visibility exists for either self-image congruity (β = 0.06, p = .20) or functional congruity (β = −0.01, p = .90) in the context of the low-priced category. Therefore, the results support Hypothesis 4.

Discussion

This study addresses an important issue regarding the choice of a hotel brand by exploring a consumer’s psychological reactions to a hotel’s functional and expressive features and their influence on brand attitude. First, the results highlight that one of the ways to influence the consumers’ attitude toward a hotel brand is to use self-congruity. When consumers see themselves in a hotel brand or find functions they desire in a hotel brand, they are more likely to perceive the hotel brand as positive. However, the balance of one’s need for functional value versus the need for self-expressive value in a hotel is affected by a brand’s visibility to others. Especially for high-priced hotels, consumers who perceive their hotel consumption as socially visible will sacrifice some functional value to gain self-expressive value. However, this rule is not applicable to the low-priced hotel category, because a low-status consumption restrains consumers’ needs for uniquness and self-expression. The findings of the study provide significant theoretical and managerial implications.

Theoretical Implications

This study extends the self-congruity theory by demonstrating the moderating effect from the social visibility of hotel consumption at different hotel price levels. We show that functional congruity plays the dominating role in forming a consumer’s attitude toward a hotel brand in comparison with self-image congruity. Our results are consistent with the previous findings (Sirgy & Johar, 1999). However, the effects are jointly moderated by the hotel’s level of social visibility and its price. Specifically, the influence of self-image congruity increases, and functional congruity decreases with a hotel’s level of social visibility. And the social visibility of hotel consumption only has a role in the high-priced rather the low-priced segment.

This finding relates to status consumption, which refers to the human tendency to purchase goods and services for the status or prestige (Correia, Kozak, & Reis, 2016; Han & Hyun, 2017). Since the status comes from others in the society (Magee & Galinsky, 2008), the effect of status consumption is more salient when the consumption is socially visible. Purchasing a stay at a high-priced hotel is considered as an act of purchasing the status that comes with a luxury brand, and, therefore, the match of self-image with the hotel brand can result in favorable brand images. Moreover, as contended by the previous literature, social visibility is a fundamental dimension of status-directed consumption that is typically featured in high-priced products (Han & Hyun, 2017; Shukla, 2010; Trigg, 2001). The general consensus regarding consumer behavior is that consumers make economic and rational consumption decisions. When it comes to status consumption, consumers make “irrational” decisions. This study expands the theory by showing that when the purchase of high-priced products or services is visible to others, the purchase not only confers status but also “matches” the brand and the self that can also strongly fortify positive brand attitude.

In addition, this study contributes to the hotel branding literature by exploring the effect of consumption visibility, which has been rarely studied. Unlike the literature that normally treats consumption visibility as a binary variable (public or private consumption; Parker, 2009), this study theorizes consumption visibility as a continuous variable that is more suitable to the hotel setting. First, in the Internet era, people can update their consumption experience through Facebook, Twitter, and other communication technologies, so private consumption can go public. Second, hotels offer both public and private value. The social visibility of hotel consumption differs by customer needs. For instance, a businessman who often meets his or her clients or partners in hotels might think that his or her hotel consumption is more visible than that of those who just want to take advantage of a private room. Therefore, the social visibility of hotel consumption should be a continuous concept that reflects personal differences.

Managerial Implications

This study provides significant practical implications. First, it confirms that the social visibility of hotel consumption is the boundary condition for the consumer’s evaluation of the hotel’s functional and self-image congruities. This finding furthers hotel practitioners’ understanding of the psychological process whereby consumers make their hotel choices. Specifically, it shows that self-image congruity can have more of an effect on consumers’ attitude toward a hotel brand when they think of their consumption as visible to other people. Thus, we recommend that hotel practitioners market or position their hotels and brands by highlighting expressive features to consumers who perceive that their hotel consumption is socially visible and weaken the importance of them for those who think of their hotel consumption as socially invisible. To this end, practitioners should better understand the factors that result in different perceptions of the social visibility of hotel consumption. We suggest that practitioners ask their customers why they are staying at the hotel (e.g., if any important meeting is arranged during the stay), their social media habits, or other personal characteristics such as public self-consciousness, needs for impression management.

Moreover, hotels should tailor their marketing strategies based on the features of the targeted market. For example, while marketing on Facebook and other social networking sites, a hotel should emphasize its expressive features more to facilitate users’ self-image congruity with the brand, because self-expression is an important driver of people using social networking sites (Livingstone, 2008). On the other hand, cultural contexts may also affect the consumer’s perception of the social visibility of hotel consumption, such as people in a collective culture that have close connections with family, friends, and colleagues, that may make their consumption more public. The research has shown that different from Western customers, those from collectivism cultures are more likely to engage in luxury consumption to signal social status (Wong & Ahuvia, 1998). In this regard, a hotel brand can further highlight its expressive features to the consumers from a collective culture.

In addition, the study shows that the moderating effect of the social visibility of hotel consumption is only effective for high-priced hotels and not for low-priced hotels. This finding signals that self-image is not the major purchase driver to consumers in the low-priced hotel segment. Therefore, hotels from that segment should relate their improvements to the hotel’s functionality, amenities, and service quality. And the hotel should stand out because of its sincerity and competence, which are especially insightful to functional congruity (Su & Reynolds, 2017).

Limitations and Future Directions

As with any research study, the current one is subject to certain limitations. First, respondents on MTurk skew to younger and less wealthy people (Redmiles, Kross, Pradhan, & Mazurek, 2017). Thus, our sample may not well represent the consumers of high-priced hotels such as the Four Seasons or Ritz-Carton. Although a series of questions regarding a selected hotel were used to filter out participants who do not have any knowledge about the hotel, an actual consumption history was not collected. Moreover, although we stated that boutique and lifestyle hotels indicated the importance of self-image congruity of hotel consumption, we did not incorporate those types of hotels in our study because of the concern that most consumers may lack experiences with them.

In addition, we identify some future research questions. The social visibility of consumption is a complicated and dynamic concept to a hotel setting. To better understand its influence, other potential factors should be further explored, and so should the question of how it affects the psychology of consumers. For instance, public self-consciousness, defined as the tendency to consider oneself as a social object, may influence how much a customer perceives that a hotel is socially visible (Fenigstein et al., 1979). And the personal tendency to self-expose on social media also can lead to different perceptions of a brand’s social visibility. We suggest that future studies explore the above connections.

Conclusion

In summary, the current article confirms the moderating effect of social visibility of hotel consumption in the consumer’s evaluation of a hotel’s functional congruity and self-image congruity and extends the effect to different hotel price levels (low-priced vs. high-priced). Findings of the study suggest the influence of self-image congruity increases but the influence of functional congruity decreases with the social visibility of a hotel consumption. Moreover, such an interactive effect only exists among high-priced hotels rather than in low-priced hotels. The study contributes to the hospitality literature by furthering our understanding on consumers’ hotel brand choices. And it provides significantly managerial implications to branding and marketing hotels.

Footnotes

Appendix

Na Su (email: nsu@cnta.gov.cn) is a research support professional for the School of Hospitality Management at the Pennsylvania State University. Yaou Hu (email: yh.jn@outlook.com) is a lecturer at the Management School of Jinan University. Hyounae (Kelly) Min (email: min@cpp.edu) is an assistant professor in the Collins College of Hospitality Management at California State Polytechnic University, Pomona.

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