Materialism and well-being among Chinese college students: The mediating role of basic psychological need satisfaction

Abstract

Based on self-determination theory, this study explored the potential mediating role of basic psychological need satisfaction in the relationship between materialism and well-being among Chinese college students. The results showed that basic psychological need satisfaction partially mediated the relationship between materialism and life satisfaction and fully mediated the relationships among materialism and emotional well-being, subjective vitality, and self-actualization. The findings indicated the importance of considering both subjective and psychological well-being and the interpretative power of basic psychological need satisfaction and Chinese culture in the flow from materialism to well-being.

Keywords

basic psychological need satisfaction Chinese culture materialism self-determination theory well-being

As a kind of life value, materialism influences individuals’ life aspirations, need satisfaction, and well-being. Although some researchers have explored the mechanism of how materialism affects well-being (Christopher et al., 2004, 2007, 2009; Christopher and Schlenker, 2004; Kashdan and Breen, 2007), few researches have been based on self-determination theory (SDT) to investigate the mediating role of basic psychological need satisfaction. Moreover, most research on materialism has been conducted in Western cultures that tend to be individualistic. Few attempts have been made in Eastern collectivistic societies (Wong and Ahuvia, 1998), especially seldom among Confucian Chinese people who have high “face consciousness” (Bao et al., 2003; Kim and Nam, 1998). Face, in this context, refers to a sense of favorable social self-worth that a person wants others to have of him or her in a relational network context, which is a key concept in understanding the social behaviors of people in Confucian societies (Bao et al., 2003). Therefore, based on SDT, this study aimed to investigate the psychological mechanism through which materialism affects well-being in the context of Confucian Chinese culture.

Well-being is an important research topic within health psychology. Variables that have already been identified as correlates of well-being are objective life circumstances (e.g. marital status, socioeconomic status, and life events; Camfield and Skevington, 2008), activities engaged and value expected (e.g. religious activity, goal value, and goal success expectation; Ingledew et al., 2005; Lawler-Row and Elliott, 2009), intrapersonal variables (e.g. extroversion, optimism, and materialism; Smith et al., 2004), and interpersonal variables (e.g. social support and parental attachment; Kafetsios and Sideridis, 2006).

Materialism refers to the extent to which one places value on material wealth in defining one’s self-concept, success, and happiness (Kashdan and Breen, 2007). People who strongly emphasize materialism regard material pursuits as the core of their life, measure personal success by material wealth, and consider material gain as the fundamental way to experience well-being (Richins and Dawson, 1992). Compared to people with intrinsic life goals (i.e. making contributions to society, the pursuit of social belonging, and self-acceptance), those with materialistic values are more focused on economic success (Kasser and Ryan, 1996). Therefore, materialism impacts individual life aspirations, goal pursuits, and well-being.

Materialistically oriented people attempt to experience well-being through the pursuit of material possession. Unfortunately, they are dissatisfied with their living standards and interpersonal relationships. Compared to nonmaterialists, materialists appear to be less satisfied with their acquired material wealth, family income, friendship, and even the experiences of pure fun and enjoyment (Roberts and Clement, 2007). Being dissatisfied with so many life areas, materialists become dissatisfied with their whole life (Sirgy, 1998). Materialists also have a strong desire for expensive consumer products, through which to show their social status or to gain social recognition (Rindfleisch et al., 2009). As a result, materialists place much more value on extrinsic possessions than on some important sources of well-being such as family life and friendship. Moreover, materialism was empirically found to be negatively associated with positive aspects of well-being such as life satisfaction, positive emotion, and self-actualization, whereas it was positively associated with negative aspects of well-being such as social anxiety and negative emotions (Christopher et al., 2004, 2007; Kashdan and Breen, 2007; Kasser and Ryan, 1996). In essence, the evidence suggests that materialists tend to have lower level of well-being compared with nonmaterialists.

However, most of the relevant studies have been conducted in Western individualistic cultures, with few attempts to study the topic in Eastern collectivist cultures. Although some relevant studies conducted in Eastern societies have examined the relationships between money and well-being (Zhang and Cao, 2010), or materialism and luxury consumption (Liao and Wang, 2009), few studies have directly focused on the relationship of materialism to well-being and fully explored the psychological mechanisms that underlies these variables (Camfield and Skevington, 2008; Jiang et al., 2013). This study aimed to explore the associations between materialism and well-being among Chinese college students.

Current research on well-being distinguished subjective or hedonic well-being from psychological or eudaimonic well-being (Ryan and Deci, 2001). Subjective well-being means hedonic pleasure or happiness. Its measurement indicators may include positive emotions, negative emotions, and life satisfactions (Camfield and Skevington, 2008). Psychological well-being, however, is typically defined as actualizing one’s potential. Its representative indicators may include outcomes such as self-actualization, vitality, self-acceptance, positive relations with others (or intimacy), environmental mastery, autonomy, purpose in life, and personal growth (Chang, 2012; Ryan et al., 2008). Materialism researches have focused mainly on the relationships of materialism and subjective well-being, although a few researchers have attended to the relationship of materialism and psychological well-being (Kashdan and Breen, 2007; Kasser and Ryan, 1996). Therefore, it is necessary to simultaneously explore the relationships of materialism to both subjective and psychological well-being.

In recent years, researchers have started to explore the psychological mechanism through which materialism affects well-being. For example, Christopher et al. (2009) found that external locus of control acted as a mediator between materialism and emotional well-being. Specifically, materialists tended to hold a belief that they were unable to effectively control the internal and external situations and then experienced higher level of external control, which in turn led to lower well-being. Similarly, Kashdan and Breen (2007) showed that experiential avoidance played a mediating role in the flow from materialism to well-being.Experiential avoidance referred to individual’s unwillingness to contact their own negative thoughts, feelings, and bodily sensations as well as willingness to strategically avoid situations that may bring about negative experiences. Christopher et al. (2009) pointed out that there were some common features between external locus of control and experiential avoidance. Both of them concerned individual perceptions of low personal autonomy and ineffectiveness on controlling their goal pursuit.

In addition, Christopher et al. (2007) found that defensive self-presentation strategies could also mediate the relationship between materialism and well-being. In detail, materialists tended to use defensive rather than assertive self-presentation strategies to protect their self-image, including excuse-making, disclaimer, and self-handicapping. This kind of self-protective or defensive presentation strategy was extremely unfavorable for them to be fully engaged in the process of mastering tasks and pursuing goals, which in turn resulted in poorer emotional well-being.

Furthermore, Christopher et al. (2004) documented evidence that social support played a mediating role in the relationships of materialism and positive emotions. As materialists attached more importance to material possession than to meaningful interpersonal relationships, social bonds, or family life, they had perceptions of weak social support (Burroughs and Rindfleisch, 2002) and lower emotional well-being.

To sum up, previous studies have confirmed that the relationship between materialism and well-being is mediated by variables such as external control, defensive self-presentation, and social support. According to SDT, there are three basic psychological needs (i.e. autonomy, competence, and relatedness), which are essential psychological nutrients for intrinsic motivation, optimal functioning, and well-being. Only by satisfying these needs are individuals able to experience well-being (Ryan and Deci, 2001). Materialism, however, is not conducive to the satisfaction of these basic psychological needs.

Kashdan and Breen (2007) found that materialism negatively predicted satisfaction with autonomy, competence, and relatedness. Similarly, Deckop et al. (2010) extended this line of research to the organizational domain and demonstrated that materialistic work value orientation thwarted basic psychological need fulfillment. Vansteenkiste et al. (2007) also found that extrinsic work values negatively predicted the satisfaction of the basic psychological needs. However, these studies have not directly examined the relationships among materialism, basic psychological need satisfaction, and well-being.

Theoretically, there could be a relationship between materialism, basic psychological needs, and well-being. First, materialists tend to experience a higher external control (Christopher et al., 2009), whereas autonomy satisfaction implies experiencing one’s behavior as self-endorsed or volitional, or experiencing internal locus of control. Second, materialists tend to use defensive self-presentation strategies (e.g. self-handicapping) in the pursuit of well-being and then experience lower self-efficacy (Christopher et al., 2007), whereas competence satisfaction implies experiencing higher self-efficacy. Third, materialists tend to have poorer interpersonal relationships and lower perceived social support (Burroughs and Rindfleisch, 2002; Christopher et al., 2004), whereas relatedness fulfillment means valuing interpersonal relationships and having higher perceptions of social support. Thus, based on SDT, we could hypothesize that materialism tends to thwart the satisfaction of three core basic psychological needs and then diminishes well-being.

To explore the relationships among variables mentioned above, it is necessary to compare some critical terms in the contexts of SDT and well-being. Autonomy and relatedness or positive relationships with others are the foci. They are related but different in nature in two contexts. In SDT, autonomy and relatedness are conceived as human inherent and basic psychological needs. In psychological well-being dimensions, however, autonomy and positive relationships with others are conceptualized as indicators of one’s positive functioning and perception of engagement with the existential challenge of life. Hence, autonomy and relatedness can be viewed as conditions and nutriments for the attainment of psychological well-being (Ryan and Deci, 2001). That is, the basic psychological needs play the roles of motive resources in the pursuit of well-being. In addition, there is a different conceptual breadth in different contexts in spite of the similar terms being used. Autonomy in SDT, for example, refers to the volitional and self-endorsed engagement of behavior, which is contrasted with feeling pressured or controlled in partaking in a particular activity (Ryan and Deci, 2001). It does imply self-determination and self-regulation but not independence in psychological well-being (Ryff, 1989). According to SDT, it is quite possible to be autonomous (volitional) while relying on others rather than acting independently. Similarly, relatedness in SDT refers to feelings of closeness and connectedness to significant others, whereas positive relationships with others emphasized by Ryff (1989) also include characteristics of strong empathy and affection that are more relevant to personality maturity and other characteristics of self-actualization. So, it can be argued that the meanings of the terms used in SDT are relatively specific and pertinent to psychological needs, whereas Ryff and colleagues gave more broad and abundant explanations on the terms in the context of well-being.

The present study

As no attempt has been made to examine the potential mediating role of need satisfaction in the relationship between materialism and well-being, the primary goal of this study was to fill the literature gap. In this study, life satisfaction and emotional assessment were used as indicators of subjective well-being, and subjective vitality and self-actualization were used as indicators of psychological well-being. Based on SDT, we proposed that materialism would negatively correlate with both subjective and psychological well-being, in which psychological need satisfaction would act as a mediator.

Method

Participants

The sample consisted of 261 Chinese undergraduates from Beijing Normal University. There were 166 females and 95 males, plus four unassigned participants who did not report gender, ranging in age from 17 to 26 years with an average of 23.07 years and standard deviation (SD) of 1.27 years. The participants volunteered for the study without any monetary reward.

Procedures and measures

All questionnaires were translated from English to Chinese following the back-translation procedures (Brislin, 1980). Students completed the questionnaires in class within 30 minutes. Throughout the questionnaire (except for Emotional well-being), we used the same 1–7 response scale for each measure (strongly disagree to strongly agree).

Materialism

The 18-item Richins and Dawson’s (1992) Materialism Scale was used to assess materialistic value, including three dimensions of materialism: (a) importance centrality (7 items, e.g. “I usually buy only the things I need (reverse-scored)”), (b) acquisition as the pursuit of happiness (5 items, e.g. “I’d be happier if I could afford to buy more things”), and (c) success (6 items, e.g. “The things I own say a lot about how well I’m doing in life”).

General need satisfaction

The 21-item General Need Satisfaction Scale (Deci and Ryan, 2000) was used to assess three basic psychological needs: (a) satisfaction of competence (6 items, e.g. “Most days I feel a sense of accomplishment from what I do”), (b) satisfaction of autonomy (7 items, e.g. “I generally feel free to express my ideas and opinions”), and (c) satisfaction of relatedness (8 items, e.g. “I really like the people I interact with”).

Life satisfaction

The Satisfaction with Life Scale (Diener et al., 1985) was used to assess general life satisfaction. This scale is a widely used measure of cognitive aspects of subjective well-being, consisting of five items. Participants rated statements such as “The conditions of my life are excellent” and “I am satisfied with my life.”

Emotional well-being

The Positive Affect/Negative Affect Schedule (Watson et al., 1988) was used to assess positive and negative mood adjectives. This scale is widely used to measure the emotional aspects of subjective well-being, consisting of 10 positive (e.g. “excited” and “pleased”) and 10 negative (e.g. “ashamed” and “distressed”) mood adjectives. Using a scale of 1 (not at all) to 5 (extremely), participants rated how much they had experienced each mood “in the past month or so.” Emotional well-being was created by standardized and subtracted negative effect from positive effect.

Subjective vitality

The seven-item Subjective Vitality Scale (Ryan and Frederick, 1997) was used to assess general feelings of energy, vigor, and aliveness in the past month or so. Participants rated statements such as “I feel alive and vital” and “I look forward to each new day.”

Self-actualization

This 15-item questionnaire (Jones and Crandall, 1986) was used to measure self-actualization, which was considered to be the highest level of well-being for humans. Internal reliability was .55 in the current sample. An examination of the item-total scale correlation revealed three items that, unexpectedly, had lower loading—“I can like people without having to approve of them,” “It is better to be yourself than to be popular,” and “I can express my feelings even when they may result in undesirable consequences.” To improve the internal consistency of the self-actualization scale in the current sample, we reduced it to the remaining 12 items and gained a higher reliability (α = .63).

Results

Descriptive statistics, internal reliabilities, and zero-order correlations are shown in Table 1. To test our hypothesis that basic psychological need satisfaction mediates the relationships between materialism and well-being, we conducted a series of multiple regressions following Baron and Kenny’s (1986) procedure. Regression results are shown in Table 2.

Table 1.

Descriptive statistics, internal reliabilities, and correlations between study variables (n = 261).

	M	SD	α	1	2	3	4	5
1. Materialism	3.75	.67	.73
2. Basic need satisfaction	4.78	.64	.83	−.17**
3. Life satisfaction	3.71	1.26	.84	−.35**	.33**
4. Emotional well-being	1.15	.95	–	−.19**	.53**	.34**
5. Subjective vitality	4.65	1.00	.86	−.17**	.50**	.36**	.56**
6. Self-actualization	4.53	.68	.63	−.14^*	.48**	.18**	.45**	.27**

SD: standard deviation.

Emotional well-being was created by standardized and subtracted negative emotion from positive emotion.

p < .05 **p < .01.

Table 2.

Betas for the paths in the meditational analyses with regression for the independent variables of materialism.

	Step 1	Step 2	Step 3	Step 4	β test	Sobel’s (1982) test	R ²
Life satisfaction	−.35**	−.17**	.28**	−.30**	2.77**	2.09*	.20
Emotional well-being	−.19**	−.17**	.52**	−.10	7.06**	2.84**	.29
Subjective vitality	−.17**	−.17**	.49**	−.08	6.30**	2.83**	.26
Self-actualization	−.14*	−.17**	.47**	−.06	8.40**	2.93**	.24

Step 1 refers to the path from the independent variable to the dependent variable. Step 2 refers to the path from the independent variable to the mediating variable. Step 3 refers to the path from the mediating variable to the dependent variable, controlling for the independent variable. Step 4 refers to the path from the independent variable to the dependent variable, controlling for the mediating variable. β test refers to significance of the difference between betas obtained in Step 1 and Step 4. R² represents the total amount of variance explained in a dependent variable after entering the independent variable and the mediating variable.

p < .05; **p < .01.

First, we considered the relationships between materialism and life satisfaction. As can be seen from Table 2, the results seemed to suggest that need satisfaction partially mediated the effect of materialism on life satisfaction.

Similarly, we analyzed the relationships among variables with emotional well-being, subjective vitality, and self-actualization separately as the dependent variables. The results are shown in Table 2.

Discussion

This study examined the links among materialism, basic psychological need satisfaction, and well-being. The results showed that materialism was negatively related to both subjective and psychological well-being indicators significantly, in which need satisfaction partially mediated the relationships of materialism and life satisfaction and fully mediated the relationships of materialism and other well-being indicators.

In line with previous research on materialism in Western individualistic cultures, this study found that materialism was inversely associated with subjective well-being among collectivistic Chinese people as well. More importantly, unlike most previous studies that focused on the ties of materialism with subjective well-being, this investigation also examined the relationship between materialism and psychological well-being and further found that materialism was harmful to psychological well-being as well.

As noted in the introduction, subjective and psychological well-being are two different aspects of well-being, in which the former focuses on happiness and the latter concerns living well or actualizing one’s potentials (Ryan et al., 2008). In particular, subjective well-being emphasizes maximizing pleasure and minimizing pain without concerning whether psychological needs are being met or not. In contrast, psychological well-being focuses on the formation of long-lasting well-being and the development of people’s capacity to fulfill their potentials such as self-actualization, full functioning, and maturity. Previous empirical studies have tended not to separate psychological well-being from subjective well-being, even though some researchers suggested these two kinds of well-being should be separated (Ryan and Deci, 2001; Ryan et al., 2008; Ryff and Singer, 2008).

Our results were largely congruent with the findings of Vansteenkiste et al. (2007). In the organizational domain, they found that extrinsic work values were associated with increased emotional exhaustion and turnover intention and decreased job satisfaction and commitment. More importantly, basic psychological need satisfaction mediated the relationship between work values and job outcomes. In fact, materialism shares some common features with extrinsic work value (e.g. focusing on material possessions), and our research demonstrated similar results.

This study is one of the first studies to study materialism and well-being in a collectivist culture. Chinese people are more likely to “have to” pursue materialism for their family face (Wong and Ahuvia, 1998) rather than for themselves, so they are inclined to experience lower personal autonomy. Compared to Western individualists, Eastern collectivists’ pursuit of material wealth or luxury goods is more indicative of conformity to in-groups’ expectations (predominantly coming from one’s family) and social role requirements (e.g. men as husbands have to earn money to support the whole family). In this case, materialism may represent some kind of expression of personal taste for Western individualists, while it may be more indicative of externally imposed values for Eastern collectivists (“keeping up with their Western Joneses”). In addition, the face consciousness of Chinese people strengthens the harmful effects of materialism on autonomy. Face also plays a much more important role in collectivistic societies than it does in individualistic societies (Hwang et al., 2003). Unfortunately, such face consciousness leads collectivistic Chinese to be more concerned with how others look upon them (e.g. public self-image), struggle to maintain their social status, and be more anxious. All of these are detrimental to personal autonomy (Zhang and Cao, 2010).

Second, materialism is particularly in conflict with collectivistic Chinese higher need for relatedness. Unlike Western individualists who view themselves as unique, independent, and autonomous ones, collectivistic Chinese view themselves as more closely connected with others and evaluate themselves by their social roles and positions in the interpersonal relationships. Consequently, collectivistic Chinese are more inclined to pay more attention to others’ opinions, avoid conflict, facilitate interpersonal harmony, and subordinate personal goals to group goals (Wong and Ahuvia, 1998). However, materialism makes people devalue interpersonal relationships and even regard other people as tools for their material achievements (Deckop et al., 2010). In conflict with collective values, materialism is detrimental to the satisfaction of relatedness.

Limitations and future directions

There are limitations in current research that provide useful avenues for future research. First, this study is a correlational and cross-sectional study. It is necessary to conduct longitudinal research in order to find the causal mechanisms of how materialism affects well-being via basic psychological needs. Second, all surveys involved self-reports, so there could be common method biases. Future studies could use peer-reported data or observational data. Third, this study examined the overall mediating effects of basic psychological needs. Further investigations should differentiate the effects of the three basic psychological needs, especially for autonomy in Asian cultures. For collectivist culture emphasizes social harmony, conformity, and interdependence, some cross-cultural scholars argued that the need for autonomy may not be in match with prevailing Asian social values. Moreover, given the importance of face consciousness in understanding Confucians’ social behavior, future research should attend to the relationships between materialism, face, and well-being. Finally, this research did not systemically control for the sociodemographic variables because of the relative small or homogeneous sample size. In spite of these limitations, this study contributed to the overall body of literature in the exploration of the relationship between materialism and well-being and the potential psychological mechanisms in the context of a Chinese collectivist culture.

Footnotes

Funding

This research was supported by MOE (Ministry of Education in China) Project of Humanities and Social Sciences [No.09YJAXLX003] and National Key Technologies R&D Program of China [No.2012BAI36B03].

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