[Softly Assembled] Gender Performance Through Products: Four Practices Responding to Masculine and Feminine Codes in Product Design

Abstract

Purpose: This study seeks to determine the marketplace practices in which consumers engage with regard to masculine and feminine codes employed in product design. Since extant consumer research argues that consumers prefer marketing stimuli that match their sex or gender identity, this study also asks how consumers’ practices inform this understanding of the possession-self link.

Design/methodology/approach: This study used semi-structured interviews with an auto-driving component to answer the research questions. Data from 20 interviews were analyzed using feminist critical discourse analysis and a poststructuralist feminist-informed theoretical framework.

Findings: Four consumer practices identified in the data show that interpretations and evaluations of product gender are sometimes, but not always, a reflection of the gendered self.

Research limitations/implications: This research shares a snapshot of a cohort of individuals that interact with the marketplace, but there are some perspectives missing. Future research must engage with individuals from different socioeconomic backgrounds, as well as non-binary or gender nonconforming individuals, in order to enhance or even challenge these findings.

Practical implications (if applicable): Evidence from the marketplace demonstrates intense criticism of products that have been coded as masculine or feminine based on gender stereotypes or men and women’s perceived aesthetic tastes. Marketers are encouraged to use gender codes to differentiate products catered to men and women based on their ergonomic or biological needs.

Originality/value: This study complicates theory on the possession-self link to show cases in which that link is broken. Engaging critically with the topic of product gender from a poststructuralist feminist perspective also illustrates how marketing practices may help or harm consumers.

Citation

Drake, C. and Radford, S.K. (2018), "[Softly Assembled] Gender Performance Through Products: Four Practices Responding to Masculine and Feminine Codes in Product Design", Cross, S.N.N., Ruvalcaba, C., Venkatesh, A. and Belk, R.W. (Ed.) Consumer Culture Theory (Research in Consumer Behavior, Vol. 19), Emerald Publishing Limited, Leeds, pp. 123-144. https://doi.org/10.1108/S0885-211120180000019008