Product gender perceptions: the case of China

Abstract

Investigates whether the Chinese perceive products to possess gender and whether these perceptions are based on who buys the product, who uses the product, and/or who promotes the product. The results indicate that the Chinese do indeed perceive many products to have gender. For those products which are clearly sex‐typed, the primary determinant of these perceptions is the user; for more ambiguous products, uses the cues of user, buyer and promoter. Discusses the marketing implications regarding how to use these cues in creating and/or avoiding gender images of products.