O homem e o shopping: um estudo de marketing sobre o significado de ir ao shopping

Abstract

Why do people go often to shopping centers? Starting from this wide and generic question, this dissertation research the meaning of going to shopping centers, further than its practical, economical and functional dimensions. It is analyzed the relationship between the man and theshopping center from an interpretative approach, focused on the construction of cultural meanings, mediated by physical space and by cultural ambiance. The research was elaborated as a qualitative case study, based on techniques from ethnography investigation. The ethnographic method is adapted for the study of a specific place, straying form its classical form originating from anthropology. The theoretical body is constructed by four different perspectives: the marketing one, the symbolism one, the consumption anthropology one and the architecture one. Based on these four perspectives, a critic it is proposed to the theories of the functionalist paradigm, witch domain the marketing debate, the consumer behavior debate and the shopping experience management debate. The reached conclusions allowed proposing a new theory able to explain and to predict the underlying motivation of people associated with the activity of going the shopping center. This theory was named Extraordinary movement.