CONSUMERS’ DIGITAL SELF-EXTENSION AND PRO-BRAND SOCIAL MEDIA ENGAGEMENT – THE ROLE OF CULTURE

Self-monitoring and self-esteem are found to drive the self-extension tendency across cultures with stronger effects in the individualist culture than in the collectivist culture. The self-extension tendency has a relatively stronger positive influence on social media engagement intention in the individualist culture than in the collectivist culture. This tendency is also found to mediate the link between self-monitoring, self-extension, and social media engagement intentions across both cultures, albeit in different ways. In the collectivist culture, self-monitoring’s influence on the self-extension tendency is moderated by public self-consciousness. The study findings have important theoretical and practical implications.