ABSTRACT
In Chapter 7, alternative consumer stress coping strategies are presented. An embodied reading of the insecurity and mood-alleviation properties of affluent fashion consumption practice suggests an understanding of such consumption practice as stress coping. From a stress perspective, reliance on expert systems such as advertising, brands, peers or aesthetic experts to decide what products to choose is an example of a consumer support-seeking, stress coping strategy. Coping with marketplace-induced stressors is discussed as compensatory consumption which consumption objects provide self-assurance. The links between affluent consumption as coping and materialism are discussed.
