The consumer behavior can be characterized through a cross-section of distinguished culture circles. A culture circle comprises a human community whose members share the same system of values (religion and tradition), the same language and a similar history (past). In the world there are twelve ma-jor culture circles including the European, Eastern-Slavic, Anglo-American, Chinese, Indian, Australian, Japanese, Latino-American, Pacific, as well as the circle of the Sub-Saharan Africa and Southeastern Asia (GEO, 2011).
The European circle is represented by Western and Central European countries with a population of 520 million people. In an overwhelming majori-ty people of these nations use Indo-European languages and are followers of the Christian religion, the values of which are commonly recognized and re-spected, even by people who consider themselves non-religious. The identity of the European circle appears as a strengthening power of the European Un-ion existence (Solomon, Bamossy & Askegaard, 1999).
The Eastern-Slavic circle comprises Slavic countries situated east of Poland including Russia, Ukraine and Belarus as well as non-Slavic countries like Georgia and Armenia. This circle also extends over the area of northern Ka-zakhstan and European countries within the influence of the Orthodox church such as Bulgaria, Serbia, part of Greece and Cyprus. The bonds between these
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nations are cemented by the Orthodox church religion, as well as the Slavic language with the alphabet different from the one used in the West-European circle. The whole area of the Eastern-Slavic circle has been under military and political influence of Russia (Kieżel, 2010).
EXAMPLE
Information sources for customer on Bulgaria clothes market
Results of research into consumer behavior during clothes shop-ping in Bulgaria show that half of consumers buy goods in the company of friends or relatives, who act as advisers and sugges-tion-makers. Forty-three percent of respondents claim they pre-fer to do shopping individually, without seeking anybody's ad-vice. Only 6% of the questioned consumers say they ask a sales clerk for advice. At first glance, the results confirm, on the one hand, the existence of great possibilities for using personal sources for informal information, since ‘the sources’ accompany consumers during shopping. On the other hand, great possibili-ties of exerting influence on the consumer by people who be-come such source of information.
Source: Marinov, Petrovici and Marinova (2008)
The Anglo-American circle comprises area of the USA and Canada. The cul-ture of both countries is of the European origin, which is demonstrated in the language similarity - with English as a dominant language (in Canada one of two official languages, the other being French) and in the Christian religion, including Protestantism. Nonetheless, the Anglo-American culture stands as a separate culture circle and as such it independently sets its own trends of development (Raymond, 2003).
The circle of Latin America comprises all countries of South and Central America, including the Caribbean islands. Here, Spanish prevails as the domi-nant and most common language, even though Argentinians are mainly of Italian origin. In this group the major religion is represented by Catholicism, whereas the name “Latinoamerican” reveals a common Latin cultural
back-ground. Contemporary Latino-Americans are descendants of Indians, Europe-ans (conquistadors and immigrants), AfricEurope-ans (slaves) and AsiEurope-ans.
The Islamic culture consists of Arab countries of Asia and Africa, as well as of Turkish speaking countries of the Near East. All these nations are united under one Islamic religion and the Arab language in which the Koran – the holy book - is written. The circle is developing in a very dynamic way, and the Islamic religion is gaining an increasing number of followers. In this circle political structures, rules of social life and the national legislation are strictly subordinated to religious rules.
The circle of Sub-Saharan Africa represents a compact area stretching south of Sahara Desert and is referred to as „Black Africa”. Nonetheless, it is extremely diverse both in terms of ethnics and religion. The greatest popula-tion of this circle is represented by adherents of tribal religions, as well as Islam and Afro-Christian religion.
The Chinese circle extends across the territory of China. It is the most nu-merous of all the circles, with people using a language from the family of Chi-nese-Tibetan languages. The system of values of the Chinese civilization is based on Confucianism (a philosophical doctrine developed by Confucius who advocated respect for tradition, obedience to authorities, necessity of abiding by norms of social coexistence). With respect to technological development in the past the Chinese civilization used to be ahead of the European one, but the country's switch to the policy of isolation, followed by Chinese Communist rule, precipitated the economic slowdown and even civilization regression.
The Japanese circle is the smallest of all the circles. Here Shintoism is rec-ognized as a national religion, but many Japanese and Koreans are also adher-ents of Buddhism. What is characteristic of all members of the circle is their strong sense of national identity, honor, bravery and labor.
The Indian circle includes such countries as India, Nepal, Sri Lanka, Bhutan and Bangladesh. In this region religions vary across countries, from Hinduism in India to Islam in Bangladesh.
The circle of Southeastern Asia encompasses countries from Myanmar (previous Burmah) to Philippines in the West and Indonesia in the South.
The countries share one common territory as well as history, but are divided by language and religious differences. In Myanmar and Thailand the prevalent
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religion is Buddhism, in Indonesia, Malaysia and Brunei – Islam, and in Philip-pines, being a previous Spanish colony, the Catholic religion.
The Australian circle consists of Australia and New Zealand, countries that once used to be under the rule of the British Empire, which greatly affected development of this region. Both countries have a relatively open immigration policy, whereby the ethnic and religious culture of these states is undergoing constant changes.
The Pacific circle represents a vast geographic area comprising Pacific Islands such as Hawaii, New Guinea, Micronesia and Polynesia (Małysa-Kaleta, 2010).
Each of the presented culture circles can be identified with a set of funda-mental values which influence human behavior in all aspects of life, including purchasing behavior (Table 3.1.).
Table 3.1. Values respected in particular culture circles NAME OF THE CULTURAL
CIRCLE
FUNDAMENTAL VALUES
European Respect for the individual, openness towards others, love of freedom, drive for success, pursuit of constant deve-lopment
Anglo-American Individualism, great self-esteem, faith in democracy, pur-suit of success, great openness and acceptance of dif-ferences, orientation on consumption
Latino-American Attachment to tradition, strong faith, rituals, love for dance and music
Eastern-Slavic Profound spirituality, openness and directness, worship of strong power
Islamic Subordination of private life to religious rules, enga-gement in religious practices, moral severity, resignation from individual freedom
Sub-Saharan Strong tribal bonds, (cross-national), magic and super-stitions, attachment to tradition, love for dance and life according to nature
Chinese Values based on Confucianism, respect for tradition, obe-dience of social norms and subordination to the autho-rity power
Australian Values developed by immigrants (especially form Eu-rope) for the natives – Aborigens – land is a value, but lack of at-tachment to one's own property, freedom, life in concord with nature
Pacific Attachment to one's won tradition, culture and rituals Japanese Strong sense of national identity, honor, bravery,
indus-try, dedication
Indian Values based on Islam, Buddhism and Hinduism, ful-fillment of caste-related duties, resignation from vio-lence, acceptance of suffering, ascetic way of life
South-East Asia Values related to Buddhism, Catholicism and Islam, local tradition is interwoven with values of colonialists Source: Małysa-Kaleta (2010)
It is worth noting the fact that within cultural circles there appear the so-called cultural groups which share a higher degree of similarity. Here, one can distinguish the Anglo-Saxon Europe (Great Britain, Ireland), Central Europe (Germany, Belgium, Luxemburg, Austria, Switzerland), Nordic Europe (Fin-land, Sweden, Denmark, Norway), Mediterranean Europe (Italy, Spain, France, Portugal) (Sznajder, 1997). The European cultural is deeply rooted in Christi-anity which first appeared here in the 1st Century to become the dominant religion throughout Europe until the end of the 10th Century. However, the religion has not always been of one homogenous character, as in the 11th Century the Christian religion was split into Catholic and Orthodox religion.
500 years later, another religious schism took place as a result of the refor-mation process, giving rise to the Protestantism which is nowadays one com-mon religion of Scandinavian countries and the European Germanic region (Germany, Holland, Switzerland, Great Britain) as well as Estonia and Latvia.
The Catholic religion occupies a dominant position in most Roman countries (Italy, France, Spain, Portugal) and Central European states. The Orthodox
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church, in turn, is the most powerful and influential in the eastern and south-eastern part of the European continent. Altogether, Christians account for 70% of all Europeans. Nonetheless, Europe is now witnessing a wide-scale process of secularization, which means religious defection and lack of reli-gious declaration on the part of European citizens. Consequently, the share of atheists in populations of particular countries is relatively high – e.g. in Swe-den, Estonia, the Czech Republic and France it is estimated at 30–50%, and in the whole Europe it is about 20%. Over 50 million citizens of the European states (7% of population) are Islamic. The religion came to Europe in the 8th Century with Arab invasion on Spain, but it was the Balkan region that became the hub of Europeans Muslims since the 15th century. The latter remain in majority in Albania, Kosovo, Bosnia and Herzegovina, as well as in some parts of Russia- Tatarstan. Additionally, Muslim communities inhabit West-European cities of France, Germany, Great Britain, Spain, Italy or Holland (Małysa-Kaleta, 2010).
Europe is a country of multicultures, i.e. the existence of various groups within one circle, where the groups demonstrate a diverse system of tradi-tions, values and a social organization. The coexistence of many ethnic minori-ties within European countries is connected with a massive influx of migrants from various world regions. This phenomenon became especially powerful after the II World War, when inhabitants of less developed countries, mainly former colonies, started to grossly settle in fast developing states where the standard of living was high. Consequently, in France the dominant immigra-tion group became Arab people from North Africa, in Great Britain, Indians, in Spain -inhabitants of South and Central America, in Germany – Turks who were brought to this country as cheap labor force to facilitate implemen-tation of development programs and help to reconstruct the country after the II World War. Also, the ongoing integration and development of the Euro-pean Union, with free flow of member state citizens within the EU borders, have contributed to intensified migration of people for better life standards.