A Comparison of Korean and American Gift-Giving Behaviors

In an effort to understand diverse, multicultural consumer behavior, this study compares Korean and American gift-giving behavior and its related values. This study aims to illustrate how gift-giving behavior works and differs across cultural values; specifically, in the Confucian collectivistic nature of the Far East, Korea, and the individualistic nature of the West, America. Focus groups and in-depth interviews are conducted for initial issue exploration, and mail surveys are then utilized for testing the proposed hypotheses. Results reveal Confucian collectivistic and individualistic values as significant in explaining differences in cross-cultural gift giving.