Importance Of Self Identity

Self Identity and Brands
Our attachment to objects give rise to the materialist perspective that ‘we are what we own’. We may feel that we are free to make our choices and our own decisions, based solely on ourselves. However, this is just another aspect of the self illusion. How we make our decisions relies more on those around us than we realise. Even in instances where we feel like we are making our own personal choices, many of these are actually greatly influenced by what we are told and controlled by external influences of which we may not even be aware.
Brands have the power of communication and self-expression, and can be made to be perceived in different ways by consumers. Every individual strives to create their own unique identity

Evidently, consumers particularly prefer brands that are more congruent to their own perceived identity. For example, those that proclaim to be socially-conscious may decide to purchase products from cruelty-free brands, to support their personal morals and beliefs. Likewise, business executives choosing to travel in business class over economy in a short haul flight can largely be considered a lifestyle driven choice rather than one made for convenience.
Objects serve an important function as markers for self-identity and as a reflection of our self, or at least as the perceived notion of how we would like to be seen. Psychologist William James wrote: “A man’s Self is the sum total of all that he CAN call his, not only his body and his psychic powers, but his clothes and his house, his wife and children, his ancestors and friends, his reputation and works, his land and horses, and yacht and bank account.” (James, 1950)
With the consumer as sovereign, perhaps one of the most liberating forms of consumerism is the opportunity to make a new ‘self’. Advertising and the media offer examples of the transformed self, and consumerism provides a means of effecting that

This culture of self expression allows people to “make lifestyle a life project and display their individuality and sense of style in the particularity of the assemblage of goods, clothes, practices, experiences, appearance and bodily dispositions they design together into a lifestyle.” (Featherstone, 2007)
French sociologist and anthropologist Pierre Bourdieu offers another view of taste or preference, and suggests for it to be seen as a social phenomenon; that “taste is not the result of individualistic choices, but is socially patterned in particular ways.” (Lury, 2011)
People seek to establish their place or position in the social hierarchy by using brands as instruments of status signalling. As such, consumers often choose to buy products that they believe reflect certain qualities with which they would like to be associated, and that are aligned with an identity to which they aspire.
This allows them to build and construct a representation of themselves – regardless of whether it is an honest one or otherwise – to the world, by manipulating how want to be seen through the lenses of