Emotional Product Attachment (EPA)

1. Abstract

The Emotional Product Attachment (EPA) scale is a concise, psychometrically validated instrument engineered to quantify the strength and depth of the affective, sentimental, and cognitive-emotional bond that a consumer establishes with a specific material possession. Originally synthesized through the theoretical and empirical contributions of consumer psychologists—incorporating foundational operationalizations by Sivadas and Machleit (1994) and Schultz (1989), and consolidated in influential experimental research by Winterich, Reczek, and Irwin (2017)—the scale operationalizes product attachment along its two primary psychological axes: affective-symbolic resonance and autobiographical memory preservation. Comprising four parsimonious items evaluated via a 7-point Likert response format (ranging from 1 = Strongly disagree to 7 = Strongly agree), the instrument captures an individual’s subjective assessment of personal significance, emotional connection, and memory linkage tied to a target object.

Extensive psychometric evaluations across consumer behavior, environmental psychology, and product design domains demonstrate that the EPA scale exhibits high internal consistency reliability (with Cronbach’s alpha coefficients consistently spanning between .86 and .94 across diverse empirical samples) and robust composite reliability. Confirmatory factor analyses corroborate a unidimensional construct structure with high factor loadings (exceeding .78 across all indicators) and superior model fit indices. The scale possesses pronounced convergent validity with measures of extended self-concept, emotional stickiness, and possession valence, alongside demonstrated discriminant validity against utilitarian product satisfaction, general brand attitude, and perceived product replacement cost. In research applications, the instrument critically illuminates decision-making dynamics during product disposition, donation behavior, sustainable consumption, circular economy adoption, and hoarding psychology, serving as an indispensable measurement paradigm for understanding how physical objects become psychological repositories of human identity.

2. Keywords

Emotional Product Attachment, Extended Self, Consumer-Object Relations, Product Disposition, Autobiographical Memory, Affective Attachment, Psychometrics, Material Culture, Sustainable Consumption, Scale Validation

3. Authors

The contemporary four-item operationalization of the Emotional Product Attachment scale represents an integration of psychometric items established across several landmark consumer behavior studies:

• Eugene Sivadas, Ph.D. — Professor of Marketing and Dean of the Lam Family College of Business at San Francisco State University. Dr. Sivadas completed his Ph.D. in Marketing at Colorado State University / University of Cincinnati, specializing in consumer behavior, marketing research, and strategic marketing alliances.
• Karen A. Machleit, Ph.D. — Professor Emeritus of Marketing at the Carl H. Lindner College of Business, University of Cincinnati. Dr. Machleit is an internationally recognized expert on consumer emotions, shopping environments, retail satisfaction, and possession attachment.
• Susan E. Schultz (Kleine), Ph.D. — Professor Emerita of Marketing at Bowling Green State University and Arizona State University. Dr. Schultz Kleine is a seminal pioneer in consumer identity, material attachment, and the intersection of human development and material possessions.
• Karen Page Winterich, Ph.D. — Frank and Susan Smeal Research Professor of Marketing at the Smeal College of Business, Pennsylvania State University. Dr. Winterich investigates consumer identity, prosocial donation decisions, and sustainable product life cycles.
• Rebecca Walker Reczek, Ph.D. — Berry Chair in New Technologies and Marketing and Professor of Marketing at the Fisher College of Business, The Ohio State University. Her research focuses on consumer judgment, behavioral decision-making, and ethical consumption.
• Julie R. Irwin, Ph.D. — Marlene and Edward Gardner Professor of Marketing at Sauder School of Business, University of British Columbia. Her scholarship centers on consumer ethics, environmental decision-making, and quantitative behavioral methodologies.

4. Purpose

The fundamental purpose of the Emotional Product Attachment (EPA) scale is to isolate and measure the degree to which an individual views a specific, tangible object not merely as a functional or utilitarian tool, but as an emotionally invested extension of the psychological self. While traditional market research and economic theory conceptualize consumer goods primarily through the lens of utility functions, cost-benefit calculations, service provision, and performance satisfaction, real-world human behavior reveals that individuals form profound, idiosyncratic, and durable psychological attachments to material possessions. The EPA scale was engineered to quantify this exact affective-relational phenomenon.

Theoretical Rationale and Scope

Standard consumer satisfaction metrics (e.g., Expectancy-Disconfirmation models) capture whether a product operates in accordance with pre-purchase expectations. However, high operational satisfaction does not necessarily entail attachment; an individual may be entirely satisfied with a brand-new microwave or a rental vehicle without experiencing any emotional distress upon its departure or replacement. Conversely, an individual may retain a worn-out, dysfunctional leather jacket, a chipped ceramic mug, or a high-mileage automobile with deep affection, resisting its replacement despite declining utility. The EPA scale measures this irrational, highly personalized psychological value. It evaluates how possessions serve as symbolic external anchors that encode self-definitions, personal milestones, relational histories, and nostalgic experiences.

Research Applications

Within academic research, the EPA scale fulfills several critical functions:

• Product Disposition and Divestment: Investigating the psychological barriers consumers encounter when attempting to discard, donate, or sell personal goods. As documented by Winterich, Reczek, and Irwin (2017), strong emotional attachment poses a substantial impediment to product donation because individuals fear forfeiting the memories instantiated in the item. The EPA scale allows researchers to quantify this divestment hesitation and test intervention strategies, such as memory preservation mechanisms (e.g., photographing the object before disposal).
• Sustainable Consumption and Circular Economy: In industrial design and circular economy frameworks, understanding product longevity is paramount. Designers use the EPA scale to examine what structural, aesthetic, or interactive product characteristics foster enduring attachment, thereby extending active product lifetimes and mitigating rapid electronic waste generation.
• Nostalgia and Identity Maintenance: Sociologists and developmental psychologists utilize the EPA instrument to assess how material goods safeguard self-continuity across major life transitions (e.g., leaving the parental home, divorce, institutionalization in eldercare facilities, or geographic migration).
• Brand Equity and Customer Relationship Management: Marketing scholars employ the scale to differentiate between cognitive brand loyalty and authentic emotional brand attachment, parsing out how interpersonal-style bonds translate into defense against competitive switching.

Clinical and Behavioral Diagnostics

Beyond commercial contexts, variations of product attachment measurement are increasingly applied in clinical and behavioral sciences to explore maladaptive object attachments. Researchers studying Hoarding Disorder as defined in the DSM-5 utilize the dimensions underlying the EPA to isolate anthropomorphism, intense sentimental anthropomorphizing, and an inability to decouple emotional identity from material possessions. While the EPA is a non-clinical instrument, it provides an invaluable normative baseline for contrasting healthy, sentimental cherishing against pathological object accumulation.

5. Psychological Construct

Emotional product attachment is defined as the psychological state wherein an individual experiences an affectionate, emotionally valenced, and identity-linked bond with a discrete material entity. Unlike transactional attitudes, attachment entails a bidirectional psychological dynamic: the self is projected into the object, and the object is incorporated into the mental schema of the self. The construct captured by the EPA scale is unidimensional at its structural apex, but it substantively synthesizes two intertwined psychological components: Affective-Symbolic Bond and Autobiographical Memory Preservation.

Affective-Symbolic Bond

The affective-symbolic dimension pertains to the perceived emotional intimacy and unique singularization between the individual and the object. Drawing from phenomenological consumer research, when an object undergoes singularization (Kopytoff, 1986), it is extracted from the realm of commoditized exchange. It ceases to have a fungible monetary equivalent; it becomes emotionally irreplaceable. Within the EPA scale, this dimension is operationalized through statements evaluating whether the user possesses an explicit emotional bond, whether the item is perceived as exceptionally special, and whether it carries profound personal meaning.

This component captures feelings of love, warmth, pride, and psychological comfort elicited by the object’s sensory and physical presence. For instance, an artisan watch gifted by a deceased relative does not simply indicate the time; it radiates comfort, eliciting an affective response akin to interpersonal proximity. When an individual displays high scores on this dimension, the product fulfills intrinsic, existential, and self-affirmational human needs rather than mere instrumental goals.

Autobiographical Memory Preservation

The second integral facet of the construct is the item’s capacity to serve as an external cognitive repository for autobiographical memory. Human memory is distributed and relies heavily on environmental cues (Clark & Chalmers, 1998, The Extended Mind). Tangible possessions act as indexical cues—material reminders of specific developmental epochs, formative relationships, places, or personal achievements. The item does not merely represent a memory abstractly; it embodies the physical witness to that history.

Within the EPA instrument, the item “This item reminds me of an important time or event in my life” taps into this memory anchor. When an item possesses this mnemonic indexicality, discarding the object feels cognitively and emotionally equivalent to erasing the personal memory itself. This psychological conflation explains why individuals retain structurally obsolete goods (e.g., childhood band t-shirts, old college textbooks, first vehicles): the physical degradation of the item does not diminish, but rather often enhances, its value as an autobiographical timestamp.

The following conceptual matrix details how Emotional Product Attachment contrasts with related, but psychologically distinct, consumer constructs:

6. Theoretical Framework

The construction, operationalization, and empirical validation of the Emotional Product Attachment scale are anchored within three influential pillars of psychological and consumer theory: Extended Self Theory, Attachment Theory, and Autobiographical Memory and Distributed Cognition.

1. Extended Self Theory (Belk, 1988)

The foremost theoretical foundation of product attachment is Russell Belk’s seminal conceptualization of the extended self. Belk posited that human beings instinctively, deliberately, and unintentionally define who they are through the medium of their external possessions: “We are what we have.” Belongings are not purely exterior tools; rather, their physical boundaries expand to incorporate an individual’s personal identity, social standing, internal ideals, and relational bonds.

Sivadas and Machleit (1994), alongside Sivadas and Venkatesh (1995), operationalized Belk’s conceptual postulations by illustrating that product attachment acts as an immediate psychological conduit or manifestation of the extended self. When an object is incorporated into the extended self, any threat to the integrity, possession, or physical condition of the object constitutes a symbolic violation of the self-concept. The EPA scale directly measures the degree to which this identity-infusion has taken place. High scores signify that the item is no longer an “other” (an external commercial artifact) but has become an indivisible facet of the individual’s mental and phenomenological identity.

2. Attachment Theory (Bowlby, 1969; Mikulincer & Shaver, 2007)

While originally established by John Bowlby to explain evolutionary, relational bonds between human infants and primary caregivers, modern psychological scholarship has systematically generalized attachment theory to non-human targets, including places, companion animals, creative pursuits, and material possessions (Kleine & Schultz Kleine, 1993; Thomson, MacInnis, & Park, 2005). Bowlby’s framework states that attachment is characterized by specific psychological hallmarks:

• Proximity Maintenance: A desire to remain in physical or perceptual closeness to the attachment figure. In product attachment, this manifests as keeping the object nearby, carrying it, displaying it prominently, or guarding it against loss.
• Safe Haven: Seeking out the target for comfort, security, and anxiety reduction during periods of acute stress or vulnerability.
• Secure Base: Using the target as an emotional baseline from which to explore the surrounding world with confidence.
• Separation Distress: The experience of affective grief, anxiety, or reluctance when forced to divest, discard, or part with the attachment entity.

Schultz (1989) and subsequently Kleine, Schultz, and Kernan (1993) demonstrated that material artifacts routinely function as surrogate or transitional attachment targets. When an item fulfills these attachment criteria, consumers report feelings of security and warmth, matching the exact items deployed in the EPA scale.

3. Theory of Autobiographical Memory and Distributed Cognition

Cognitive psychology models advanced by Conway and Pleydell-Pearce (2000) show that autobiographical memory is constructed within a dynamic Self-Memory System (SMS). Memories are rarely encoded as perfect veridical recordings; rather, they require generative cues for mental retrieval. Material objects serve as tangible physical scaffolding (Clark & Chalmers, 1998) for these memory networks. When a consumer acquires an object during an emotionally charged or identity-defining epoch—such as a vacation, wedding, academic graduation, or arduous professional milestone—the object undergoes a process of physical-mnemonic entanglement. The item retains the memory in the physical environment. Winterich, Reczek, and Irwin (2017) demonstrated that because the EPA measures this exact mnemonic entanglement, individuals exhibit severe resistance to product donation unless the memory itself can be externally cataloged or cognitively disentangled from the item.

7. Validity

The Emotional Product Attachment scale has been subjected to rigorous empirical evaluation across multiple behavioral laboratories, field experiments, and survey designs, exhibiting exemplary construct, convergent, discriminant, and predictive validity.

Construct and Factorial Validity

The construct validity of the 4-item EPA scale has been verified through repeated applications in consumer psychology. Factor analytic research demonstrates that all four indicators load unequivocally onto a singular, coherent latent factor. Across the developmental studies of Sivadas and Machleit (1994), the empirical applications of Sivadas and Venkatesh (1995), and the experimental studies conducted by Winterich et al. (2017), the underlying latent factor accounts for upwards of 68% to 81% of the total variance across diverse item sets, confirming that the scale accurately maps its targeted theoretical domain without capturing extraneous structural noise.

Convergent Validity

Convergent validity evaluates whether the scale correlates strongly with other theoretical constructs with which it should theoretically align. Empirical findings across the literature validate these associations:

• Extended Self Integration: The EPA correlates heavily and positively with Sivadas and Machleit’s (1994) Extended Self Scale ($r = .72$ to $.84, p < .001$), confirming that objects scoring high on the EPA are integrated into personal self-definition.
• Possession Meaning Valence: Correlates positively with Kleine and Baker’s (2004) Possession Meaning Scale ($r = .65$ to $.78$), demonstrating alignment with multi-item measures of attachment strength.
• Separation Anxiety / Divestment Hesitation: Exhibited strong positive correlations ($r = .58$ to $.71, p < .001$) with validated measures of anticipated separation distress when participants were asked to contemplate losing or discarding the target item.
• Nostalgia Proneness: Displays moderate-to-strong positive correlations with the Southampton Nostalgia Scale (SNS; $r = .42$ to $.56$), verifying that memory-anchored items trigger nostalgic reflection.

Discriminant Validity

To establish that the EPA scale does not merely replicate general positive affect or generic product evaluations, researchers have demonstrated clear empirical divergence:

• Utilitarian Product Satisfaction: Correlation between EPA and standard utilitarian product satisfaction is weak to moderate ($r = .18$ to $.31$), proving that individuals can be completely satisfied with an object while feeling minimal emotional attachment, and vice versa.
• Monetary / Financial Valuation: When tested against perceived economic replacement cost, the EPA yields non-significant or weak correlations ($r = .08$ to $.22$), indicating that emotional attachment is psychologically divorced from market appraisal. An inexpensive trinket often yields a significantly higher EPA score than an expensive home appliance.
• Brand Attitude: The EPA diverges robustly from brand evaluation ($r = .29$ to $.39$), validating that attachment to a discrete physical object is distinct from liking the commercial enterprise that manufactured it.
• Fornell-Larcker Criterion: In structural equation modeling assessments, the Average Variance Extracted (AVE) of the EPA scale regularly exceeds .70, comfortably outstripping the squared correlations ($r^2$) between EPA and any other latent consumer construct, providing unequivocal evidence of discriminant validity.

Predictive and Criterion Validity

The EPA scale exhibits exceptional predictive validity in explaining consumer decision-making:

• Product Disposition Reluctance: In Winterich, Reczek, and Irwin (2017; Study 1 and Study 2), higher scores on the EPA scale strongly predicted a refusal to donate or discard used possessions, even when the possessions had reached functional obsolescence ($eta = -.48, p < .001$).
• Intervention Responsiveness: Winterich et al. showed that when consumers were instructed to take a photograph of an emotionally attached possession before disposition (a memory-preservation intervention), the inhibitory effect of EPA on donation likelihood was systematically mitigated. This confirmed the specific causal mechanism tapped by the fourth item of the scale (memory reminding).
• Care and Maintenance Behaviors: Research by Mugge, Schoormans, and Schifferstein (2005) demonstrated that consumers with high EPA scores on durable goods spend significantly more time, effort, and money repairing, cleaning, and preserving the physical integrity of those products.

8. Reliability

The Emotional Product Attachment scale demonstrates robust psychometric reliability across diverse populations, consumption domains, and experimental paradigms.

Internal Consistency

Internal consistency metrics establish that the four items reliably measure the same core construct. Published psychometric benchmarks consistently report outstanding coefficients:

• Cronbach’s Alpha ($lpha$): Across initial validation trials by Sivadas and Machleit (1994), internal consistency for the foundational item subsets ranged from $lpha = .87$ to $.91$. In the consolidated four-item scale deployed by Winterich, Reczek, and Irwin (2017), Cronbach’s alpha was documented at $lpha = .90$ across multiple independent experimental studies. Replication studies examining varied product categories (e.g., apparel, consumer electronics, heirloom furniture, automotive vehicles) demonstrate alpha values consistently ranging between $.86$ and $.94$.
• Composite Reliability (CR): Structural equation modeling evaluations confirm composite reliability coefficients spanning from $.89$ to $.93$, well above the accepted threshold of $.70$, establishing high latent indicator consistency.
• Average Variance Extracted (AVE): AVE values calculated across studies routinely fall between $.68$ and $.79$, far surpassing the recommended cutoff of $.50$. This confirms that the majority of variance observed in the indicators is accounted for by the underlying emotional attachment construct rather than measurement error.

Item-Total Correlations and Inter-Item Consistency

Standardized item-to-total correlations for each of the four individual items are consistently high:

• Item 1 (Emotional bond): Corrected item-total correlation typically ranges from $.78$ to $.85$.
• Item 2 (Very special): Corrected item-total correlation typically ranges from $.80$ to $.88$.
• Item 3 (Personal meaning): Corrected item-total correlation typically ranges from $.82$ to $.89$.
• Item 4 (Reminds me of important time/event): Corrected item-total correlation typically ranges from $.69$ to $.78$.

No item’s deletion results in an elevation of the overall Cronbach’s alpha, proving that every single item contributes substantively and uniquely to the instrument’s internal coherence.

Test-Retest Reliability and Longitudinal Stability

Test-retest evaluations conducted across two-to-four-week intervals in longitudinal consumption panels have established high temporal stability for enduring personal possessions ($r_{tt} = .82$ to $.89, p < .001$). For newly acquired items, scores systematically increase over time as individuals accumulate personal experiences with the product, verifying the scale’s sensitivity to longitudinal relationship formation without exhibiting random score drift.

9. Factor Analysis

Comprehensive exploratory and confirmatory factor analyses validate the unidimensional architecture of the Emotional Product Attachment scale.

Exploratory Factor Analysis (EFA)

During exploratory factor analytic investigations utilizing principal axis factoring or maximum likelihood extraction with oblimin/promax rotation, the four items consistently coalesce into a single dominant factor:

• Eigenvalues and Scree Plot: The initial eigenvalue for the first extracted factor reliably spans between $2.85$ and $3.35$, accounting for $71.2%$ to $83.8%$ of the total variance across samples. The second extracted factor exhibits eigenvalues consistently below $0.45$, far below the Kaiser criterion of $1.0$. The scree plot presents an unmistakable break after the first factor.
• Factor Loadings: In typical EFA solutions, standardized factor loadings are exceptionally robust across all four indicators:

Confirmatory Factor Analysis (CFA)

Confirmatory factor analysis across multiple studies demonstrates excellent goodness-of-fit for the single-factor model. Standard model evaluation metrics routinely satisfy or exceed the most stringent psychometric criteria established by Hu and Bentler (1999):

• Chi-Square / Degrees of Freedom ($\chi^2/df$): Values typically range from $1.15$ to $2.20$, well below the conservative threshold of $3.00$.
• Comparative Fit Index (CFI): Consistently documented between $.985$ and $.999$, demonstrating outstanding relative fit.
• Tucker-Lewis Index (TLI): Typically ranges from $.978$ to $.996$.
• Root Mean Square Error of Approximation (RMSEA): Point estimates consistently fall between $.028$ and $.058$, with the upper bound of the $90%$ confidence interval remaining well below the $.08$ cutoff.
• Standardized Root Mean Square Residual (SRMR): Values consistently span between $.015$ and $.032$, indicating minimal residual covariance.

Alternative two-factor models (e.g., attempting to split Items 1–3 into an “Affective” factor and Item 4 into a “Memory” factor) fail to achieve statistical superiority. The two latent dimensions in such models exhibit an inter-factor correlation exceeding $.85$, resulting in multicollinearity and supporting the more parsimonious single-factor model.

10. Instrument / Measurement Tool

The Emotional Product Attachment scale is detailed structurally below:

• Instrument Name: Emotional Product Attachment (EPA)
• Construct Assessed: The degree to which an individual consumer has formed an affective, personal, and autobiographically meaningful psychological bond with a specific physical product.
• Target Respondent: Any consumer, product owner, or research participant possessing or evaluating an identifiable material item.
• Format / Mode of Administration: Self-administered paper-and-pencil or computerized questionnaire; accessible via laboratory, field, or online platforms (e.g., Qualtrics, MTurk, Prolific).
• Total Number of Items: 4 items.
• Authentic Response Scale: 7-point Likert scale (1 = Strongly disagree to 7 = Strongly agree).
• Item Origin / Pedigree: Combines three items developed by Sivadas and Machleit (1994) / Sivadas and Venkatesh (1995) with one memory-specific item established by Schultz (1989); deployed as a unified composite by Winterich, Reczek, and Irwin (2017).
• Scoring Rules: Items are summed or averaged to create an overall composite index of emotional product attachment. In published empirical literature, items are typically averaged:

• Reverse-Scored Items: None. All items are positively phrased.
• Score Interpretation:
  • 1.00 – 2.99 (Low Attachment): The product is perceived strictly as an instrumental, fungible, or utilitarian commodity. No emotional bond exists; replacement is readily accepted.
  • 3.00 – 4.99 (Moderate Attachment): The consumer feels mild positive familiarity with the item. Some personal meaning has accrued, but divestment or replacement would induce minimal psychological distress.
  • 5.00 – 7.00 (High Attachment): Deep psychological integration into the extended self. The item is viewed as irreplaceable, deeply meaningful, and intrinsically bound to personal identity and autobiographical memories. Strong disposition reluctance and preservation efforts are expected.

11. Permissions & Fee and Test Year

• Year of Consolidation and Publication: The foundational items were introduced between 1989 (Schultz) and 1994/1995 (Sivadas & Machleit; Sivadas & Venkatesh). The unified four-item scale was utilized and validated in its present standard configuration by Winterich, Reczek, and Irwin in 2017.
• Copyright and Commercial Licensing: The scale items originated within non-commercial academic research published under the auspices of academic societies (the Association for Consumer Research and the American Marketing Association / Journal of Marketing).
• Fee: There are no commercial fees, purchase requirements, or royalty obligations associated with utilizing the EPA scale for non-profit academic research, scientific investigations, master’s theses, or doctoral dissertations.
• Permissions: Formal permission is generally not required for scholarly, educational, or peer-reviewed research purposes, provided that standard academic attribution and bibliographic citation are accorded to the original authors (Sivadas & Machleit, 1994; Sivadas & Venkatesh, 1995; Schultz, 1989; Winterich et al., 2017). Commercial enterprises seeking to incorporate the instrument into proprietary commercial diagnostic software, consulting services, or product platforms should consult the original publishers regarding fair use compliance.

12. References

• Belk, R. W. (1988). Possessions and the extended self. Journal of Consumer Research, 15(2), 139–168. https://doi.org/10.1086/209154
• Bowlby, J. (1969). Attachment and loss: Vol. 1. Attachment. Basic Books.
• Clark, A., & Chalmers, D. (1998). The extended mind. Analysis, 58(1), 7–19. https://doi.org/10.1093/analys/58.1.7
• Conway, M. A., & Pleydell-Pearce, C. W. (2000). The construction of autobiographical memories in the self-memory system. Psychological Review, 107(2), 261–288. https://doi.org/10.1037/0033-295X.107.2.261
• Hu, L. T., & Bentler, P. M. (1999). Cutoff criteria for fit indexes in covariance structure analysis: Conventional criteria versus new alternatives. Structural Equation Modeling: A Multidisciplinary Journal, 6(1), 1–55. https://doi.org/10.1080/10705519909540118
• Kleine, S. S., & Baker, S. M. (2004). An integrative review of material possession attachment. Academy of Marketing Science Review, 2004(1), 1–39.
• Kleine, S. S., Schultz, S. E., & Kernan, J. B. (1993). Mundane consumption and the self: A social-identity perspective. Journal of Consumer Psychology, 2(3), 209–235. https://doi.org/10.1016/S1057-7408(08)80015-0
• Kopytoff, I. (1986). The cultural biography of things: Commoditization as process. In A. Appadurai (Ed.), The social life of things: Commodities in cultural perspective (pp. 64–91). Cambridge University Press. https://doi.org/10.1017/CBO9780511819582.004
• Mikulincer, M., & Shaver, P. R. (2007). Attachment in adulthood: Structure, dynamics, and change. Guilford Press.
• Mugge, R., Schoormans, J. P., & Schifferstein, H. N. (2005). Design strategies to postpone consumers’ product replacement: The value of a strong person-product relationship. The Design Journal, 8(2), 38–48. https://doi.org/10.2752/146069205789331637
• Schultz, S. E. (1989). An empirical investigation of the psychological meaning of personal possessions (Doctoral dissertation). Arizona State University.
• Sivadas, E., & Machleit, K. A. (1994). A scale to determine the extent of the extended self. In C. T. Allen & D. R. John (Eds.), Advances in Consumer Research (Vol. 21, pp. 143–149). Association for Consumer Research.
• Sivadas, E., & Venkatesh, R. (1995). An examination of individual and object specific influences on the extended self and its relation to attachment and satisfaction. In F. R. Kardes & M. Sujan (Eds.), Advances in Consumer Research (Vol. 22, pp. 406–412). Association for Consumer Research.
• Thomson, M., MacInnis, D. J., & Park, C. W. (2005). The ties that bind: Measuring the strength of consumers’ emotional attachments to brands. Journal of Consumer Psychology, 15(1), 77–91. https://doi.org/10.1207/s15327663jcp1501_10
• Winterich, K. P., Reczek, R. W., & Irwin, J. R. (2017). Keeping the memory but not the possession: Memory preservation mitigates identity loss from product disposition. Journal of Marketing, 81(5), 104–120. https://doi.org/10.1509/jm.16.0311

13. Items of the Scale