Author: McCain, Roger A

Publication Year: 1978

Media Type: Report

Summary:

Using a linear 'consumption technology,' we may model some phenomena of endogenous changes of taste, including addiction, habituation, and cultivation of taste. This essay concentrates on cultivation of taste. A short-run, long-run dichotomy is used in order to simplify the imtertemporal choice aspects of the model. If the 'underlying demand curve' for perceived characteristic, in Lancaster's sense, is elastic, then cultivation of taste leads to increasing consumption. In that case, multiple equilibria are a possibility. The multiple equilibria may explain sudden flowering of taste, the division of the population into 'fan' ingroups and nonfan outgroups, seemingly arbitrary and mutable national traditions of drinking coffee or tea, and similar phenomena.

Abstract:

Using a linear 'consumption technology,' we may model some phenomena of endogenous changes of taste, including addiction, habituation, and cultivation of taste. This essay concentrates on cultivation of taste. A short-run, long-run dichotomy is used in order to simplify the imtertemporal choice aspects of the model. If the 'underlying demand curve' for perceived characteristic, in Lancaster's sense, is elastic, then cultivation of taste leads to increasing consumption. In that case, multiple equilibria are a possibility. The multiple equilibria may explain sudden flowering of taste, the division of the population into 'fan' ingroups and nonfan outgroups, seemingly arbitrary and mutable national traditions of drinking coffee or tea, and similar phenomena. (Summary, p. 49-50)

Arts & Intersections:

Categories: Participation