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The Effectiveness of Family Life Cycle Variables in Consumer Expenditure

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Article  in  Journal of Consumer Research · February 1983

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The Effectiveness of
Family Life Cycle Variables in
Consumer Expenditure Research"^
JANET WAGNER
SHERMAN HANNA**
Traditional famiiy life cycle, revised family life cycle, and family composition vari-
ables are compared in models predicting total family clothing expenditures. There
is little difference In the predictive ability of the three sets of variables. In models
controlling for socioeconomic and demographic variables, family life cycle and
family composition variables have little predictive ability, independent of income.
F amily iife cycle is a construct which has been popular
in consumer expenditure research for the past 30 years
(e.g., Amdt 1979; Lansing and Morgan 1955; Wells and
Gubar 1966). A set of composite variables, family life cycle
combines trends in income and family composition with
changes in demands placed on income. In economic theor)',
income and family composition are considered the most
important variables influencing family expenditures (Brown
and Deaton 1972). If family life cycle successfully captures
the effects of changes in income and family composition
on expenditures, then family life cycle should be a ver>'
powerful determinant of expenditures for goods and ser-
vices.
Despite its popularity, family life cycle has been criti-
cized. Ferber (1979) has argued that when socioeconomic
and demographic variables—especially income—are con-
trolled, family life cycle variables may have little effect on
expenditures. Other critics (Murphy and Staples 1979; Trost
1974) have suggested that the effect of family composition
is obscured by family life cycle variables. There is no em-
pirical evidence to support or refute these contentions.
The well-documented incidences of divorce, postpone-
ment of marriage and childbearing. and voluntary child-
lessness (U.S. Bureau of the Census 1982; U.S. Depart-
*This article received an honorable menlion in the 1983 Robert Ferber
Award for Consumer Research competition for the best interdisciplinary
anicle based on a recent doctoral dissertation. The award is cosponsored
by the Association for Consumer Research and the Journal of Consumer
Research.
**Janei Wagner is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Textiles
and Consumer Economics, University of Marjiand. College Park. MD
20742. Sherman Hanna is an Associate Professor in the Department of
Family Economics. Kansas State University. Manhattan. KS 66506. The
authors would like to thank both Elizabeth McCullough and three anon-
ymous reviewers for their comments on the preliminarj' drafts of this
paper. The research was conducted at Kansas State University.
281
ment of Health and Human Ser\'ices 1982) have resulted
in an increase in the number of families who are excluded
from traditional family life cycle categories. As a result,
there has been controversy in the consumer behavior liter-
ature over the appropriate defmition of the family life cycle.
Consumer researchers ha%'e proposed increasing the number
of family life cycle stages in order to accommodate non-
traditional family forms, such as single parent families and
married couples who choose not to bear children (Gilly and
Enis 1981; Murphy and Staples 1979; Stampfl 1978). Such
revisions presuppose that increasing the number of family
life cycle stages would be useful in predicting family ex-
penditures for goods and services. If this is a worthwhile
exercise, then the superiority of revised defmitions should
be demonstrated. To date, there has been no substantiating
research.
This paper reviews prior use of family life cycle variables
in consumer expenditure research and discusses altemative
definitions of the family life cycle. The predictive ability
of a traditional family life cycle model (Wells and Gubar
1966) is compared to that of revised family life cycle and
family composition models. The predictive effectiveness of
each of these models is then compared to a set of socio-
economic and demographic variables. Clothing is the ex-
penditure category used for the purposes of this compari-
son.
PRIOR RESEARCH
Family life cycle variables have been used to study a
wide range of family financial characteristics and expen-
diture pattems. Lansing and Morgan (1955) studied income
and assets as well as expenditures for housing and durables,
using a seven-stage family life cycle model based on the
age and marital status of the household head and the age
of the youngest child. The pattem of income over the family
C JOURNAL OF CONSUMER RESEARCH • Vol. 10 • December 198.'
282
life cycle followed an inverted U-shape. Income increased
over the life cycle, peaking when there were dependent
children in the family. As the children left home, income
decreased until the household head retired.
Wells and Gubar (1966) expanded the Lansing and Mor-
gan family life cycle to include the employment or retire-
ment of the household head. Using data from both the 1963
Sur\'ey of Consumer Finances and the 1960-1961 Survey
of Consumer Expenditures, the effectiveness of family life
cycle variables was compared to that of age of the house-
hold head in predicting expenditures for food, durables,
housing, and vacations. In each comparison, family life
cycle variables were more effective. Wells and Gubar also
used the data from the 1960-1961 Survey of Consumer
Expenditures to compare the effectiveness of age of the
household head to the effectiveness of stage in the family
life cycle in predicting expenditures for selected clothing
items. They found that age of the household head was su-
perior to family life cycle in predicting expenditures for
luxury items such as fur coats, as well as for more obviously
age-related garments such as women's shorts and dunga-
rees. Much of the ensuing expenditure research using fam-
ily life cycle variables has been based on the Wells and
Gubar model, which has been used to study the consump-
tion of food (Derrick and Lehfeld 1980), ser\'ices (Amdt
1979), and leisure time (Hisrich and Peters 1974; Landon
and Locander 1979; Settle, Alreck, and Belch 1979).
Murphy and Staples (1979) argued that a great deal of
information is lost because nontraditional families are ex-
cluded from the Wells and Gubar family life cycle model.
Their modemized family life cycle, unique in recognizing
both divorce and childlessness, contained 13 stages. Al-
though the Murphy and Staples model was designed to be
more inclusive than the Wells and Gubar model, it still
excluded cohabiting couples, never-married individuals
with children, married couples who are separated, and
young and middle-aged widows and widowers. The Mur-
phy and Staples model has been used by Frey and LaBay
(1983), Fritzsche (1981), and Zimmerman (1981) in anal-
yses of household energy expenditures. As of this study,
there has been no research comparing the predictive ability
of the Murphy and Staples model to that of the Wells and
Gubar model.
CRITICISMS OF
FAMILY LIFE CYCLE RESEARCH
Failure to Test Altemative Definitions
Consumer expenditure research involving family life
cycle variables has been critized for three reasons. First,
altemative definitions have not been tested over a compre-
hensive range of goods and services (Ferber 1979). Recent
studies have been designed to correct this inadequacy.
Fritzsche (1981), for example, compared expenditures for
energy over the family life cycle using modified versions
of both the Wells and Gubar (1966) and Murphy and Staples
(1979) models. The Wells and Gubar model was modified
THE JOURNAL OF CONSUMER RESEARCH
by the addition of a stage called the Mature Nest, which
included households with more than two adults, but no
children under the age of 18; the Murphy and Staples model
was modified by the inclusion of never-married and pre-
maturely widowed parents. An analysis of covariance
showed that in both models, expenditures for energy varied
by stage in the family life cycle. However, there was no
comparison of the effectiveness of the two models in pre-
dicting energy expenditures. Derrick and Lehfeld (1981)
proposed a simplified version of the family life cycle, in
which family life cycle variables were treated individually.
They compared two models in predicting expenditures for
food: a model that included the family life cycle variables
used by Wells and Gubar (1966), and a model that included
the individual variables used to define family life cycle (age
and marital status of the household head and age of the
youngest child). There was a slight improvement in pre-
dictive ability when these variables were treated individ-
ually.
To date, the family life cycle stages proposed by Wells
and Gubar (1966) and Murphy and Staples (1979) have not
been used in models designed to explain the variance in
family clothing expenditures. Theoretically, the Murphy
and Staples model might be expected to explain more of
the variance than would the Wells and Gubar model because
it is composed of more stages and describes families more
accurately.
Conceptual Limitations
A second criticism of family life cycle research has been
that family life cycle has conceptual limitations. Family life
cycle variables obscure the effects of both family size and
the age/sex structure of the family (Murphy and Staples
1979; Trost 1974), variables which are used in defining
family composition. Next to income, family composition
is considered to be the most important variable influencing
family expenditures for goods and services (Brown and
Deaton 1972).
Family life cycle variables are related to family compo-
sition variables in that family composition changes as it
progresses through the life cycle. In a family composition
model, each variable represents the number of individual
family members in one of a series of mutually exclusive
age and sex categories. Since clothing is usually purchased
for and wom by individual family members, family com-
position variables may be more effective than family life
cycle variables in predicting family clothing expenditures.
In a multiple regression analysis of clothing expenditures
by low income families participating in the Rural Income
Maintenance Experiment (RIME), Hager and Bryant (1977)
used nine age and sex categories to define family compo-
sition. Among wage-eaming families, the number of male
dependents between the ages of three and 15 and the num-
ber of female dependents 11 years of age or older were
positively related to family clothing expenditures. Among
nonwage-eaming families, the number of infants, the num-
ber of male dependents 11 years of age or older, and the
EFFECTIVENESS OF FAMILY LIFE CYCLE
number of female dependents seven years of age or older
were positively related to clothing expenditures. The pres-
ence of a wife 55 years of age or older was negatively
related to family clothing expenditures. There was no at-
tempt to determine the size of the effect of the family com-
position variables.
Failure to Control for Socioeconomic
and Demographic Variables
Finally, research using family life cycle variables has
been criticized for failing to control for socioeconomic and
demographic variables, especially income (Ferber 1979).
This has been a problem of studies limited to a single ex-
penditure category (Hisrich and Peters 1974; London and
Locander 1979) and of studies encompassing all of the
major consumption categories (Amdt 1979). Family life
cycle is a multivariate concept defined by the age, marital
status, and employment status of the household head and
by the age of the youngest child. As those variables change
over the life cycle, family income changes. Much of the
observed effect of family life cycle is then assumed to be
related to changes in income as the household head, in
particular, ages. While this may be the case, there is no
research demonstrating how much of the effect of family
life cycle is attributable to income and how much is attrib-
utable to the variables used to define family life cycle. In
other words, there is no research comparing the predictive
ability of family life cycle to that of (1) income alone or
(2) income in conjunction with socioeconomic and demo-
graphic variables that are not used in defining family life
cycle.
If income and other socioeconomic and demographic
variables are controlled, the amount of the variance in ex-
penditures directly attributable to family life cycle variables
can be isolated. In a model controlling for socioeconomic
and demographic variables, Dardis, Derrick, and Lehfeld
(1981) found a set of family life cycle variables significant
in predicting total clothing expenditures. However, they did
not report the proportion of the variance in clothing expen-
ditures that was directly attributable to variance in the fam-
ily life cycle variables.
Based on these criticisms of family life cycle studies, the
present study had the following objectives:
• To compare the effectiveness in predicting total family
clothing expenditures of a set of traditional family life
cycle variables (Wells and Gubar 1966) to that of a set
of revised family life cycle variables based on the model
proposed by Murphy and Staples (1979).
• To propose a set of family composition variables as an
altemative to either set of family life cycle variables.
• To determine the size of the effect of family life cycle
variables in models controlling for socioeconomic and
demographic variables, including total consumption ex-
penditures (a proxy for income).
• To compare the predictive ability of total consumption
expenditures (a proxy for income) to that of a traditional
283
family life cycle model, a revised family life cycle model,
and a model composed of socioeconomic and demo-
graphic variables that are not used in defming family life
cycle.
Although this study was limited to total family clothing
expenditures, it was expected that the results might be gen-
eralized to other expenditure categories.
METHOD
The Sample
The sample used in this study was taken from a public
use tape file of expenditure data collected in the 1973 quar-
terly interview component of the 1972-1973 Consumer
Expenditure Survey (CES). This survey is the most recent
and most comprehensive source of information available on
the expenditures and incomes of families classified accord-
ing to socioeconomic and demographic characteristics. One
limitation in using these data for a family cycle analysis is
that the CES data are cross-sectional and not longitudinal.
In using cross-sectional data, it was assumed that the future
clothing expenditures of families could be inferred from
their expenditures at the time of the survey.
The unit of obser\'ation used in this study was the con-
suming unit. As defined by the Bureau of Labor Statistics,
a consuming unit consists of (1) a family of two or more
persons who pool their income and draw from a common
fund for major items of expenditure, or (2) a single con-
sumer who is financially independent of any family group
(Carlson 1974). The head of the consuming unit is defined
as the husband in husband'wife families. In non-husband/
wife families, the head is that individual designated as such
by other members of the consuming unit.
Certain consuming units were dropped from the sample,
including those that reported having more than nine mem-
bers and those that reported total consumption expenditures
of over S 100,000. To minimize the effect of those extreme
values on the results, 72 units were eliminated from the
original sample of 10,106 units (U.S. Department of Labor
1978), leaving 10,034 consuming units to be used in this
study.
The Independent Variables
Four sets of independent variables were used in this
study. The set of traditional family life cycle variables was
defined by the age or employment of the household head,
the marital status of the household head, and the age of the
youngest child. The set of revised family life cycle variables
was defined by the age or employment of the household
head, the marital status of the household head, and the age
of the oldest child. The family composition variables each
represented the number of family members in one of 13
mutually exclusive age and sex categories. The set of so-
cioeconomic and demographic variables included variables
other than those used in defining family life cycle which
are known to infiuence or were hypothesized to infiuence
family clothing expenditures.
284 THE JOURNAL OF CONSUMER RESEARCH

TABLE 1
REGRESSION RESULTS FOR TOTAL FAMILY CLOTHING EXPENDITURES: THE TRADITIONAL FAMILY LIFE CYCLE VARIABLES

Clothing expenditures as percentage

of expenditures by bachelors

Mean Model controlling for

N expenditures socioeconomic and
Variables and descriptions (N = 10.034) in dollars Basic model demographic variables

Bachelor (base variable) 811 450 100 100

Head less than 45 years ot age.
never married
Newly married 674 644 162* 88*
Head less than 45 years of age.
married, no children
Full nest la 1.607 760 211* 101
Head less than 45 years of age.
married, youngest child less than 6
Full nest lb 1.046 959 285* 111'
Head less than 45 years of age.
married, youngest child 6 or older
Full nest It 1.029 989 283" 109*
Head 45 years of age or older,
married, youngest child 6 or older
Empty nest I 1.621 626 145" 82*
Head 45 years of age or older,
married, employed, no dependent children

Empty nest II 622 294 64* 78*

Head 45 years of age of older,
married, retired, no dependent children
Solitary survivor 1 724 ' 339 62* 80*
Head widowed and employed
Solitary survivor II 838 217 36* 80*
Head widowed and retired
Other 1.062 691 169* 125
W (0.24) (0.54)
F value 350.55 347.67
Degrees of freedom 9/10024 34/9999

'Signilicantly ditferent Irom 1.00 at Ihe 0 01 level.

'%gnilicanlty diHerenl Irom 1 00 at Ihe COS level.

Traditional Family Life Cycle Variables. The set of tra-
ditional family life cycle variables was chosen for two rea-
sons. First, it is the set of family life cycle variables de-
veloped by Wells and Gubar (1966) and used most
frequently in empirical work. Second, the ability of the
basic .traditional family life cycle model to effectively pre-
dict family clothing expenditures was thought to be limited
by its exclusion of nontraditional family forms. It was then
assumed that most families follow the traditional sequence
of stages through the family life cycle. We used nine
dummy variables to represent the basic traditional family
life cj'cle model (see Table 1). Expenditures by bachelors
was the base variable.
Revised Fatnily Life Cycle Variables. The revised set
of family life cycle variables was adapted from the mod-
emized family life cycle proposed by Murphy and Staples
(1979; see Table 2). Like the Murphy and Staples model,
this set of variables was designed to be flexible enough to
accommodate both changing demographic trends and non-
traditional flows through the family life cycle. Individual
categories were defined narrowly in order to describe fam-
ilies as accurately as possible. At the same time, categories
were collapsed when necessary in order to include sufficient
information for the purposes of analysis.
The Murphy and Staples family life cycle model was
modified in three ways. First, all single household heads—
EFFECTIVENESS OF FAMILY LIFE CYCLE 285

TABLE 2
REVISED FAMILY LIFE CYCLE VARIABLES BEFORE AND AFTER COLLAPSING STAGES

Defining variables N
N (after
Original family life Original Age of household Age of oldest (before Stage or substage collapsing)
cycle stage substage head child collapsing) used in analysis

Young single adult 18-34 654 Young single adult 654

(base variable)
1 0-2 29]
il 3-5 68 » Young single parent 1 205
Young single parent III 18-34 6-11 108]
IV 12-17 62 Young single parent II 62

Young married adult 18-34 549 Young married adult 549

1 0-2 423 Young married parent 1 423

II 3-5 382 Young married parent II 382
Young married parent III 18-34 6-11 486 Young married parent Itl 486
IV 12-17 167 Young married parent IV 167

Mature single adult 35 or older 1.220 Mature single adult 1.220

and employed
1 0-2 8]
II 3-5 6 • Mature single parent 1 50
Mature single parent III 35 or older 6-11 36 J
IV and employed 12-17 317 Mature single parent II 317

Mature married adult 35 or older 1.746 Mature married adult 1.746

and employed
1 0-2 ^^ — » Mature married parent 1 117
II 35 or older 3-5
Mature married parent III and employed 6-11 393 Mature married parent II 393
IV 12-17 1.830 Mature married parent III 1.830

Older single adult 726 Older single adult 726

Older married adult 622 Older married adult 622

Other 85 Other 85

NOTE: Brackets indicate stages that have been collapsed

whether divorced, widowed, or never married—were as-
signed the satne status. Neither never-married nor prema-
turely widowed household heads were included in the Mur-
phy and Staples model. In the revised family life cycle, we
assumed that the clothing expenditure pattems of all single
household heads are similar. This assumption was neces-
sary because the CES data did not distinguish among di-
vorced, widowed, and never-married individuals. Second,
the Murphy and Staples model was modified by defining
childbearing and childrearing stages according to the age
of the oldest—not the youngest—child. Parents may invest
in clothing for the oldest child with the intention of handing
it down to siblings who follow. Finally, Murphy and Sta-
ples recognized three categories of families with children:
families with infants aged zero to four, families with chil-
dren aged five to 11, and families with children aged 12 to
17. In our revised family life cycle, infancy was defined as
ending at age two because supplementary sources of cloth-
ing such as gifts, hand-me-downs, and borrowed garments
become less important after that age (Britton 1969).
There were originally 10 major stages in our revised fatn-
ily life cycle. The four childbearing and childrearing stages
each included four substages, so that there were a total of
22 possible variables. Despite the size of the sample, some
stages with children were underpopulated and had to be
collapsed (see Table 2). Consequently, the revised family
life cycle used in the regression analysis included only 18
stages. There were 17 dummy variables used to represent
the basic revised family life cycle model. The base category'
was young single adults.
According to Murphy and Staples (1979), one advantage
to using their family life cycle is that it classifies more
families than does the traditional family life cycle of Wells
and Gubar (1966). While 8.4 percent of the obser\ations
were categorized as "other" in the traditional family life
cycle, only 0.8 percent were categorized as "other" in the
revised version of the Murphy and Staples model.
Family Cotnposition Variables. For the comparison in
this study, the family composition model included 13 age
286 THE JOURNAL OF CONSUMER RESEARCH

TABLE 3 TABLE 4
REGRESSION RESULTS FOR TOTAL CLOTHING REGRESSION RESULTS FOR TOTAL FAMILY CLOTHING
EXPENDITURES: THE FAMILY COMPOSITION VARIABLES' EXPENDITURES; THE SOCIOECONOMIC MODEL*

Percentage change in clothing Variable F value d.f.

expenditures
Region 10.80 3,10030
Controlling for
socioeconomic and City Size 7.79 7,10026
Basic demographic Race
Variable Age 230.05 1,10032
models variables
Education 12.22 6,10027
Infant 0-2 104 103
Employment 19.30 7,10026
Male preschooler 3-5 114" 101
Total consumption expenditures 5813.32 1,10030
Female
preschooler 3-5 107 102 (0.53)
Male grade F value" 313.24
schooler 6-11 115" 103 Degrees of freedom 25/10008
Female grade
schooler •N - 10.0M.
6-11 114" 104 "p < 0.0001.
Male teenager 12-17 121" 108"
Female teenager 12-17 129" 117"
to be related to total family clothing expenditures (Dardis
Young adult male 18-34 147" 92" et al. 1981). Each of these variables was treated as a set of
Young adult dummy variables. Hafstrom and Dunsing (1972) suggested
female 18-34 180" 116" that since women are often the most important purchasing
Mature adult male 35-64 167" 94" agents for their families, either the effect of the wife's ed-
ucation or the combined effect of the educations of the
Mature adult
husband and wife may influence expenditures for goods and
female 35-64 152" 107"
services. Dummy variables which represented the educa-
Older adult male 65 or older 101 89" tional levels of the household head and the spouse were
Older adult then included in the set of socioeconomic and demographic
female 65 or older 83" 88" variables.
(0.25) (0.54)
The variable total consumption expenditures—a proxy
for income—was also included. The use of total consump-
F value 253.67 313.24 tion expenditures as a proxy for income is defensible for
Degrees of a number of reasons.' Previous research shows that total
freedom 13/10021 389990 consumption expenditures give a better fit than does income
• N = 10.034.
in models designed to predict total clothing expenditures
"Significani at the 0.01 level. (Dardis et al. 1981). The use of total consumption expen-
ditures can also be defended on the basis of the permanent
income hypothesis: in the short run, families have more
and sex categories (see Table 3). Age categories were es- control over their expenditures than over their incomes
tablished based on two considerations: the school placement (Houthakker and Taylor 1970; Prais and Houthakker 1955).
of children and the employment or retirement of adults. Finally, there is a long tradition of using total consumption
Although not all individuals retire at 65, it is likely that expenditures as a proxy for income in expenditure research.
many reduce their clothing expenditures in anticipation of Because one objective of this study was to test the predic-
retirement. There were 13 variables used to represent the tive ability of income, we tested total consumption expen-
family composition model. Each of these variables repre- ditures alone in a regression equation designed to predict
sented the number of family members in a given age and total clothing expenditures.
sex category. Every family was then described specifically The socioeconomic and demographic variables were in-
by its size and its age and sex structure. cluded in the analysis for two reasons. First, these variables
were necessary in order to determine the size of the effect
Socioeconomic and Demographic Variables. Socio-
economic and demographic variables included in this study 'Each model was also tested with gross income and disposable income.
were the occupation and education of the household head, The results were similar to those obtained with total consumption expen-
ditures. However, the family life cycle variables explained slightly more
the employment status of the spouse, geographic region, of the variance when either gross income or disposable personal income
and city size (see Table 4), all of which have been shown was included in the model.
EFFECTIVENESS OF FAMILY LIFE CYCLE
of family life cycle and family composition variables in
models controlling for socioeconomic and demographic
variables. Second, these variables were included in order
to compare the predictive ability of variables other than
those used in defining family life cycle to the predictive
ability of family life cycle itself. Because the focus of this
paper is on family life cycle variables, discussion of the
socioeconomic and demographic variables will be limited
to the predictive ability of the socioeconomic model. See
Wagner (1982) for more discussion of the socioeconomic
and demographic variables.
The Dependent Variable
This study focused on two parts of the process of clothing
consumption: expenditures for the acquisition of clothing
and expenditures for the maintenance of clothing by the
family. The three sources of acquisition studied were the
purchase of new and ready-to-wear clothing, the purchase
of used clothing, and the purchase of clothing materials for
home production. Of these expenditure categories, the av-
erage family acquires most of its clothing new and ready-
to-wear (Winakor 1969). Maintenance included expendi-
tures for drycleaning, shoe repair, alterations, and coin-
operated laundering. Expenditures for laundry equipment
were omitted because of the difficulty of placing a dollar
value on the flow of services from such durable goods as
washing machines and clothes dryers. Gifts of clothing to
family members were included, while expenditures for
clothing gifts to individuals outside the consuming unit
were excluded. The dependent variable total family clothing
expenditures was then defined as expenditures by the family
for all clothing, sewing materials, and clothing-related ser-
vices purchased in the market and intended for consumption
by members of the consuming unit.
The Models
Seven models were tested. Each of the three basic models
included one set of inde()endent variables: a set of tradi-
tional family life cycle variables, a set of revised family
life cycle variables, or a set of family composition vari-
ables. Each of these models was of the following semi-
logarithmic functional form:
lny = Po + C,D, + . . . + C A
where lny is equal to the natural log of total clothing ex-
penditures and £)„ is a variable representing one of the fam-
ily life cycle stages or family composition categories. If
clothing expenditures were equal to zero, then the log of
one was used, because the log of zero does not exist. The
appropriate interpretation of the coefficient C„ of the
dummy variable £)„ (assuming there is only one dummy
variable in the equation) is shown by the transformation
(Halvorsen and Palmquist 1980):
C„ = In (1 + g,)
287
where g, the relative effect on Y, can be shown to be (Ken-
nedy 1981):
g = exp [C - V2V (C)] - 1
Consequently, the coefficients of the dummy variables for
the family life cycle variables represent clothing expendi-
tures as percentages of expenditures by families in the base
category. The interpretation ofC„ in the family composition
model is somewhat different. In that model, C^ represents
the percentage change in clothing expenditures that occurs
with the addition to a family of an individual in a given age
and sex category.
The sets of family life cycle and family composition vari-
ables were tested in models controlling for socioeconomic
and demographic variables. Each of these three models in-
cluded a set of traditional family life cycle, revised family
life cycle, or family composition variables, plus the set of
socioeconomic and demographic variables. These models
were necessary to determine the effect of controlling for
socioeconomic and demographic variables on the predictive
ability of the family life cycle and family composition vari-
ables.
The seventh model was called the socioeconomic model.
This model included all of the variables in the set of socio-
economic and demographic variables. This model was nec-
essary'—in conjunction with the models which controlled
for socioeconomic and demographic variables—to deter-
mine the size of the effect of the sets of family life cycle
and family composition variables.
Both the socioeconomic model and the models which
controlled for socioeconomic and demographic variables
were of the following functional form:
lny = lnPo + Pi'n^i + P:^2 + C,D, + . . . + C„D„
where p, represents the income elasticity of total clothing
expenditures and X, represents the variable total consump-
tion expenditures. P^ is the coefficient of X^, which rep-
resents the difference between the education of the house-
hold head and the education of the spouse, and D^
represents the dummy variables for the independent vari-
ables. The interpretation of C„ is the same as in the basic
models.
Multiple regression, a technique used frequently in the
analysis of clothing and other household expenditure data,
was used to analyze the relationships between the indepen-
dent and dependent variables. Regression analysis is based
on the assumption that the relationships among variables
are both linear and additive. On the basis of both theory
(Brown and Deaton 1972) and past research (Dardis et al.
1981; Houthakker and Taylor 1970), it was determined that
the double-logarithmic functional form is the best choice
for describing the relationship between total consumption
expenditures and total family clothing expenditures. Pre-
vious research has demonstrated that an increase in total
consumption expenditures leads to an increase in total
clothing expenditures which is proportionally larger than
the increase in total consumption expenditures (Dardis et
al. 1981). When this is the case, the double-logarithmic
288
functional form is the appropriate choice for the regression
equation (Prais and Houthakker 1955).
For each model; the proportion of the variation in total
clothing expenditures attributable to variation in the inde-
pendent variables was evaluated using 7?^, the adjusted
square of the multiple correlation coefficient. For the
models in which socioeconomic and demographic variables
were controlled, the size of the effects of the sets of family
life cycle and family composition variables was measured
by a series of square part correlations, calculated using the
following formula:
Rj =
where:
Rj is the proportion of the variance in clothing expenditures
explained by the set of family life cycle or family com-
position variables
Rl is the proportion of the total variance explained by the
family life cycle or family composition model in which
socioeconomic and demographic variables are controlled
R] is the proportion of the total variance explained by the
socioeconomic model (Cohen 1977).
RESULTS
Comparison of Family Life Cycle
and Family Composition
No major differences were found in the predictive ability
of the three basic models. The^" values presented in Tables
1.3, and 5 indicate that when socioeconomic and demo-
graphic variables were not controlled, the traditional family
life cycle, revised family life cycle, and family composition
models were all moderately successful in explaining the
variance^ in family clothing expenditures.
The R' values of the traditional and revised family life
cycle models were nearly identical. Apparently there is no
advantage in increasing the number of family life cycle
stages in order to accommodate nontraditional family
forms, as proposed by Murphy and Staples.
The basic family composition model was only slightly
more successful than the two family life cycle models in
explaining the variance in family clothing expenditures.
The failure of the family composition model to account for
much more of the variance in total clothing expenditures
than either of the family life cycle models demonstrates that
there is no empirical advantage in accounting for every
family member by age and sex. The family composition
model was expected to be superior to both family life cycle
models because it accounts for all family members, while
the family life cycle models directly account for three fam-
ily members at the most.
The Effect of Controlling for Socioeconomic
and Demographic Variables
The R^ values reported in Tables 1, 3, and 5 show that
the models that included socioeconomic and demographic
THE JOURNAL OF CONSUMER RESEARCH
variables were much more successful than the basic models
in predicting clothing expenditures. This finding confirms
the importance of the set of socioeconomic and demo-
graphic variables in determining family expenditures for
clothing. As in the basic models, there were no differences
in explanatory power among the family life cycle and fam-
ily composition models that controlled for socioeconomic
and deinographic variables.
The R^ value of the socioeconomic model was 0.53,
demonstrating that the set of socioeconomic and demo-
graphic variables was much more effective than the basic
family life cycle and family composition models in explain-
ing the variance in family clothing expenditures. The results
of the regression analysis of that model are summarized in
Table 4. All of the sets of dummy variables were signifi-
cantly related to total clothing expenditures, as was total
consumption expenditures.^
The R^ value for total consumption expenditures alone
was 0.50, indicating that this variable was highly effective
in explaining the variance in family clothing expenditures.
It was more effective than either the basic family life cycle
or the basic family composition model, but it was slightly
less effective than either the socioeconomic model or the
models that were controlled for socioeconomic and demo-
graphic variables. This finding suggests that independent
of income (as represented by the proxy variable total con-
sumption expenditures), variables such as traditional family
life cycle, revised family life cycle, and family composition
have very little predictive ability.
The Size of the Effect of Family Life Cycle
and Family Composition
Both the square part correlations and the F-values for the
sets of family life cycle and family composition variables
are presented in Table 6. When socioeconomic and de-
mographic variables were controlled, the sets of traditional
family life cycle, revised family life cycle, and family com-
position variables were all significant, but explained very
iittle of the variance in clothing expenditures. This implies
that the effects of family life cycle and family composition
variables in the basic models represent the confounding
influence of the socioeconomic and demographic variables
with which they are correlated.
The confounding effects of the socioeconomic and de-
mographic variables and the family life cycle or family
composition variables are further illustrated by the com-
parisons of the percentage effects of individual variables in
Tables 1, 3, and 5. Discussion of the effects of the indi-
vidual variables will be limited to comparisons between the
basic models and the models that were controlled for so-
cioeconomic and demographic variables. This is done for
two reasons. First, the emphasis of this article is upon the
size of the effects of family life cycle and family compo-
sition variables independent of socioeconomic and demo-
•While some mullicollincarity is inherent in all noncxperimenlal re.
search, examination of both the standard errors of the regression coeffi-
cients and the simple correlations among the independent variables showed
that this was not a serious problem in this study.
EFFECTIVENESS OF FAMILY UFE CYCLE 289
TABLE 5
REGRESSION RESULTS FOR TOTAL FAMILY CLOTHING EXPENDITURES: THE REVISED FAMILY LIFE CYCLE VARIABLES*

Clothing expenditures as a percentage

of expenditures by young single adults

Mean Controlling for

expenditures socioeconomic and
Variable in dollars Basic model demographic variables

Young single adult (base variable) 433 100 100

Young single parent I 487 132" 124"
Young single parent II 760 189" 160"
Young married adult 626 *165" BT
Young married parent I 631 182" 100
Young married parent II 684 200" 94
Young married parent III 756 224" 97
Young married parent IV 880 250" 103
Mature single adult 363 69" 81"
Mature single parent I 856 160" 109
Mature single parent II 714 187" 129"
Mature married adult 634 152" 81"
Mature married parent I 770 219" 92
Mature married parent II 838 249" 102
Mature married parent III 1,028 312" 111=
Older single adult 217 37" 80"
Older married adult 294 66" 78"
Other 499 126 124'
R' (0.24) (0.54)
F value 190.62 282.35
Degrees of freedom 17/10016 42/9991

• N = 10.034.
"Signjlicantly difierenl Irom 1 00 at the 0.01 level.
'Signilicantly diflerent Irom 1.00 at the 0.05 level.

graphic variables, especially income. Second, the results
of this research demonstrate the importance of controlling
for socioecotiomic and demographic variables in family life
cycle and family composition models.
Table 1 presents the percentage effects of the traditional
family life cycle variables from both the basic models and
the models that included socioeconomic and demographic
variables. These figures can be interpreted as representing
percentages of the base variable, expenditures by bachelors.
For example, in the equation that included socioeconomic
and demographic variables, expenditures for total clothing
by newly married couples were 88 percent of expenditures
by bachelors. The percentage effects of the revised family
life cycle variables are presented in Table 5. For those
variables, the figures represent expenditures as percentages
of the level of expenditures by young single adults.
For both the traditional and revised family life cycles,
the number of significant differences between the base vari-
ables and the other dummy variables was reduced by con-
trolling for socioeconomic and demographic variables. Re-
ductions in the number of significant differences occurred
in the early stages in which children were present. Appar-
ently the confounding effect of family life cycle variables
with socioeconomic and demographic variables is greatest
during those stages.
The percentage effects for the family composition vari-
ables are presented in Table 3. Mean clothing expenditures
are not reported for these variables because of the large
number of possible age and sex configurations among the
families in the sample. By controlling for socioeconomic
and demographic variables, the number of family compo-
sition categories in which expenditures were significantly
different from zero was reduced. The reduction in the num-
ber of significant differences occurred among children un-
der 12 years of age. When socioeconomic and demographic
variables were included in the regressions, the addition to
a family of a child under 12 years of age had no significant
effect on family clothing expenditures.
IMPLICATIONS
In models of consumer behavior, family life cycle is
considered part of the social and cultural environment
which determines family purchase behavior. The results of
290
TABLE 6
SQUARED PART CORRELATIONS AND F VALUES
FOR THE SETS OF FAMILY UFE CYCLE AND
FAMILY COMPOSITION VARIABLES'
Model
Traditional Revised
(amily (amily
li(e cycle li(e cycle
Squared part 0.01 0.01
correlation
F value" 27.44 15.86
Degrees o( (reedom 9/9999 17/9991
• N = 10.034.
"All values were signilic.irt at the 0.001 level.
this study challenge the acceptance and use of family life
cycle variables in consumer theory and research.
Family life cycle is purported to be a composite frame-
work that combines trends in income with demands placed
on income. When socioeconomic and demographic vari-
ables—esjjecially income—are not included in family cycle
models, family life cycle is moderately successful in rep-
resenting the effect of those variables on expenditures.
Models which include socioeconomic and demographic
variables are much more successful. In fact, when socio-
economic and demographic variables are controlled, the
size of the effect of family life cycle is very small. This
study confirms the importance of income, in particular, in
determining expenditures for goods and ser\'ices.
Speculation about altemative definitions of the family life
cycle, while interesting conceptually, must be either sup-
ported or refuted by research. Empirical justification for the
use of a given definition is essential to the building of the-
ory. This research was limited to a comparison of two def-
initions of family life cycle in predicting expenditures for
one consumption category. Further research might be di-
rected toward testing these models with other consumption
categories, or comparing these models to those proposed
by Stampfl (1978) or Gilly and Enis (1981). Researchers
might even experiment with reducing the number of stages
in the traditional family life cycle. For example, the first
two stages of the full nest variable might be collapsed.
However, the results of this study imply that the manipu-
lation of the variables underlying family life cycle generates
no increase in predictive ability, at least in the case of
clothing expenditures.
While the size of the effect of family life cycle variables
is small, it is still significant. In terms of predictive ability,
the results of this study support the inclusion of either the
traditional or the revised family life cycle in models of
consumer expenditure behavior. However, it should be kept
in mind that the effects of socioeconomic and demographic
variables, particularly income, are much larger than the
effect of family life cycle on expenditures.
THE JOURNAL OF CONSUMER RESEARCH
In terms of methodological simplicity, the use of family
life cycle variables is awkward. Easy-to-use models with
a small number of stages exclude large numbers of families.
When the number of stages is increased, fewer families are
excluded from the model, but some cells are underpopu-
lated, as was the case in this study. A set of socioeconomic
and demographic variables is easier to use and explains
Family
more of the variance in expenditures. Compared to the
composition models which included both family life cycle and socio-
economic and demographic variables, the socioeconomic
0.01 model was neariy as effective in predicting family clothing
expenditures. Occam's razor suggests that, given two
models of comparable predictive ability, the simpler of the
22.17
two models should be used. While family life cycle vari-
13/9995 ables offer a convenient conceptual framework, socioeco-
nomic and demographic variables may be better choices for
expenditure research.
SUMMARY AND CONCLUSIONS
This study tested the effectiveness of family life cycle
variables in predicting expenditures for goods and services.
While family life cycle variables have been used frequently
in consumer expenditure research, their use has been crit-
icized. As a result of this research, conclusions have been
reached conceming the validity of three of those criticisms.
First, expenditure research has been criticized for failing
to test altemative definitions of the family life cycle concept
over a comprehensive range of goods and ser\'ices (Ferber
1979). During the last five years, consumer researchers
have proposed revised definitions that include nontradi-
tional family forms. However, interest in those definitions
has been primarily at the conceptual level. Including non-
traditional family forms in the family life cycle involves
increasing the number of stages. In this study, a revised
family life cycle was no more successful than the traditional
family life cycle in explaining the variance in expenditures
for clothing. The traditional family life cycle may be an
outdated concept because it does not accommodate a variety
of family types, but this study concludes that increasing the
number of family life cycle stages to include nontraditional
families does not improve the predictive ability of family
life cycle models, at least in the case of clothing expendi-
tures.
Family life cycle variables have also been criticized by
Murphy and Staples (1979) and Trost (1974) for obscuring
the effects of family composition on expenditures. Our re-
search demonstrates that this criticism is unwarranted. The
family composition model offered only slight improvement
in predictive ability over the family life cycle models. Once
socioeconomic and demographic variables were controlled,
there was no difference between the family life cycle and
family composition models. This study concludes that fam-
ily life cycle variables successfully represent the effects of
family composition on expenditures.
Finally, family life cycle research has been criticized for
failing to control for socioeconomic and demographic vari-
ables, especially income (Ferber 1979). The results of our
EFFECTIVENESS OF FAMILY LIFE CYCLE
study demonstrate that this criticism is valid. In models that
controlled for socioeconomic and demographic variables,
the sets of family life cycle variables were significant, but
their effects were small. We conclude that clothing exf)en-
ditures vary over the family life cycle, but that the impor-
tance of stage in the family life cycle in determining ex-
penditures has been exaggerated. As compared to income
or to income in conjunction with other socioeconomic and
demographic variables, sets of family life cycle variables
are of limited value in predicting clothing exjjenditures.
[Received September 1982. Revised July 1983.]
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