To beer or not to beer

I'm beginning to feel like most of the strange decisions made by students living in the residence halls are made by men, since this week I will once again be talking about a decision made specifically by men. New college students living in the residence halls, especially those who are under the age of twenty-one, tend to purchase a large amount of alcohol, often at great expense. The most interesting part of this situation is that these underage men do not purchase this alcohol for their own enjoyment the majority of the time.

These men instead purchase alcohol primarily to be able to offer drinks to women that they know and wish to impress. I believe that the reasoning behind this phenomenon is similar to that which I described when discussing large TVs. The young men who buy these large quantities of alcohol acquire it in order to express their social status and importance as opposed to buying it for their own enjoyment. This buying of alcohol as a method of  impressing their peers is another example of the need of young college men, especially freshmen, to achieve social status in any way that they can.   

Image Credit: http://scopeblog.stanford.edu/2011/10/using-facebook-to-assess-alcohol-related-problems-among-college-students/     

Giant TVs in dorm rooms- legitimately useful or extravagant status symbol?

Living in the residence halls for the last three years, two of them as an RA, I have noticed many strange consumer behaviors from students living in our buildings. One of the first of these behaviors that I noticed upon arriving at MSU was that tendency of male students in the residence halls to buy 50, 60, or even 70 inch TVs for their 9'x13' dorm rooms. Living in Langford (the all male building) my freshman year, I saw many of these overly large TVs in the rooms of students who were attempting to impress the other residents of their floor.  Since Langford is essentially a building built on high levels of testosterone, I viewed this behavior as fairly normal for the "manly men" who tend to populate Langford. The next year, upon moving to South Hedges (a co-ed building) I was surprised to witness the same behavior among the male residents of the building, especially those who lived on all-male floors.

As a consumer behavior, buying these enormous TVs for use in tiny dorm rooms makes very little sense.  Not only are these TVs expensive, they are also often so large that they prove to be overwhelming and not as pleasurable to view in the small space of a dorm room as a smaller TV would be.  According to crutchfield.com, the maximum size TV that should be placed in a dorm room, considering the room available for placement of seating and the TV itself, should be 46 inches, but I have seen several TVs in the residence halls as large as 70 inches.

This behavior can only be explained by seeing the large TVs not as a simple device for watching movies or playing video games, but as a status symbol. Owning a very large TV, to a college freshman, is one of the most obvious ways to show that they have money without openly bragging about it. Almost everyone is aware that large TVs are very expensive, and they almost universally impress college freshmen, the majority of whom do not recognize or care about more adult status symbols such as expensive shoes or watches.  By viewing these ridiculously large TVs as status symbols meant to impressive, as opposed to devices used to achieve the most pleasurable possible viewing experience, we can explain this otherwise confusing consumer behavior.

Image Credit:
 http://stagetwo.com/2010/09/ten-essential-tips-for-making-a-great-google-tv-site/