Determinants of Propensity to Seek Aesthetic Plastic Surgery

Abstract

The present study analyses the consumption of aesthetic surgeries among females from the cities of São Paulo and Recife, two large Brazilian cities that possess different economic, demographic, and cultural characteristics. In such context, the objectives of this paper are to comprehend the influence of materialism, self esteem, and of control variables on the decision to undertake an aesthetic surgery procedure. A questionnaire was made available online and was completed by 347 respondents, 173 from São Paulo and 174 from Recife. The data analyses show that the city of the respondent does not help to predict the probability of engaging in an aesthetic surgery; on the other hand, the ‘social comparison’ dimension of the self esteem scale, as well as materialism, do contribute to predict the probability of occurrence of such event. The academic and managerial implications of the findings are discussed, as well as possibilities for future investigations.