Do Cultural Capital and Conspicuous Consumption Influence Counterfeit Purchase Attitude? Evidence from Brazilian Market 1

This article analyses the influence of economic benefits, brand affection, cultural capital, and conspicuous consumption on the attitude toward counterfeit luxury products. A survey was carried out in places where these products are sold in the cities of Belo Horizonte and Nova Serrana, in the state of Minas Gerais, Brazil. The interviewees were divided into two groups (high and low cultural capital) and the data obtained were analyzed using Structural Equation Modeling. We found that brand affection, conspicuous consumption and cultural capital do not influence the attitude about counterfeit luxury products. Therefore, the economic benefit was the only factor capable of explaining the attitude. In comparative terms, the results were similar, but the economic benefits are more relevant for high cultural capital respondents.


Introduction
Consumers attitude towards consumption plays two roles.The first is social-adjustive, that means the achievement of approval in social situations; the second is value-expressive, as a mean of communicating the person's beliefs and values (Wilcox, Kim, & Sen 2009).The status consumption, called by Veblen (1899Veblen ( /1934) ) as "conspicuous consumption", represents a kind of purchase showing the "capacity to own", that is to be noticed, seen by the other, the quest to belong to a certain social group.Thus, conspicuous consumption plays the social-adjustive function.Bourdieu (1984) presented a new perspective on this subject.Consumption is related to cultural capital as well, and it is defined as a set of knowledge, experiences, and occurrences, built throughout life, which also determine individuals" consuming modes (Üstüner & Holt, 2010).Therefore, people with high cultural capital (HCC) seek sophistication and refinement in their consumption practices, accomplishing their polished taste.In this case, consumption meets value-expressive function.
The desire to own a luxury item is not rich people exclusivity.It is a way to differentiate within a particular group, to which the consumer belongs, or even to be identified with an economic and social group, emulating an image of belonging to a group by means of consumption.In both cases, it is the pursuit of social visibility (O'Cass & Mcewen, 2004).Therefore, the desire for a luxury product (and its consequent acquisition) does not always directly match the brand manufacturer or authentic supplier.The purchase may occur in the counterfeit markets, which seek to meet the desire of consumers, knowledgeable and desirous of a particular luxury brand, however not having enough conditions (economic or cultural) to acquire the authentic product.
Counterfeit luxury products attract many consumers because of its ability to offer a product at a lower price than the original product.This market acts as substitute of well-known brands, affecting especially the so-called luxury brands.Counterfeit products are based on successful designers" collection, and normally sold at a more affordable price.
The motives that drive consumers to buy counterfeit luxury goods have received increasing attention from researchers.This interest lies in the fact that the counterfeit market generates great damage to economy and companies, becoming a challenge for the luxury market (Eisend & Schuchert-Güler, 2006;Müller, Kocher, & Ivens, 2011).
Studies evaluating consumption of counterfeit products have provided insights and established foundations for future research (e. g.Hoe, Hogg, & Hart, 2003;Penz, Schlegelmilch, & Stöttinger, 2008;Sharma & Chan, 2011, 2016;Viot, Le Several researchers sought to understand the main antecedents driving the purchase intention of counterfeit products, that is, to identify the factors that lead consumers to buy such products.These works identified price as the main antecedent because there is a feeling of gain consumers experience by purchasing at a lower price than the authentic product sold in the official stores.Other antecedents are relevant such as hedonic factors, materialism, and brand affect (Matos, Ituassu, & Rossi, 2007;Yoo & Lee, 2009).Sharma and Chan (2011) proposed a different construct to explain counterfeit purchase intention, named counterfeit proneness, meaning a general consumers" tendency to prefer counterfeit to genuine products.Their results confirmed the positive influence of counterfeit proneness, along with attitude towards counterfeit, explaining not only the frequency of past purchase, but the future intention as well.The positive influence of counterfeit proneness on purchase intention was also confirmed in a further study (Sharma & Chan, 2016).Penz, Schlegelmilch, and Stöttinger (2008) grouped the antecedents in psychographic characteristics, product characteristics, demographic variables, and social influences.
Despite many advances in research, there are still gaps to be explored in this field.As an example, studies evaluating the influence of cultural capital and conspicuous consumption on counterfeit purchase are scarce.Some studies address status consumption as an important predictor of counterfeit purchase (Sharma & Chan, 2011); however, conspicuous and status consumption are different concepts (O'Cass & Mcewen, 2004), the former means status seeking while the latter means showing-off seeking.Likewise, counterfeit purchase intention depends on the role consumer attitude plays, social-adjustive or value-expressive (Wilcox et al., 2009), which may be influenced by cultural capital.
Thus, the present work aims to fill these gaps, by identifying the influence of cultural capital and conspicuous consumption, along with other factors commonly evaluated, economic benefits and brand affection, on Brazilian consumers" attitude toward counterfeit luxury products.
The counterfeit market consists of two important submarkets (Penz et al., 2008;Sharma & Chan, 2011).The first is the deceptive market, where consumers buy counterfeit products believing it to be an authentic product.These products are offered in markets considered safe; consumers do not have knowledge of the counterfeit.The consumer becomes the victim of the counterfeiters, buying a false product, believing it to be original (Müller et al., 2011).The second is the nondeceptive market, where consumers know they are buying a counterfeit product (Jiang & Shan, 2016).In the counterfeit fashion market, consumers usually know they are buying a counterfeit product (Triandewi & Tjiptono, 2013), and this constitutes the investigated segment in the current research.

Theoretical grounding
The counterfeit goods market has been around for a long time.However, only after the 1970s it became a concern for manufacturers of authentic brands (Bian & Moutinho, 2009).Until then, only a few manufacturers of highpriced and prestigious products such as textiles, jewelry and accessories were affected (Eisend & Schuchert-Güler, 2006).Currently, the counterfeit goods market is one of the largest and fastest growing industries in the world (Sharma & Chan, 2011, 2017;Inkon, 2013).This phenomenon is obviously related to the increasing demand for these products, which generates the market's concern to understand, in a more sophisticated way, the impact of such growth on sales of original brands.Thus, it turns out relevant to understand consumers" attitude toward counterfeit goods.Figure 1 summarizes the conceptual model including all hypotheses to be tested in this work.Source: authors.

Counterfeit goods attitude
The decision to consciously buy a counterfeit product is related to personal characteristics.It includes the person"s demographic and psychographic profile, the product aspects (price, exclusivity, availability, and quality) and individual"s social motives (Wilcox et al., 2009).
The consumption of counterfeit products is a common and recurring behavior in several regions of the world (Sharma & Chan, 2011).As it replicates a luxury item, most consumers buy the products having knowledge about their counterfeit origin (Wilcox et al., 2009).Some studies sought to identify the fundamental reasons for the acquisition of counterfeit products.The relationship between the reasons for buying counterfeit products is a depiction of consumers" attitudes towards these products.Attitude is a cognitive factor and refers to a feeling that may be positive or negative in relation to the purchase (Matos et al., 2007).In this context, attitudes are linked to intentions that influence consumer behavior, including counterfeit purchase.It is also possible to map the main antecedents that influence consumers" attitude toward purchase of counterfeit products, allocating them in five groups: economic benefits, conspicuous consumption, social capital, cultural distinctiveness, and brand affection (Souza, Sousa, Ferreira, & Mota, 2015;Penz et al., 2008).

Economic benefits
Economic benefits are linked to the product price.Such benefits exert a strong influence on purchasing decision (Souza et al., 2015).Several works have identified price as the main factor affecting counterfeit purchase intentions, which generates a feeling of gain, by purchasing at a lower price than the authentic product price, sold in luxury stores (Hussain, Kofinas, & Win, 2017;Penz et al., 2008).Price is certainly a determining factor in counterfeit markets, confirming that these buyers seek a good cost/benefit relation, as counterfeit"s low prices (at least attractive) meet the needs of those who cannot afford an original product (Raza, Ahad, Shafqat, Aurangzaib, & Rizwan, 2014), despite their inferior quality (Castaño & Perez, 2014;Hussain et al., 2017).Although with the denomination of Satisfactory Benefits, Bian and Moutinho (2009) confirm the importance of price and value relation on counterfeit purchase intention.
Derived benefits, such as the feeling of approval by relatives and friends, the aversion of taking risks (the lower the risk of buying counterfeit, the more favorable the attitude), and the number of past purchases can also be considered factors that drive intentions to purchase counterfeit goods (Matos et al., 2007).However, stating that only low-income consumers purchase such products is a mistake.High-income consumers buy counterfeit products as well, despite their ability to pay for the authentic products (Eisend & Schuchert-Güler, 2006;Jirotmontree, 2013;Omeraki Çekirdekci, & Baruonu Latif, 2019;Raza et al., 2014).
Thus, the element implicit in this group is the relation between benefit and cost, in which the low price is perceived as a gain, generating consumer satisfaction.So, we propose: H1: Economic benefits positively influence counterfeit goods attitude.

Brand affection
Brand affection is "the brand's potential to elicit a positive emotional response in the average consumer as a result of its use" (Chaudhuri & Holbrook, 2001, p. 82).In emerging markets, global brands are source of consumption-related identity meanings, and the rise of the counterfeit market contrasts with the brand discourse (Strizhakova, Coulter, & Price, 2008).The counterfeit goods market relates to consumers' desire for luxury brands (Bian, Haque, & Smith, 2015).Information on why people buy luxury products is relevant to identify what counterfeit luxury consumers want (Wilcox et al., 2009).
The most popular counterfeit luxury markets are apparel, shoes, watches, leather goods and jewelry, and the most often counterfeited brands are: Louis Vuitton, Gucci, Burberry, Tiffany, Prada, Hermes, Chanel, Dior, Yves St. Laurent and Cartier (Yoo & Lee, 2009).In sum, "high image" products (the famous brands) are the favorite targets of counterfeiters (Müller et al., 2011).Commonly, these counterfeit products are manufactured in China, South Korea, Taiwan, and South America.With technological advancement and ease to import (mainly from the Asian market), this element has gained more and more importance, given the increasing difficulty even in the identification of counterfeiting (Hussain et al., 2017).
Consumers" demand for luxury product is what determines the accelerated development of counterfeit market.Since brand image is how the consumer perceives it, prior knowledge of the brand is a positive factor influencing fake products purchase.Thus, "counterfeits are good as long as they are counterfeit of well-known brands" (Sharma & Chan, 2011, p. 604).
The level of positive affect (happiness and joy, for example) for a brand influences brand loyalty (Chaudhuri & Holbrook, 2001, p. 82).In addition, many consumers do not mind buying fake products: for those who like a certain brand and cannot afford products from original designers, having a similar product offers the opportunity to take advantage of the reputation of the luxury brand (Triandewi & Tjiptono, 2013).Bian and Moutinho (2009) identified the positive influence of competence, one of the brand personality traits, with the purchase intention.Likewise, consumers transfer the personality traits of the original brand to the counterfeit goods (Castaño & Perez, 2014).Sharma and Chan (2011) affirm that counterfeit-prone consumers may be brand conscious.
Based on this, we propose: H2: Brand affection positively influences counterfeit goods attitude.

Conspicuous consumption
Although conspicuous consumption is not a recent issue, it has received new contributions in current times.This type of consumption was observed by Thorstein Veblen (Üstüner & Holt, 2010) and describes the boasting display of luxury items and activities in an attempt to connote wealth and social status (Huntington, 2013;Souiden, M'saad, & Pons, 2011).Despite some recent progress, focused on how consumers use and buy brands and how they display their status through image, this type of consumption is still poorly known, and in some ways, little explored (O' Cass & Mcewen, 2004;Podoshen, Andrzejewski, & Hunt, 2014).Veblen (1899Veblen ( /1934) )  in the idea of symbolic consumption and in the notion that the status symbols of the upper class also became objects of desire of the lower classes (Üstüner & Holt, 2010).
Status consumption and conspicuous consumption are often identified in the literature as if they were the same phenomena (O'Cass & Mcewen, 2004).For these authors, the difference seems to lie in the view that consumption trends emphasize; in the former, the personal nature of possessing distinctive goods, which may or not be publicly demonstrated.For the latter, the focus is more on showing off wealth or social position, when possessions are openly displayed.
Consumers display their status by publicly consuming luxury goods (Bellezza, Paharia, & Keinan, 2016).Luxury products or brands are consumed to show off status and displayed to provide the respective visual representation.The more a consumer seeks distinction, the more he engages in behaviors such as the consumption of symbols, which increase his "social power" (O' Cass & Mcewen, 2004).The display and acquisition of status-oriented products play a prominent role in maintaining social structures.This means that individuals are motivated to maintain status by continuously engaging in the acquisition of conspicuous goods (Podoshen et al., 2014).
People are looking for a positive social image, thus, consuming a luxury brand can be considered a symbol of success and status, elevating their social image.Social power has a significant effect on consumer reaction to status products, which also leads to the search for counterfeit products (Bian et al., 2015).For Wilcox, Kim, and Sen (2009), the greater the conspicuousness of the luxury brand, the greater the consumers" preference for both, the brand and That being so, counterfeit luxury product can be an attractive alternative for conspicuous consumption, for people who cannot or do not want to pay for an original product (Sharma & Chan, 2011).Counterfeit products have a symbolic value for customers who buy them with a desire to improve their social status (Chen, Zhu, Le, & Wu, 2014), because status consumption is a major motivation for the consumption of counterfeit products (of luxury brands).In this sense, conspicuousness would fill social-adjustive values (Wilcox et al., 2009).
So, we hypothesize: H3: Conspicuous consumption positively influences the counterfeit goods attitude.

Cultural capital and cultural distinctiveness
Eisend and Schuchert-Güler ( 2006) present four categories representing the main intentions of counterfeit products purchases.The first category, classified as "Personal", includes the demographic and psychographic aspects as well as the attitude towards counterfeit.The second category contains aspects of product, price, uniqueness, and availability.The third category refers to the social and cultural context in which the decision to buy a counterfeit product is made, and so suggesting that cultural capital (Bourdieu, 1984) can be considered a relevant factor in the consumption of fake luxury products.The fourth relates to the purchase situation.
In general, cultural capital consists in the accumulated and in transit set of tastes, skills, knowledge, and practices that are at the same time peculiar and socially rare.Cultural capital is defined as knowledge, skills, and other cultural acquisitions (Mirador 2014).In the field of consumption, cultural influences determine the preferences and tastes of some product categories and, or specific brands (Chaudhry & Stumpf, 2011).
Developed by Bourdieu (1984), studies relating cultural capital to status consumption aim to understand the reasons that lead to the consumption of a particular product and the lifestyle adopted by the consumer (Üstüner & Holt, 2010).According to Bourdieu (1984), the theoretical understanding of this phenomenon passes by three basic constructs: the cultural capital, the habitus and the "social field".
Cultural capital expresses the accumulation of something with achievable value, knowledge, and educational advantage rather than money (Legg, 2012).It refers to high-status, widely shared cultural signals (attitudes, preferences, formal knowledge, behaviors, assets, and credentials) and is not a privilege of the rich, even if it is not accessible to all (Kamphuis, Jansen, Mackenbach, & Lenthe 2015).Bourdieu (1984) did not deny the possibility of individuals of lower economic classes acquiring dominant cultural signals through education (Kalfa & Taksa 2015).
The concept of habitus refers to the "cultural heritage" of individuals as a mean of demonstrating differences.It is formed by "routines and habits" learned and shared from childhood and are complemented by the education received (Üstüner & Holt, 2010).Habitus becomes a social heritage, affecting the production of practices by individuals (Mirador 2014).
From this construct, Bourdieu (1984) intends to demonstrate how cultural capital is related to the status consumption, reproduced through habitus linked to consumption.For example, in families with the same economic, cultural, and social level that interact with each other and share similar consumption preferences.Bourdieu (1984) further states that consumption is heavily influenced by its social environment or social field.Clothing meets a functional need, while fashion meets a social need.Some personal care products retain functional needs, but others cater to social needs.A house serves a functional need.However, a home serves a social need.Culture also influences the kind of the home where people live, how they relate to their homes, and how they tend to shelter themselves (Chaudhry & Stumpf, 2011).
According to Bourdieu (1984), consumption depends on the three capitals that interact with one another: cultural capital, social capital, and economic capital.Economic capital is related to the individual"s material resources, and consequently to the social class to which he belongs.Social capital is correlated with the individual"s social network and with the resources that a person needs to participate in a particular group (Calic & Neto, 2017).
Individuals are divided, according to Bourdieu (1984), into two groups: low cultural capital (LCC) and high cultural capital (HCC).LCC individuals are people conditioned on material issues, such as paying monthly bills and meeting their basic needs; HCC individuals are those who can hardly find economic difficulties and who may have access to consumption beyond their needs (Calic & Neto, 2017;Holt, 1998).
Despite the relative inexistence of studies related to the relationship between cultural capital and the consumption of counterfeit luxury products, it is possible to attribute a relation between the two elements.Considering that the consumption of counterfeit products is related to social class and cultural aspects, such as lack of access to education and status (Raza et al., 2014;Yoo & Lee, 2009), it is possible to state that low capital cultural is a factor that positively influences the consumption intention of fake luxury products.In addition, these consumers seek to maintain "rich" lifestyles, but they are not economically sufficient to purchase an original luxury brand, being attracted by the consumption of counterfeit products.On the other hand, high educated and high-income individuals are better able to purchase expansive items, which are status-enhancing (Cleveland, Papadopoulos, & Laroche, 2011).HCCs locate subjectivity in what they perceive to be authentic goods, they avoid mass-produced goods (Holt, 1998), which indirectly implies in disapproving counterfeit purchases.Therefore, it is proposed: H4: Cultural capital negatively influences the counterfeit goods attitude.
In the same context, Yoo and Lee (2009) affirm that social economic power is one of the main elements for consumption.In this way, the consumer becomes less price sensitive and may be more conducive to the consumption of genuine products.Thus, high cultural capital allows people to achieve refined and sophisticated tastes and consumption habits (Bourdieu, 1984;Holt, 1998;Üstüner & Holt, 2010).Cultural capital is a second order construct, composed by literature knowledge, multiple competence, and linguistic competence (Calic & Neto, 2017), which influences individual"s habits, tastes and cultural practices.In the case of HCC, cultural competence manifests as sophisticated behavior, what we denominate cultural distinctiveness (CD).On this, we propose: H5: Cultural distinctiveness negatively influences the counterfeit goods attitude.

Research design
The data were collected through interviews with consumers of luxury counterfeit products, selected by convenience, and approached in public spaces: two popular shopping malls in the city of Belo Horizonte, Minas Gerais, and near shoe stores in the city of Nova Serrana, Minas Gerais, where the counterfeit products of luxury brands are freely marketed.Malls like these are quite common in Brazil, attracting a vast number of consumers, and they were legally constituted.In Belo Horizonte, for example, the setup of popular shopping malls, by the municipal government in the 90"s, aimed to extinguish the problems created by the huge number of hawkers in the city downtown.These hawkers usually sell illegal goods, such as counterfeits, but the government turns a blind eye to this point (Lima, 2011).The same policy was adopted by other municipal government.
In addition, electronic questionnaires were sent with the objective of reaching the public with high cultural capital.For this purpose, initially the questionnaire was sent to some counterfeit buyers, who sent the link to their respective contacts, therefore it was a snowball sampling.This technique "is appealing when the characteristic is rare in the target population or when respondents are difficult to reach" (Malhotra, Agarwal, & Peterson, 1996, p.27).
An ANOVA test showed no differences between the two groups, in terms of attitudinal responses.
A questionnaire with a Likert scale of 7 points was used: I totally disagree (1), disagree in part (2), disagree (3), agree in part (4), agree (5), agree in large part (6) and I totally agree (7).In the questions related to counterfeit products, the term "non-original" was adopted, with the objective of not creating embarrassment for and exposure of the respondents.This change does not detract from the context of the research, since counterfeit is defined as the act of altering or imitating the original product, and the creation of non-original replicas (Inkon, 2013;Jiang & Shan, 2016;Sinha & Mandel, 2008) -Table 1.
Table 1 Questions from the research instrument.

Conspicuous consumption
Cons1 I like to wear luxury brands.
Cons2 I usually notice when someone is wearing a luxury brand.
Cons3 I like people to notice when I'm wearing a luxury brand.

Ba1
Luxury brands represent a status object for me.

Ba2
For me luxury brands represent wealth.

Ba3
People notice when someone is wearing a luxury brand.Economic Benefits

Eb1
Considering the price, I prefer to purchase a "non-original" luxury brand product.

Eb2
I like to buy "non-original" luxury brand products.

Eb3
I feel benefited by the purchase of "non-original" luxury brand products.

Cga1
There is nothing wrong with buying " non-original " luxury brand products.

Cga2
Overall, I believe that buying a "non-original" product is the best option.

Cga3
I consider buying "non-original" luxury brand products as acceptable behavior.
Cga4 Buying only a "non-original" luxury brand product is not all that bad.Source: authors.
Brand affection measurement used the three scale items proposed by Chaudhuri and Holbrook (2001).Economic benefits measures, with three items, were based on Souza, Sousa, Ferreira, and Mota (2015), Matos, Ituassu, and Rossi (2007).To evaluate conspicuous consumption, the three-items scale of O'Cass and Frost (2002) was used.
The criterion for determining cultural capital is based on four pillars (social class, schooling, occupation, and cultural competence) obtained in Bourdieu's original studies (1984) and adapted by Holt (1998) and Üstüner and Holt (2010).Interviewees were split into two groups: high and low cultural capital (HCC x LCC).The measurement can vary from 4 to 22 points, up to 12 for LCC and from 13, HCC.The questions about cultural distinctiveness with six items came from Calic and Neto (2017).
To determine the attitude about counterfeit products, a scale with four items was used, based on Souza et al. (2015), Matos et al. (2007), and Gupta, Gould, and Pola (2004).
The data analysis was performed with Structural Equations Modeling, using the software AMOS 25.The survey was performed with 317 respondents and 309 records remained after the exclusion of extreme multivariate cases.
Regarding the measurement model, we verified the convergent validity, since all indicators presented loads above 0.5, significant at 1% level, except for ba3 (0.332, kept in the analysis due to content importance and scale reduced items) and dist1 (0.429).Reliability is proven by Cronbach's Alpha  Source: research data.
The relation between EB and CGA is positive and significant.Thus, the greater the economic benefit, the greater the attitude toward counterfeit goods, confirming H1.This result is in line with several research, such as Hussain, Kofinas, and Win (2017), Matos et al. (2007), Penz et al. (2008), Raza, Ahad, Shafqat, Aurangzaib, and Rizwan (2014), and Wilcox et al. (2009).That is an expected result, as price and a good price value relation are the main drivers of counterfeit purchase.Interestingly, the economic benefits have slightly greater influence for HCC"s than LCC"s.
The four other relations were not confirmed, similar to findings from Penz et al. (2008).As for BA, the coefficient is positive although it is not significant.Maybe this happens because, externally, counterfeits allow consumers to represent the external image they want, but internally they do not identify themselves with the counterfeit (Castaño & Perez, 2014).Cultural capital has a negative influence on CGA, but it is not significant.As counterfeit purchase is associated with low cultural capital and status, the relation direction is a predictable result (Raza et al., 2014;Yoo & Lee, 2009).However, the non-significance was not expected, because high cultural capital persons, by their refined tastes, should nurture strong negative attitude toward counterfeit goods.Concerning CONS, the sign is negative, and it is not significant.It was expected a positive relation, and this may be caused by the aversion consumers have in assuming their preference for conspicuous goods.In this case, the respondents" answers could follow social norms.
Another possible explanation is that consumers who want to show-off their belongs avoid owing fake products.Finally, the relation between DIST and CGA is positive and not significant, contrary to the proposition.As cultural distinctiveness means sophistication and refinement, a negative relation would be the likely result.However, as sometimes counterfeit goods present high quality, similar to the original, the identification becomes more difficult, and perceived quality presents positive influence (Hussain et al., 2017).In this situation, counterfeit goods accomplish the social values, and distinctiveness turns out a secondary reason.The independent variables, jointly, explain 56% of the CGA"s variance, a moderate power in statistical terms, but a high explanatory power in managerial terms (Eisend, 2015).
As for group analysis, we tested the invariance between HCC and LCC constraining the factors loadings of each independent variable.All CMIN are non-significant, thus the invariance across groups is confirmed.There is no significantly differences between the coefficients, thus the group results are quite similar to the total sample, the main variable explaining CGA is EB.
Consequently, for both groups, with high or low level of cultural capital, the economic benefits justify the counterfeit goods purchase.The explanatory power is smaller than total sample in both cases, but slightly higher for HCC"s than LCC"s.

Discussion, limitations, and suggestions
With this study, we sought to evaluate the role of economic benefits, brand affection, conspicuous consumption, cultural capital, and cultural distinctiveness in influencing consumers attitude toward counterfeit goods.
Conspicuous consumption, which represents the consumption with the aim of communicating a distinct self-image (Chaudhuri & Majumdar 2006), impressing others, elevating self-esteem, and improving social status (Souiden et al., 2011) does not favor the attitude regarding the intention to buy counterfeit luxury products in any of the models analyzed.Thus, it indicates that the consumer surveyed does not purchase counterfeit luxury products to show off the brand or product.
Cultural capital means a set of knowledge, skills, and other cultural acquisitions of an individual (Legg, 2012;Mirador, 2014).The negative relation between this capital and the attitude about counterfeit luxury products in the three groups was observed.As would be expected, the greater the cultural capital, the lower the predisposition to purchase counterfeit goods.However, the non-significance of the coefficients indicates that CGA is not influenced by cultural capital.
The cultural distinctiveness, which comes from cultural capital, does not influence the consumers" attitude toward counterfeit goods.It should be a negative relation, but it was positive and not significant.Brand affection does not present a significant relation with counterfeit goods attitude as well.It has a positive relation, except for high cultural capital group, but not significant.
Consequently, economic benefit is the only variable able to explain positive attitude and purchase intention.This result agrees with the literature and is normally regarded as the main driver of counterfeit acquisitions.It is inferred that the consumption intention of counterfeit products is related to price, costbenefit ratio, safety, and social acceptance as presented in previous studies (Hussain et al., 2017, Matos et al., 2007;Penz et al., 2008;Souza et al., 2015).Low Cultural Capital respondents did not present a higher prospect for the purchase intent when compared to those of the High Cultural Capital group, in opposition to studies by Raza et al. (2014), who emphasize the relationship of counterfeit goods consumption with low income and education people.
As academic contributions, we can highlight the jointly measurement of three types of variables as suggested by Eisend and Schuchert-Güler (2006):

Figure 1 .
Figure 1.Conceptual Model for the hypothetical factors that may affect the counterfeit.
was one of the first researchers to report and analyze the visible display of wealth, referring to this trend as "conspicuous consumption".He defined it as prodigal expenses on quality goods or services, acquired mainly for the purpose of displaying income or wealth (O'Cass & Mcewen, 2004; Souiden et al., 2011).Such a definition seeks its basis NEECIM TUR • Núcleo de Estudos e Estratégias em Comunicação Integrada de Marketing e Turismo • UFMG Do Cultural Capital and Conspicuous Consumption Influence Counterfeit Purchase Attitude?Evidence from Brazilian Market 10 its falsification.O'Cass and Frost (2002) investigated conspicuous consumption in young consumers of well-known brands of clothing and glasses.The results pointed out that the symbolic characteristics, the self-image congruence, the brand image, and the strength of the feelings towards the brand have a significant effect on the conspicuous consumption and the status of a specific brand.
high proficiency (mastery, ability) in the use of the Portuguese language.Dist6I have a high proficiency (mastery, ability) in the use of another foreign language.
coefficient and Composite Reliability above 0.7, excepting brand affection, 0.6 for both indicators, nonetheless acceptable values.The discriminant validity was confirmed by the Fornell-Larcker criterion, in which we found correlations between the constructs inferior to the square root of the AVE(Hair, Hult, Ringle, & Sarstedt, 2014).Regarding structural model, we performed the total sample estimation using Structural Equation Modelling, software AMOS 25, the following indicators show a good adjustment (RMSEA = 0.050; GFI = 0.923; CFI = 0.943; TLI = 0.929; PCFI = 0.755).The sample was split in two, according to the cultural capital level, bellow and above 13.The relations were tested for each group, using Path Analysis, due to small sample size of high cultural capital.The coefficients are shown in personal aspects, product features, and social and cultural context.Studies accomplishing such variables are not common.Likewise, we can mention the confirmation of economic benefits as the main factor in driving counterfeit purchases.Moreover, identifying the no influence of cultural capital and cultural distinctiveness is very meaningful because they are unexpected results which deserve deeper studies.This turns out as suggestions for future research.Likewise, the sample contains only respondents that purchase counterfeit goods, which turns out relevant, as several studies were conducted with students imagining a counterfeit acquisition.In managerial terms, as the economic benefits are the only factor that increases attitude toward counterfeit goods, brand companies should try strategies emphasizing the bad relation between price and value of counterfeit products such as: "if price is too low, quality is too bad, if quality is good, rice is almost the same".Additionally, they could develop technics to increase counterfeit production costs, turning counterfeits less attractive.Now, we must emphasize the research limitations and suggestions for futures studies.The non-significance of the constructs in relation to the proposed theoretical model may be related to the sample used, since convenience samples could contain some type of bias, besides not allowing the statistical generalization of the results.Another factor to be explored is the type of questionnaire used.The direct questions about the subject can bring some personal embarrassment for the respondents.New research containing questions drawn in an indirect and generalized way could better demonstrate the results.Using this work, we cannot prove the influence of brand affection, conspicuous consumption, cultural distinctiveness, and cultural capital on the consumption of a counterfeit luxury product.Therefore, the understanding of such topics deserves deeper research, possibly of a qualitative nature.