Hi everyone,

I'm currently writing my master's thesis and I've come to a point where I'm absolutely stuck and feel like my thesis does not make sense anymore. I want to look at companies that claim that value diversity and inclusiveness, look at their corporate expressions and then compare this with the perceptions consumers have (Brand Image) on Instagram.

This is my RQ: How does the expression of the corporate brand of an organization regarding diversity and inclusiveness align with the perceptions consumers have of the brand (brand image), on Instagram?

However, I'm not sure if my conceptual model makes sense. Diversity and Inclusiveness would be an independent variable, Expressions of the corporate brand would be an independent variable and Brand Image would be dependent.

Could my conceptual model be D&I --> Expressions of the CP --> Brand Image.

This means that the variable 'Expressions of the corporate brand' is a mediator, but actually, diversity and inclusiveness can also be a part of the expressions of the corporate brand so I'm not sure if I should put them together or keep them separate...
My feedback is that I have to make my model more interesting, so I'm not sure what to do anymore...

Thanks in advance!

Any idea anyone? Not my field.

it seems to me like you firstly have to decide how you are measuring each construct.

The ideal is to find previously validated scale and use that.

In the absence of a previously validated scale, you could just come with a few questions, say 5, that measure each construct (construct 1;expression of the corporate brand that refers to diversity and inclusiveness/ construct 2; consumers perceptions of the diversity and inclusiveness of the brand). then simply see if they correlate. simple test. i think you are just getting muddled and making it complicated.

I think a difficult part would be measuring construct 1 (expression of the brand that refers to diversity and inclusiveness). you could get people to read some of company info/browse their website and then answer some rating questions (again decide if you are going to have yes or no answers or rating on a scale (rating on scale is typically easier to analyse)

You could also instead of looking of expression of diversity and inclusiveness look at actual markers of diversity and inclusiveness...like hiring policy/percentage of female/ethnic minority/disabled/ staff they employ. and things like that. but that would change the question to is the amount of diversity and inclusiveness a company/brand actually has, reflected in consumers perceptions of their diversity and inclusiveness.

you could also see what what factors predict consumers perceptions of diversity and inclusiveness. this is getting a bit more complicated. related to your question of 'expressions of exclusivity and diversity' you could identify some factors.. for example amount spent advertising or type of advertising/or amount of brand ambassadors/or type of adverts and then see is these factors you dependent variable of 'perceptions of inclusiveness/diversity' , using a regression.


Hope that helps

I would run it all my your supervisor before you commit to data collection