Handweavers' enduring product involvement with craft yarns and selected information processing variables

• Main Author: Rendleman, Susan Ruth
• Other Authors: Clothing and Textiles
• Format: Others
• Language: en
• Published: Virginia Tech 2014
• Subjects: LD5655.V855 1990.R463; Hand weaving > Equipment and supplies; Yarn
• Online Access: http://hdl.handle.net/10919/43154; http://scholar.lib.vt.edu/theses/available/etd-06112009-063405/

This study investigated attributes of craft yarns of most interest to handweavers, sources of information used by handweavers to learn about craft yarns, and methods used by handweavers to communicate information about handwoven textiles to ultimate consumers. In addition, the extent of the sample group of handweavers’ knowledge of Federal Trade Commission TRR 16 C.F.R. 423 on care labeling for garments was examined. Finally, relationships between information processing behaviors drawn from the theory of enduring product involvement were examined. The survey was returned by 81 handweavers from four handweaver’s guilds in three Southeastern states. The yarn attribute with the highest importance rating was "matching the type of yarn to what it will be used for" with a mean importance rating of 5.649 out of 6. Important sources of care information for handweavers were experience, yarn wrappers, and other weavers. On the yarn wrapper, the most important information was fiber content and length in yards. Also of strong importance were washfastness rating, written care instructions, and lightfastness rating. Only two of seventeen weavers who sold their products included a permanently attached care label as required by law. And 70% of the weavers incorrectly believed that a paper hang tag was an acceptable care label for a garment when it was sold. Five elements of enduring product involvement were operationalized in the instrument: centrality to egoidentity, hedonic value, self-reported expertise, craft-related activities, and specialized fiber-art interests and activities. Each of the five elements had a high positive correlation to the overall score (p < .0001). The correlation between the involvement score and information seeking behavior frequency score was low, (0.345) but significant (p < .001), while the correlation between the involvement score and importance of attributes was not significant. === Master of Science