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This chapter analyzes characteristics and changing patterns of marriage formation in Vietnam over the past 50 years, from various aspects including the motives underpinning marriage decision-making, the process of mate acquaintance, the criteria for mate selection, and marriage decision-making rights. The chapter is based on a review of data derived from the Vietnam Family Survey 2006 (MOCST et al., 2008) and the Vietnam Marriage Survey 2017 (Minh, 2021). It shows that the pattern of marriage formation in Vietnam has changed significantly in the past decades under the influence of various socio-economic and legal factors. Marriage is increasingly associated with the value of personal happiness. People today have many more opportunities to meet and get to know each other before marriage than older generations in the past. Adolescents spend more time getting to know their future spouse and have more options when choosing future partners before marriage. Marriage based on a partner’s individual qualities is preferred, gradually replacing mate selection based on family background. Parents’ power over their children’s marriage has decreased, while young people are becoming more and more independent in making decisions about their lives. In other words, today, it is the interests of the people involved in the marriage that matters, not only the interests of the family and kinship that determines marriages. However, despite these new marriage formation patterns, the belief that children’s marriage is an important affair for the whole family is still maintained. The general pattern is that there is a mix of personal factors and family circumstances regarding the marriage choices.

Emphasizing the increasing need for social presence in interpersonal interactions and the irreplaceable aspects of face-to-face communications, this study aims to explore the emotional impact of interpersonal influence on consumers after purchase. As individuals respond differently to others’ feedback (positive and negative/verbal and nonverbal), the author investigates potential moderating factors of the impact of feedback on consumer’s emotions in a postpurchase context.

A qualitative study was conducted using the method of semistructured individual interviews to collect data. The author selected a heterogeneous group of 30 consumers belonging to two categories: 13 adults (including seven women and six men) and 17 adolescents (including eight girls and nine boys). The author took into account this type of sampling in the selection of respondents, as investigating the influence of the respondent’s gender is one of the research objectives.

The thematic content analysis method released a set of propositions the author suggests for future validation: five moderating factors the author established from the literature review (strength of social ties, level of expertise, type of the product and consumer’s age and gender), while four factors sprang from the collected data (consumer’s level of conviction, repetition of the feedback, the feedback’s argumentation and its level of discretion).

The subjectivity of the interviewees’ personal descriptions of their felt internal states affects the accuracy of their responses. In addition, the psychological aspect of the study provoked reluctance and discretion from some respondents. Further research studies could target these limitations to study each identified moderating factor separately and search for the secondary variables that tend to be linked to these factors (e.g. the expertise level is linked to personality variables, such as the perceived level of self-confidence). Furthermore, subsequent studies can go beyond the affective impact of feedback and investigate the behavioral aspect (repurchase intentions).

This study is of great importance in providing more explanations for the reasons why consumers repurchase or abandon a product. The importance of the emotional power of others’ feedback suggests that, when positioning their offers, marketers must ensure that their product has a strong chance of acceptance by consumer’s significant other. In addition, companies must argue their offers, allowing consumers to increase their knowledge about the product. Moreover, interpersonal cues and expertise level are more important competences to find in employees. Who is more than a vendor, for example, to be perceived as having a high level of expertise in his field?

This study stresses the importance of face-to-face interpersonal interaction in a time when social lives are submerged by social media and virtual communications. The findings suggest that offline social power still matters, and its impact is relative to multiple factors that count for consumers. Face-to-face interaction has been viewed as the most efficient way to satisfy individuals’ social needs for connectedness.

This paper provides new insights into the impact of offline interpersonal verbal and nonverbal feedbacks. The feedback-affect process within consumers was explored, and the postpurchase context was precisely emphasized.