Abstract
This research has a dual objective: (1) Increase knowledge of the link between individuals and regions through a qualitative exploratory study (comprising 16 individual semi-structured interviews and two focus groups of eight people each), and consequently propose a new specific concept: regional belonging. Regional belonging is defined as a positive identity link between an individual and a physical, social and cultural place, understood by individuals as their regional territory. (2) Develop a measurement scale for this new concept that is reliable, valid, synthetic and generalizable. To do this, we conducted a qualitative exploratory study to generate a sample of items for each of the three dimensions of this concept (physical, social and cultural). Four series of quantitative data collections were done on 1691 consumers to purify and confirm the measurement scale developed, establish the convergent, discriminant and predictive validity of the scale (comprising three dimensions measured by 12 items) and test its ecological validity.
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