Abstract

China and the United States, as representative of the developing countries and developed countries, have big differences in culture, so they also show different types of consumption culture. College students are regarded as a special kind of group in the society and they can reflect the features of their country consumption culture better.
The thesis will compare the contemporary college students’ consumption culture of China and the United States. The results show the similar features of contemporary college students’ consumption culture of China and the United States: diversification in consumption structure and level, advocating symbol consumption and increase emotional consumption and other different features in consumption structure, conception and ways.
Besides, the author also studies the detailed causes for the similarities and differences between the college students' consumption culture of China and the United States: globalization of economy, politics and culture, development of information technology, history and background difference and character and conception difference.

Key Words: college students; consumption culture; similarities; differences

摘要

中国和美国，分别作为发展中国家和发达国家的代表，在文化上存在很大差异，所以各自亦展现出一种不同的消费文化。大学生作为一类特殊的群体，他们的消费更能体现出时代特征。
本文将对比当代中美大学生消费文化。研究表明了当代中美大学生消费文化上消费结构层次多样性、倡导符号消费、注重情感消费的共同特点，以及在消费结构、消费观念、消费方式反应出来的不同特点。
此外，作者研究了引起中美大学生消费文化之间异同的具体原因：经济政治文化全球化，信息技术的发展，历史和文化背景的差异以及性格和价值观的差异。

关键词：大学生；消费文化；相似性；差异性