Diversification of student consumption during the pandemic - Albania, Poland and Portugal

Abstract This paper aims to identify changes in consumption by students from Albania, Poland and Portugal in the era of the SARS-CoV-2 coronavirus. The study was conducted on a sample of 668 students of the Qiriazi University College and Aldent University in Albania, the University of Warmia and Mazury in Olsztyn, Poland and the School of Technology and Management of Porto Polytechnic in Portugal. The estimated volumes of basic macroeconomic indicators for this period prove that the crisis caused by the COVID-19 epidemic may be the cause of many adverse changes in various areas of life. The empirical study aimed to determine the impact of the epidemiological situation on changes in the shopping habits of students – designated as young consumers. The main goal was to identify differences in the purchasing decisions of young consumers depending on gender and nationality. The research instrument was a standardized survey questionnaire, which was divided into three thematic blocks. The first part of the questionnaire contains questions on the housing conditions of students, in the second part – activity on the labor market, and in the third part – issues related to shopping and the use of cultural services and the way of spending free time. Some conclusions were drawn from the research: (1) pandemic did not change the periodicity of purchases, (2) from online buying did not show a boom in the samples analyzed in this study, (3) students from these countries changed their shopping behavior in terms of shopping places. The conclusions formulated in the study, as well as the topicality of the issues, allow them to be considered useful for institutional entities interested in observing changes in consumption during the pandemic. The scientific contribution of theoretical and empirical considerations is primarily the systematization of theoretical foundations and the conceptualization of the category of factors determining the diversity of purchasing behavior of young people (students).