What are types of subculture?

1. Career Development
2. What are subcultures? (With definition and 8 examples)

By Indeed Editorial Team

Published 7 December 2021

A subculture is a smaller cultural group within a larger culture. This group shares a collection of values, beliefs, rituals and traditions. If you're a marketing professional, learning about the different subcultures can help you understand why people act and think in certain ways and to create suitable and effective marketing strategies. In this article, we discuss what subcultures are and provide a list of examples.

What are subcultures?

Subcultures are groups of individuals within a culture that distinguish themselves from the parent culture to which it belongs. Members of subcultures typically maintain some of the parent culture's founding principles. A subculture forms when a group of people have a common set of experiences or values that differ from the dominating culture in a way that fits their group's obligations and values.

If you're a marketing professional, understanding the different subcultures can help you conduct market segmentation and identify your target market so you can develop a suitable marketing strategy. For instance, you can help a company develop products suitable for the teenage culture and create advertising directed at these consumers. Each subculture, like a larger culture, has unique attitudes, beliefs and values that you can learn to create an effective marketing strategy for.

Related: Creating a healthy corporate culture

Examples of subcultures

Understanding the different subcultures is important in developing marketing strategies, as it can provide you with a general sense of understanding of consumers in the market. It can also provide you with some insight into acceptable norms, behaviours and expectations, which can be of great help to marketing communications in particular. Here are some examples of subcultures:

Ethnic subcultures

Ethnic subcultures refer to a segment or group of consumers who have different income levels or living standards but have similar values or beliefs due to their ethnicity. These values or beliefs can have an influence on their consumption behaviour or product preference. As a marketer, you may focus on a specific market comprising ethnic subcultures. It may not be easy, though, to reach a specific ethnic subculture effectively with a particular type of product. This is because not everyone in the same ethnic subculture consumes the same product, nor leads the same lifestyle.

For example, an Indian person who migrated to the United Kingdom from one city may not have the same food habits or preferences as someone who migrated from a different city in India. This means that to be effective, it's important to further study ethnic subcultures based on specific demographics. Based on the results of that study, you may further segment the same ethnic market and make different offers for different sub-segments.

Related: Job search guide: finding companies that value diversity & inclusion

Religious subcultures

Religious subculture refers to a group of people who have similar religious beliefs. People's religious affiliation may also influence to a great extent their consumption patterns. Religious rituals and beliefs may dictate the use of certain products and might discourage the consumption of others. For example, followers of some religions avoid consuming pork products.

Sometimes, there are differences among the members of a particular subculture in terms of their lifestyle or consumption habits. For example, a devout member of a particular religion may consider it immoral to be materialistic. Another member of the same religion, though, may find nothing wrong with becoming materialistic. As a marketer, you may have no problem in reaching the latter person, but it might be almost impossible for you to successfully market to the first, depending on the product or service.

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Regional subcultures

A regional or geographic subculture refers to a group of people from a particular part of a country or people living in a particular location. Different geographic regions of a country pose different problems to people. For instance, weather conditions can influence recreational opportunities, clothing requirements and home construction. In addition, different regions of a country have different social histories and different age distributions. These factors, together with climate variables, may produce different lifestyles, values and consumption behaviour.

Regional variations may influence the use of particular media, the types of products people consume and the attributes of a product they consider important. For example, people living in urban or suburban areas may prefer pre-prepared or instant food, eating out or enjoy their leisure in a way different from people living in rural areas. Thus, as a marketer, it's important to consider regional subcultures when developing marketing strategies.

Subcultures based on age

Subcultures may also vary depending on the age differences of people living in the same geographical location or belonging to the same culture. People who belong to the teen group, for example, may behave quite differently from people who belong to the middle age or elderly groups. However, since experiences, outlooks, attitudes and other aspects may vary among individuals of different age groups, their consumption patterns may vary as well.

When marketing products or services, it's important to target the correct age group. Even if the service or product you're marketing appeals to every demographic, what entices older consumers may dissuade younger ones completely. By dividing your marketing strategy into specific age groups, you can make sure that you're encouraging different consumers to actively listen to what you say.

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Singles subculture

Singles subculture consists of unmarried people. The size of this subculture is slowly becoming prominent enough to call for special marketing attention. There are quite a few reasons why this subculture is growing. These may include delaying marriage, higher divorce rate or inability to find a suitable source of income to bear family expenses.

Singles often have specific needs that differ from those of married people. Marketers who can recognise the specific needs of singles and can develop products aimed at meeting those specific needs can reap considerable benefits. Convenience foods, dating services and nightclubs are some examples of services and products typically aimed at the singles subculture .

Subcultures based on gender differences

Gender differences may also form subcultures, such as subcultures of males, subcultures of females and subcultures of non-binary people. As society often emphasises distinct, specific roles for each gender, they're likely to behave differently. Because their behaviours vary, they consume different kinds of products and may respond differently to marketing appeals.

There are products that all genders use equally, but they may need different marketing appeals for the same product. Members of all gender groups use bicycles, clothing and cosmetics, but as a marketer, it's important to provide different shapes, sizes, colours, designs and fragrances to appeal to people of different genders. The shopping patterns of these genders may also vary. As a marketing professional, it's important to understand the characteristics of each gender to create successful and impactful marketing campaigns.

Related: How to talk about race, gender and social issues at work

Occupational subcultures

Occupational subculture consists of various subcultures, such as the subculture of engineers, the subculture of teachers, the subculture of lawyers and the subculture of doctors. Individuals display different patterns of purchasing behaviours according to their occupational involvement. A defence officer, for instance, may show different purchase behaviours from someone belonging to the civilian group.

A doctor may look at the nutritional aspect when buying food items more than someone from outside of the medical field. Thus, as a marketing professional, it's important to recognise the differences in behaviours and attitudes among people of different occupations. This allows you to develop marketing strategies accordingly and to be successful in each specific subculture.

Subcultures based on social class

You can also use social class as a determinant of subcultural differences. There could be a subculture of the working class, middle class and wealthy. Individuals belonging to the subculture of the wealthy are likely to display different buying behaviours compared to those who belong to other subcultures with lower incomes. The wealthy and middle-class subcultures might have substantial control and little concern over their buying decisions, while the working class might be much more cautious and careful when making purchasing decisions.

There is also a subculture of individuals living close to or below the poverty line. Due to the low incomes of members of this subculture, they may avoid purchasing pre-packed or instant food items as they're likely to be more expensive than fresh staple ones. Also, because they may have a different life experience from other subcultures, they might develop different outlooks, attitudes and motivations, resulting in different buying behaviours. They may spend most of their income on necessities like food, shelter, clothing and transportation.