Lisa Phillips, Senior Analyst at eMarketer.com, writes that most American consumers are highly skeptical that recovery is here, or will start anytime soon.  And she shares this chart on that sentiment:

And that means, Phillips writes, that marketers are going to have to accept a "new normal":

To cope, consumers are resetting their spending behaviors and focusing on value, according to NPD Group’s “Retail & Brand Landscape Report Series 2010” study. For example, they shop at more stores but realize they can leave without buying something. They have also widened their brand considerations, MediaPost reported.

For 81% of the participants in Deloitte’s “American Pantry Survey,” however, their new-found use of coupons and loyalty programs is fun—and 93% said they still expected to spend cautiously even if the economy improved.

Even as they expect to spend less, consumers are shopping more online. Some 55% of respondents to a PriceGrabber.com survey said they were spending more time shopping for and researching purchases on the internet this year, compared with 26% in 2009.

Read The ‘New Normal’ in Consumer Shopping Behavior here.