5
Consumer Behavior
CHAPTER
Chapter Objectives
1 Define consumer
behavior and describe the
role it plays in marketing
decisions.
3 Explain each of the
5
personal determinants of
consumer behavior: needs
and motives, perceptions,
6
attitudes, learning, and
2 Describe the interpersonal
self-concept theory.
determinants of consumer
behavior: cultural, social, 4 Distinguish between
and family influences.
high-involvement and
low-involvement
purchase decisions.
Outline the steps in the
consumer decision
process.
Differentiate among
routinized response
behavior, limited problem
solving, and extended
problem solving by
consumers.
CHAPTER 5 Consumer Behavior
• Consumer behavior Process through which
buyers make decisions.
• Marketers borrow extensively from
psychology and sociology to better understand
consumer behavior.
• Consumer behavior is usually understood as a
function of interpersonal influences and personal
factors.
CHAPTER 5 Consumer Behavior
INTERPERSONAL DETERMINANTS OF
CONSUMER BEHAVIOR
CULTURAL INFLUENCES
• Culture Values, beliefs, preferences, and tastes handed down from one
generation to the next.
• Culture is a broad environmental determinant of behavior.
Core Values in U.S. Culture
• Work ethic and desire the accumulate wealth.
• Importance of family and home life.
• Individualism, education, freedom, youth, health, and others.
• Consumers are adopting new values as communication technology
changes.
CHAPTER 5 Consumer Behavior
International Perspective on Cultural Influences
• Successful strategies in one country may not extend to others.
Subcultures
• Groups within a culture that have their own modes of behavior.
• In U.S. subcultures can differ by ethnicity, nationality, age, rural versus
urban location, religion, and geographic distribution.
• Population mix in U.S. is changing as the Hispanic, African American, and
Asian populations grow.
CHAPTER 5 Consumer Behavior
SOCIAL INFLUENCES
• Everyone belongs to multiple social groups: family, neighborhood, clubs,
and sports teams.
• Group membership influences buying decisions.
• Groups establish norms of behavior—values, attitudes, and behaviors that a
group deems appropriate for its members.
• Differences in status and roles within groups also influence behavior.
• Some Americans make purchases to enhance their status within social
groups, and others work to reduce their consumption dramatically.
The Asch Phenomenon
• Theory of psychologist S. E. Asch that individuals conform to majority rule,
even if that majority rule goes against their beliefs.
CHAPTER 5 Consumer Behavior
Reference Groups
• Reference groups People or institutions whose opinions are valued and to
whom a person looks for guidance in his or her own behavior, values, and
conduct, such as family, friends, or celebrities.
• Influence of reference group depends on two conditions:
• Purchased product must be seen and identifiable.
• Purchased product must be conspicuous, something not everybody
owns.
Social Classes
• Six classes: upper-upper, lower-upper, upper-middle, lower-middle,
working class, lower class.
• Income not always a primary factor.
• Individuals’ buying habits sometimes reflect the class to which they aspire.
CHAPTER 5 Consumer Behavior
Opinion Leaders
• Reference groups Trend- setters who
purchase new products before others in a
group and then influence others in their
purchases.
• Individuals tend to act as opinion leaders
for specific goods or services.
• Information sometimes flows from mass
media to opinion leaders to consumers;
sometimes flows directly to consumers.
CHAPTER 5 Consumer Behavior
FAMILY INFLUENCES
• Like other influences, families have norms of expected behavior, status
relationships, and roles.
• Family structure changing.
1900
Today
Percent of households headed by married couple
80
53
Percent of households that include extended family
50
10
Percnet of married women who work outside the home
6
60
CHAPTER 5 Consumer Behavior
FAMILY INFLUENCES
• Four roles of spouses:
• Autonomic role—partners independently make an equal number of
decisions.
• Husband-dominant role—husband usually makes certain buying
decisions, such as purchasing life insurance.
• Wife-dominant role—wife makes buying decisions, such as buying
children’s clothing.
• Syncratic role—buying decision made jointly.
• Increasing occurrence of two-income households increases likelihood of
spouses making joint buying decisions.
Children and Teenagers in Family Purchases
• Have $192 billion in purchasing power either directly or by influencing
family purchasing decisions.
CHAPTER 5 Consumer Behavior
PERSONAL DETERMINANTS OF
CONSUMER BEHAVIOR
NEEDS AND MOTIVES
• Need Imbalance between a consumer’s actual and desired states.
• Motive Inner state that directs a person toward the goal of satisfying a
need.
Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs
• Developed by psychologist Abraham H. Maslow
• Identifies five levels of human needs.
• Person must at least partially satisfy lower-level needs before higher-level
needs affect behavior.
CHAPTER 5 Consumer Behavior
PERCEPTIONS
• Perception Meaning that a person attributes to incoming stimuli gathered
through the five senses.
• Results from two types of factors:
• Stimulus factors—characteristics of the physical object such as size,
color, weight, and shape.
• Individual factors—unique characteristics of the individual, including
not only sensory processes but also experiences with similar inputs and
basic motivations and expectations.
Perceptual Screens
• Consumers are bombarded by commercial messages.
• Perceptual screens help people filter out some messages.
• Advertisers work to break through these screens such as through using large
ads, word-of-mouth advertising, and virtual reality.
CHAPTER 5 Consumer Behavior
Subliminal Perception
• Subconscious receipt of incoming information.
• Use is aimed at subverting perceptual screens.
• Unlikely to work in customers not already inclined to buy.
ATTITUDES
• Attitudes Person’s enduring favorable or unfavorable evaluations,
emotions, or action tendencies toward some object or idea.
Attitude Components
• Cognitive—individual’s knowledge about an object or concept.
• Affective—deals with feelings or emotional reactions.
• Behavioral—tendencies to act in a certain manner.
CHAPTER 5 Consumer Behavior
Changing Customer Attitudes
• Marketers have two choices for appealing to consumer
attitudes:
• Attempt to produce consumer attitudes that
will motivate purchase of a particular product.
• Evaluate existing consumer attitudes and
then make the product features appeal to them.
• Attitudes may not be unfavorable, just not motivating
the consumer toward a purchase.
Modifying the Components of Attitude
• Provide information about product benefits and correcting misconceptions.
• Engaging buyers in new behavior.
• New technologies can encourage changes in customers’ attitudes.
CHAPTER 5 Consumer Behavior
LEARNING
• Learning Knowledge or skill that is acquired as a result of experience,
which changes consumer behavior.
• Learning process:
• Drive—any strong stimulus that impels action.
• Cue—any object in the environment that determines the nature of the
consumer’s response to a drive.
• Response—an individual’s reaction to a set of cues and drives.
• Reinforcement—the reduction in drive that results from a proper
response; creates bond between the drive and the purchase of the
product.
CHAPTER 5 Consumer Behavior
Applying Learning Theory to Marketing Decisions
• Marketers use shaping, the process of applying a series of rewards and
reinforcements to permit more complex behavior to evolve.
• Product and promotional strategy work together in the shaping process.
SELF-CONCEPT THEORY
• Self-concept Person’s multifaceted picture of himself or herself.
• Four components—real self, self-image, looking-glass self, and ideal self—
influence purchasing decisions.
CHAPTER 5 Consumer Behavior
THE CONSUMER DECISION PROCESS
• High-involvement purchasing decisions include buying a car.
• Low-involvement purchasing decisions include buying a candy bar.
CHAPTER 5 Consumer Behavior
PROBLEM OR OPPORTUNITY RECOGNITION
• Consumer becomes aware of a significant discrepancy between the existing
situation and a desired situation.
SEARCH
• Consumer gathers information about the attainment of a desired state of
affairs.
• Evoked set Number of alternatives that a consumer actually considers in
making a purchase decision.
EVALUATION OF ALTERNATIVES
• Consumer accepts, distorts, or rejects information as they receive it.
• Evaluative criteria Features that a consumer considers in choosing among
alternatives.
CHAPTER 5 Consumer Behavior
PURCHASE DECISION AND PURCHASE ACT
• Consumer decides where or from whom to make the purchase.
POST-PURCHASE EVALUATION
• Buyer feels either satisfaction at the removal of the discrepancy between the
existing and desired states or dissatisfaction with the purchase.
• Cognitive dissonance Imbalance among knowledge, beliefs, and attitudes
that occurs after an action or decision, such as a purchase.
• Reasons dissonance may increase:
• The dollar value of a purchase increases.
• The rejected alternatives have desirable features that the chosen
alternatives do not provide
• The purchase decision has a major effect on the buyer.
CHAPTER 5 Consumer Behavior
CLASSIFYING CONSUMER PROBLEM-SOLVING
PROCESSES
• Results from two types of factors:
Routinized Response Behavior
• Consumer makes many purchases routinely by choosing a preferred brand
or one of a limited group of acceptable brands.
Limited Problem Solving
• Consumer has previously set evaluative criteria for a particular kind of
purchase but then encounters a new, unknown brand.
Extended Problem Solving
• Results when brands are difficult to categorize or evaluate.
• Typical of high-involvement purchases.