Consumer Behavior Topic 8
Attitude Change
Attitude change strategies:
a. change consumer’s basic motivational function
motivational function of attitude:
1. utilitarian function
2. ego defenses
3. value expressive
4. knowledge
5. social adjustment
b. associate product with an admired group or event
c. relate two conflicting attitudes
(i.e., health foods – people associate healthy foods with not tasting good so the
marketer must relate the product to good taste and convince the pubic that you
can have healthy and still taste good – Weight Watchers, Snack Wells)
d. alter components of the multi-attribute model (beliefs and evaluations)
beliefs and evaluations make up attitudes – so judge the attributes of a brand
and associate with beliefs that deal with a brand
e. change consumers’ beliefs about the brands of competitors – focus on the
competition and proving that they do not do as good of a job in some
dimensions
Which came first - behavior or attitude? The traditional approach is that attitudes cam
first – that the consumer thinks before they act – the assumption is that everyone acts
rationally – but the consumer behaviorist has found that in many situations this is not so –
hence behavior may precede attitude.
Cognitive Dissonance Theory
Leon Festinger (New York psychologist) was the father of this concept – where we have
some sort of unbalance regarding an action so we find justifications for the action (i.e.,
the Surgeon General has stated that smoking is bad for your health yet you still smoke
pointing out that Uncle Jimmy smoked 3 packs a day and lived to be 92 and died in an
auto accident – hence, how bad could smoking really be?)
Post-purchase dissonance – the consumer may have conflicting thoughts that create
tension so they try to reduce this tension – there have been many studies of people
following purchases and their concern as to whether they made the right choice – a smart
marketer tries to reassure the buyer – after a car purchase, often the dealership will call to
see how the car is running; the buyer may begin to notice ads for the car that they never
noticed before, or all of the other cars like theirs on the road – if all of these other people
purchased this car, then I must have made the right choice – marketers know that after a
high involvement purchase it is valuable to reduce the tension for the buyer
Relationship marketing is the goal today for marketers – to have a relationship with their
customers so that they can continue to sell to them – they do not want the consumer to
have dissonance.
Research on dissonance
One classic study asked a group of students, who were selected as other students looked
to them as role models, to tell others why it was important to take shorter showers (i.e.,
save resources, save water especially during drought months etc.) – these students were
then asked how many actually “practiced what they preached” and at that point only 55%
actually did take shorter showers; to increase the dissonance, these same student role
models were asked to discuss the value or shorter showers on videotape – once they had
actually spoken about it they were then asked again if they were taking shorter showers
and the results were 92% were in fact taking shorter showers – people like to hold
consistent views
Attitudes may changer after behavior – one do something and you think about it, you may
have tension and then change behavior
How brainwashing works – start with a behavior and see an attitude chance automatically
so there is no dissonance – In the film The Manchurian Candidate, American soldiers are
brainwashed by the Korean soldiers using a psychological technique – no torture was
used – and a common technique used was having American soldiers, without cohersion,
write essays to why communism is a superior form of government – once done, these
soldiers often in fact did find communism superior to democracy
Defensive attribution – if we see something horrible that happens to someone else, we
may say that is was something that they did to bring it on (i.e., classic claim regarding
rape was that the “woman was asking for it” by doing something or wearing something
provocative) – this is the way we explain to ourselves the setbacks that befall other
people – an internal attribution – we do so as not to think it will happen to us – to say that
is was not random (which could happen to us) – by blaming the victim
Self Perception Theory
Sometimes people look at themselves and try to figure out why they did something – here
attitude comes after behavior – If I did this then it must mean that this is my attitude…
Foot-in-the-Door – a technique used to change peoples’ behavior – articles written to
prove that it works – the original study asked houses randomly in a community to sign a
petition in favor of safe driving (something simple that everyone believes in, even if they
are not interested in it) and then come back later and ask for something larger such as
placing a sign in their yard for safe driving – it was found that among the group who
signed the petition more were willing to allow the sign than those not asked on the first
round – the reason? Once you do something small, your brain starts working – Why did I
sign this? It must be because I believe in this.
Door-in-Face – the opposite technique – ask or something monstrous and the door gets
closed in your face but then come back and ask for something stronger and often the
person will have thought about it and agree to the smaller request
Attribution – internal and external
Internal:
a. more consistency over time
b. more consistency over modality
c. lower degree of consensus
d. greater degree of perceived decision freedom
e. higher the perceived behavioral desirability
How we test our attributes:
1.distinctiveness – this only happens when certain person are there – that is, these
people cause the misfortune so you attribute your misfortune to these people; it is
distinct in that this is the only time such and such happens
2. consistency over time – every time we see something happen, there is
something consistent that happens – such as, using a certain product and always
get sick so you say it is due to the product, or food or season etc.
3. consistency over modality – if you offer your friend sushi and each time they
decline, you eventually will decide that thi person does not like sushi but this is
not necessarily so
4. consensus – if fail, due to an attribution – blame self but if everyone fail, then it
is the teacher’s fault
5. perceived decision freedom – think have lots of choices, such as a celebrity
who chooses to endorse a particular product – you perceive that they can endorse
lots of product yet selected this one
6. perceived behavioral desirability – a foot of snow yet you make it to class –
you think this says that you like the course to the professor
Over justification effects – in studies have 2 groups of children do things that they like to
do – then have one group rewarded for having done so and the other not rewarded –
several weeks later who is more likely to do the work without a reward? Clearly the
group ho was not rewarded the first time – when given a reward, the mind will say “who
do this without a reward? “
It is dangerous to reward people for doing things that they would normally do – the brain
may begin to expect rewards for work = over justification. Don’t always reward. In
marketing when premiums, prizes or gifts are continually given (cereals, Cracker Jacks)
then the brain says “don’t buy” unless the expected prize is there
One application of attribution theory:
Why do this? Because of the reward – but would have done it anyway
Other findings from attribution theory: if brand claims superiority on all attributes then
people will think that this is too good to be true – it is better to “disclaim superiority” on
one or two attributes – this makes a better ad
The same theory holds when a celebrity endorses too many products – their credibility
goes down – vs. when they just endorse one product and they seem more sincere and
believable.