Involvement, Values and Attitudes

We had an interesting group work on Friday. Ruth asked us to consider the likely level of involvement of a) a 21 year old and b) a 46 year old buying a car, mobile phone and underwear. The table below shows how we did this exercise.

We were talking about values as well.

Value is an abstract and complex construct that can provide underlying continuity to behavior (Pitts and Woodside 1984)

"Values may prove to be one of the most powerful explanations of, and influences on, consumer behavior. They can perhaps equal or surpass the contributions of other major constructs including attitudes, product attributes, degrees of deliberating, product classification, and life style
Therefore, the consumption of a product can express or fulfill a certain value.
Consumers' preferences for certain values are likely to be expressed through consumption."

For example, certain products and activities may be preferred by a person who values excitement (e.g.fast cars). On the other hand, a person placing security as very important would be likely to have a different set of preferred products and activities (e.g.an airbag in their car). Researchers have suggested that we need "a better understanding of the links between values and behaviours, and special consideration of how values interact with situations"(Beatty et al. 1985).

To study consumption related values, Kahle (1983) modified the Rokeach Value Survey (RVS) into a smaller subset of values that were person oriented and generalizable across many activities. The List of Values (LOV) includes:

•sense of belonging
•excitement
•fun and enjoyment
•warm relationships with others
•self fulfillment
•being well respected
•a sense of accomplishment
•security
•self respect

Ruth asked about our values. Most of the group said: fun and enjoyment or family but foreign students consider security and sense of belonging as the most important values.

There are several interesting parallels between emotions and values. Psychologists (Tolman 1951; Izard 1977)agree that both emotions and values play an extremely important role in behavior.

Values are central beliefs expressed through specific behaviors (Rokeach 1973) and emotions are feelings linked to specific behaviors (Gardner 1985).

More about values: http://www.gentleye.com/research/cb/acr/acr1993.html

As it turned out, laddering techniqes are also very important in our life.

Laddering techniques enable us to identify the links between functional product attributes & desired end states

Laddering is used within two streams of research: Consumer research and organization research
•Consumer research to elicit consumers’ preferences towards certain products or services.
•Consumers’ preferences are categorized into three dimensions:
–Attributes of a product/service
–Consequences
–Values

To find out more about laddering techniques just read this article: http://www.epistemics.co.uk/Notes/178-0-0.htm

During the lecture, Ruth asked us to do 2 tests.
According to Harvard project test I have an automatic association between men and exact sciences and women and humanities. I did also another test. As I found out I have an automatic preference for slim people in comparison with overweight people. I hope it's a mistake because I know that discrimination against weightism is very unfortunate and people should be respected based on who we are and not how we look.

I did also the second test.

My primary VALS type is Achiever, and my secondary type is Experiencer.
The primary VALS type represents my dominant approach to life. The secondary classification represents a particular emphasis I give to my dominant approach.

According to online Dictionary achiever is “a person with a record of successes.”

The value of achievement lies in the achieving.
Albert Einstein

We were also asked to prepare our own TimeLine with the key events that made an impact on us. I divided it into events important to me and my country.

Key events for Poland:
•Barack Obama - President of the United States - 2009
•Poland in Schengen zone - 2007
•Lech Kaczyński – President of Poland - 2005
•Polish Pope’s death- 2005
•Poland in UE - 2004
•Adam Małysz – world’s champion in ski jumping - 2001
•WTC- terrorists attack, 2001
•Poland in NATO 1999
•Diana’s death - 1997
•Aleksander Kwaśniewski –President of Poland – 1995



Key events of my life:
•Studying time! - Bucks New University - 2008
•Mature exam - 2008
•The title of the student of the year at the end of the High School- 2008
•Driving licence – 2008
•My 18th birthday - 2008
•The last competition :( - 2007
•Buying my lovely dog - 2007
•Singing during the review of young talent - 2007
•Champion in the school dancing marathon - 2007
•First Certificate in English - 2007
•First earned money – 2006
•High school - 2005
•First date with my present boyfriend :) - 2005
•Best life result in the long jump (5,39m) - 2004
•2nd place in the Junior Championships of province in the long jump – 2002
•Champion of town and region in my leading sports disciplines (the long jump, the 100 meters sprint and the 4 x 100m relay race) - 2002
•Grandma's death - 2002
•First light athletics competition - 1999
•Sister’s birth - 1993

Gift Giving & Consumer behaviour

Gift-giving is an important tradition, especialy for marketers. Christmas accounts for nearly 40% of all gifts bought in the UK during the year and remains by far the main gifting occasion.

Our involvement in gifts buying depends on what we are going to buy. A customer's approach to purchasing a product or service is influenced by their situation - whether they have money and how important, frequent, risky or urgent the purchase is to them in their situation.

Customers make more of an effort, and become more involved, if the purchase is relatively important to them - particularly if they have no previous experience of buying such a product or service.
On the other hand, if the item being purchased is low value and frequently bought, like a jar of coffee, it follows that the buyer will spend less time and effort and will have less involvement with the purchase.
These frequent, inexpensive purchases generally have little risk, and require less information. These kind of purchase situations are referred to as 'Low Involvement Purchases'. In these situations, consumers can fall into a routine purchasing pattern which requires little thought and even less effort.

Alternatively, an expensive high risk infrequent purchase like your first computer will require a lot of detailed information and careful analysis before deciding which machine. This is called 'High Involvement'. Here the consumer goes through an extensive problem solving process - searching and collecting information, evaluating it and eventually deciding on a particular choice.
There is a third type of buying situation. This is where the customer has had some experience of buying a particular type of product or service before. There is less risk attached and less information is required. This is called 'Limited Problem Solving'.

If you would like to find out more about this topic-take a look on this page: http://www.multimediamarketing.com/mkc/buyerbehaviour/

According to Laurent & Kapferer (1985) consumer’s level of involvement will be affected by four components:
1.Importance & risk (FTPEPS)
*Finance
*Time
*Performance
*Ego
*Physical
*Social
2.Probability of making a bad purchase
3.Pleasure value of product category
4.Sign value of product category

There are also four levels of involvement:


High involvement think-feel-do

Low involvement think-do-feel

Experiential/impulse feel-do-think

Behavioural influence do-think-feel


"Think-feel-do" model:






I read some articles from WARC about this topic and I think I foud some interesting things:

"The buyer can often feel unsure or distrustful of a new provider and a new product which will involve them changing the way they do things and learning new things. They need assurance about the provider and product. In these high-involvement purchase markets the buyer initially is driven by the need to learn first, so they can evaluate based on sound information and feel assured, before they become comfortable to complete (do) a buying transaction. Buyers will be reluctant to get involved with a brand (personality) that is not engaging, attractive and credible."

"Gift shopping is the ultimate in 'emotional consumerism', since gift giving is all about emotionally connecting giver and recipient. Whenever consumer shopping behaviour is driven by emotion, the shopper's goal is to buy a thing to achieve a special feeling, enhance an emotional experience or deepen an emotional reaction. In other words, the gift itself (the noun) is the means to an end to strengthen the emotional connection between individuals. The challenge for retailers and marketers is how to enhance the 'gifting' experience."

Store choice for gifts is controlled by the left brain, but gift selection is right-brain dominated.
Givers use different criteria when choosing a store to shop for a gift and what to buy once they are there. They select the store based on rational, left-brain factors, such as where they will find the best prices, while they select the gift primarily on emotional, right-brain factors.

I think that these graphs are really interesting:

GIFT ATTRIBUTES RATED 'VERY IMPORTANT'



TRENDS IN GIFT SPENDING




What's more...
"Men are only significantly involved in a few gifting occasions, such as Mother's Day, Valentine's Day and anniversaries. Consequently, the main recipients of male gifts tend to be their partners and mothers. There are still barriers in the British consumer's psyche about malemale to gifting and, hence, it remains very small. The good news for women is that men tend to spend significantly more on individual gifts (31.04 versus 19.04 for women). The categories in which the share of male purchasing is highest are: music, computer hardware and software, flowers, household personal items, and videos and DVDs.
Women tend to be in charge of most of the household gifting, ranging from presents for children and family relatives to those for schoolteachers. Therefore, not surprisingly, women buy 65% of all gifts. This proportion is even higher for specific occasions such as christenings, newborn babies, housewarmings and birthdays. In addition to this, femaletofemale (friend) gifting is also a key dynamic, accounting for more than one in ten gifts bought by women."



Farther reading about Consumer Behavior:
http://smib.vuw.ac.nz:8081/WWW/ANZMAC2001/anzmac/AUTHORS/pdfs/Quester1.pdf
http://proactive.sis.pitt.edu/suleehs/Journal/paper5.pdf

Heuristics, Memory and Nostalgia

Research suggests that customers go through a five-stage decision-making process in any purchase. This is summarised in the diagram below:



"For example, a student buying a favourite hamburger would recognise the need (hunger) and go right to the purchase decision, skipping information search and evaluation. However, the model is very useful when it comes to understanding any purchase that requires some thought and deliberation".

A customer can obtain information from several sources:
• Personal sources: family, friends, neighbours etc
• Commercial sources: advertising; salespeople; retailers; dealers; packaging; point-of-sale displays
• Public sources: newspapers, radio, television, consumer organisations; specialist magazines
• Experiential sources: handling, examining, using the product

"An important determinant of the extent of evaluation is whether the customer feels “involved” in the product. By involvement, we mean the degree of perceived relevance and personal importance that accompanies the choice.
Where a purchase is “highly involving”, the customer is likely to carry out extensive evaluation.
High-involvement purchases include those involving high expenditure or personal risk – for example buying a house, a car or making investments.
Low involvement purchases (e.g. buying a soft drink, choosing some breakfast cereals in the supermarket) have very simple evaluation processes".

An example from our lecture:



We were talking about Heuristic as well.
According to Encyclopedia: "
Heuristic (hyu-ˈris-tik) is an adjective for methods that help in problem solving in turn leading to learning and discovery. In psychology, heuristics are simple, efficient rules, hard-coded by evolutionary processes or learned, which have been proposed to explain how people make decisions, come to judgments, and solve problems, typically when facing complex problems or incomplete information".

For example, people may tend to perceive more expensive beers as tasting better than inexpensive ones (providing the two beers are of similar initial quality or lack of quality and of similar style). This finding holds true even when prices and brands are switched; putting the high price on the normally relatively inexpensive brand is enough to lead subjects to perceive it as tasting better than the beer that is normally more expensive.

Fast and frugal heuristics meet the criteria set forth in Goldstein & Gigerenzer, 2004. Fast and frugal heuristics are rules of thumb for decision making that are:
1. ecologically rational (that is, they exploit structures of information in the environment)
2. founded in evolved psychological capacities such as memory and the perceptual system
3. fast, frugal, and simple enough to operate effectively when time, knowledge, and computational might are limited
4. precise enough to be modeled computationally
5. powerful enough to model both good and poor reasoning.




“Every time an advertisement or commercial appears, the objective is to have the reader or viewer learn something …. and remember what he learned “ (Britt 1955)

In psychology, memory is an organism's mental ability to store, retain and recall information. A basic and generally accepted classification of memory is based on the duration of memory retention, and identifies three distinct types of memory: sensory memory, short term memory and long term memory. Sensory memory corresponds approximately to the initial 200 - 500 milliseconds after an item is perceived. Short-term memory allows one to recall something from several seconds to as long as a minute without rehearsal. By contrast, long-term memory can store much larger quantities of information for potentially unlimited duration".

The multi-store model (also known as Atkinson-Shiffrin memory model) was first recognised in 1968 by Atkinson and Shiffrin.



We did a very interesting experiment during Friday's lecture. We had to remember as many products from the shopping list as it was possible and match each item with a specific thing, for example matches and shoe. In other words, we had to use our imagination:) It was much easier to remember this list than a normal one. It explains how do people react for conditioned and unconditioned stimulus.

Conditioned stimulus are often being used in marketing. After watching some adverts, we easily relate for example Lipton tea with a family or Nike with sport and many achievements.

Later, we were talking about nostalgia.
The term nostalgia describes "a longing for the past, often in idealized form. The word is made up of two Greek roots (νόστος nostos "returning home", and άλγος algos "pain"), to refer to "the pain a sick person feels because he wishes to return to his native home, and fears never to see it again". It was described as a medical condition, a form of melancholy, in the Early Modern period, and came to be an important topic in Romanticism".



Pepsi Cola Around The Globe - one of our most popular nostalgia card sets.

Like Ruth said: "Advertisers try to use nostalgic themes such that consumers LINK the happiness/good feelings they had at that time to the product that they are trying to sell".

And these are mine nostalgic memories... :)



Here are some articles which I have used in my post:
http://fastandfrugal.com
http://psychology.about.com/od/cindex/g/condstim.htm
http://tutor2u.net/business/marketing/buying_decision_process.asp