Consumer behavior is the process behind acquiring goods, psychologically as well as socially. To gain a better understanding of the underlying mechanisms of consumer behavior we will first look at categorization and functions of goods.
First of all we categorize goods according to their required level of involvement. Goods that we buy with low involvement are usually used on a regular or even daily basis like toilet paper or milk. We purchase them automatically, with little information search or deliberation. High involvement goods are those that are infrequently bought and usually very expensive, like cars, laptops or houses. We gather a great deal of information and seek advice before making a purchase.
A second categorization which also lies on a continuum is thinking vs. feeling. On a continuum means that on one end we find the category of thinking and on the other the category of feeling. Therefore these two terms are not two independent categories, but dimensional.
“Think” products are mainly bought for their utilitarian function, their performance, reliability and quality are the main criteria for our decision upon them. They serve the utilitarian function of goods.
To purchase “feel” products we want them to fit our personal preferences and even our self-image. Taste, flavor and design are the criteria we look at. These feeling products serve the self - or value expressive and identity function of goods. It is called conspicuous consumption if we use certain goods to tell the world something about our personality, how we see ourselves and our wealth. We prefer goods that are congruent with our self-image (I feel snobby, I wear Burberry; I am an activist, I buy green products). By this we use goods not only to reflect our identity but also to build it.
This surplus meaning of a good may even just stem from the brand it was merchandised by since brands can adapt human characteristics. This brand personality is influenced by advertisements as well as our personal experience we made with people using that particular brand. So we choose also certain brands to reflect as well as to build that kind of person we desire to be.
A third distinction is made between well-planned and impulsive purchase. Impulsive buying occurs without much thinking, often following a sudden and powerful urge to do so. We forget about any pre-shopping intentions or consequences and narrow our attention down to that specific moment in which we feel the strong need to buy that certain product. This buying style contributes to 62% of all supermarket sales.
In the next section we will look at social psychological theories that may help us to explain and understand the phenomena we have just encountered.
Theory of Planned Behavior
One of the most influential theories in social psychology is the “Theory of Planned Behavior” (TPB) which assumes that deliberate actions are preceded by the intention to perform it. It states three determinants of people’s behavioral intentions, namely Attitudes, Subjective norms, Perceived Behavioural control.
Attitudes reflect the positive or negative evaluation people hold about a specific behavior (e.g. It is wrong to litter in public places). Subjective norms are what we think others wants us to do or not to do. Perceived behavioral control reflects if a person believes that he or she actually has control over the target behavior (Can I improve my grade by studying or is my intelligence that low that it does not make a difference?).
The Theory of Planned Behavior assumes that all these presented determinants are influenced by subtle environmental factors. That way they are dynamic and can change over time and situation (e.g. by moving to a different country).
Extension of the Theory of Planned Behavior
By adding identity similarity as a fourth determinant of intentions the explained variance of the Theory of Planned Behavior improves by 12%. Identity similarity is how a person perceives a specific behavior to be consistent with his or her own self-concept.
Theories on impulse buying
Other theories focus on impulsive buying, which means to purchase a product impulsively without a lot of thinking. One of the major causes of impulsive buying are for instance self-control dilemmas. These occur if an action like go for a run will be rewarded at some point in time in the distant future by losing weight, is conflicting with a more immediate reward (e.g. the relaxation from laying on the couch). In such a situation we have goal conflict since two different goals are competing with each other leading to a self-control dilemma. In such a situation we need to have high self-control to actually go for a run, or resist the temptation of fatty food.
Self-control is used for adjusting our behavior according to our personal goals. So we do not buy chocolate if our personal goal is to lose weight. In general it is more difficult to resist a hedonic experience if it is more accessible (as food is in supermarkets or when we pass a fast-food restaurant).
If our self-control is high due to motivation for instance, explicit measures of attitudes are better predictors of our actual behavior as they are influenced by what we think about the potential negative consequences our behavior might have.
If on the other hand our self-control is depleted for some reason as for example by high cognitive demands or due to alcohol consumption, implicit measures of attitudes are better predictors of behavior since they are a direct reflection of the wanted hedonic experience.
To sum it up, people’s goals and their intentions to reach them are determined by their ever changing attitudes, subjective norms and perceived behavioral control. How salient each predictor is depends on the person as well as the situation.
Advertising operates on three distinct routes: The cognitive route, the affective route and the subliminal route. In the following section we will elaborate on these.
The cognitive route
The first one is the cognitive route which works through persuasion (the use of persuasive arguments to change beliefs, attitudes and behavior). How well this works depends, according to the Information Processing Model on two processes. The first process is reception, in which the listener has to pay attention to and understand the presented arguments. The second process is yielding, in which the listener has to believe or accept the presented arguments.
Another theory dealing with the same topic is the Cognitive Response Theory. It claims that the cognitive responses are either counter or in support of the presented arguments and that the valence of these thoughts is critical for attitude change.
Dual-Process Theories of Persuasion claim that both a person’s processing motivation and ability are crucial for the adaption of the presented arguments. Advertisements should therefore be attuned to the different processing styles consumers have.
In addition for an advertisement to be effective its message should always be congruent with its function. So advertisements for feeling goods should have a value-expressive message, whereas advertisements for thinking goods should stick to utilitarian messages.
Many advertisements rely on heuristic processing, which is a rule of thumb we use to decide for the validity of an argument. An example would be that we rather believe in medical advice given from a doctor than given from a salesperson.
Have you ever asked yourself why some shops offer you a free drink or chocolate as soon as you enter? The answer is that it is actually a smart sale strategy using our inner rule of reciprocity to enhance their sales. The rule of reciprocity gives us the feeling that we should return any kind of favor. Offering a free drink to us may therefore result in a purchase we feel obliged to make.
The affective route
The second route used is the affective route which works with evaluative conditioning. Evaluative conditioning works by altering our affective response to an attitude or object without any cognition involved. This is done for example by playing lovely music or showing happy people in a television commercial. In the long run we transfer the valence, which is the emotional value (e.g. happiness) we have for a specific stimulus like lovely music, onto the simultaneously presented brand or product. So from now on we feel happy when encountering that product, even when there is no lovely music playing.
This process is based on Pavlovian or Classical Conditioning. In Pavlov’s well known experiment with his dog, he presented a neutral stimulus, a tone right before giving his dog food. After this has been done a couple of times the dog started to salivate when hearing the tone even if no food was presented to him.
The subliminal route
The third route is the subliminal route. Subliminal means that information is presented so shortly that we are not even aware of encountering it. For example showing very briefly pictures of specific brands or products while a movie is playing. It is clear by now that subliminal does not work as a brainwash, but it can indeed make a brand more cognitively accessible, if the following is given:
The target person is in need for the product and
The target person was not familiar with the brand before.
Conclusion
It became clear that we not solely buy goods because of their utilitarian function but also because we want to express parts of our identity by buying and possessing them. This is especially true for feeling rather than thinking goods.
We can also distinct between purchases of goods which are planned well ahead in time and those we buy spontaneously, maybe only based on an impulse. We have been looking at theories for both kinds of buying and found out about determinants that can predict our behavior.
In the last part we have been looking at advertisements and gained an understanding about how they use different routes to influence us. We also learned about strategies that are often used by salespersons to influence us in our decision to make a purchase.
